Tell the truest history in the simplest words.
The expansion of capitalism must be bloody, and the development of capitalism is even less likely to stand still. Therefore, when Columbus discovered the "New World", when the European capitalists expanded their sphere of influence, some backward places became colonies, and some rich places became what they saw as "fragrant food".
Peter I
At the beginning of the 18th century, the Russian Tsar Peter I desperately expanded outward in order to collect large quantities of gold. In 1714, gagarin, the governor of Siberia, reported to the Tsar that according to the information he had sent, there were large amounts of gold in the Yarkand River valley in China, in the lesser Bukhara (present-day Kashgar region of Xinjiang), and in the Kalmyk Khanate. This intelligence attracted the great attention of the Tsarist government, which began an "expedition" to Find Gold in Xinjiang and Tibetan areas of China.
Gagarin's report is actually based on a man who traveled to China as a Siberian nobleman. The man, named Trusnikov, set out in 1713 from Tobolsk, the capital of Siberia, all the way to the vicinity of Lake Akyap, returning in 1714.
He returned with 200 taels of gold, which he said had been purchased from the Han chinese at the mining site, and that the gold was powdered sand in a leather bag. When Governor Gagarin received the sands, he presented them to the Tsar for verification, and Peter I ordered the gold powder to be melted and cast into gold ingots for use, leaving 925 grams as samples to be kept in the treasure collection of the palace.
Although some in Russia were later skeptical of Trusnikov's account, and the governor of Gagarin, who reported the news, was arrested and imprisoned by the Tsar for false reports and rebellious behavior. However, Tsar Peter I still decided to investigate the news further and turned his attention to Tibet, and on January 31, 1721 (the third day of the first month of the 60th year of the Qing Kangxi Dynasty), Peter I issued a directive to the Russian Privy Council:
Trade with Chinese cities such as Xining and Taba also established trade relations with the Dalai Lama's station. Such trade was not for profit, but to communicate with the merchants while sending shrewd men to their merchants to study the question of gold. That is, where it came from, how many reserves and what the route was; if it wanted to get there, whether it was difficult, whether it could be taken over the place. - "The Russian Invasion of Tibet"
The Tsar's "seizure of this place" can be seen as "occupation of this place". Russia's ambitions to seize the gold resources of Tibetan areas in China were exposed here. Prior to this, between 1715 and 1716, Tsarist Russia had sent troops to attempt to conquer the Dzungars, but suffered heavy losses at Yamchevskaya.
In 1717, the Dzungars invaded Tibet to kill Lhazang Khan, and under the conquest of the Three Roads Army sent by Kangxi, the Dzungars were expelled from Tibet in 1720, and after peter I's violent death in 1725, his plan to explore and seize the gold mines in Tibetan areas was also ruined.
By the 19th century, the competition between Britain and Russia for interests in Asia was intensifying. In 1864, Prince Gochakov, minister of the Russian Empire, publicly declared that the need for Russian security was the annexation of the Khanate of West Turkestan into Russia, which would expand its power to the Pamirs by the end of the century.
To this end, Russian explorers began to carry out frequent "expeditions" to western China. The famous Prjewalski and his expeditions have conducted four "expeditions" in Xinjiang, Gansu, Qinghai and northern Tibet in China, in which they deliberately collected information on the products of these areas, including gold mines.
Gold ore
Notably, Russia also financed expeditions to gather intelligence on the gold mines in Tibetan areas from other sources. The Swedish explorer Sven Hedin, during his second (1899) expedition to Tibet, had already made secret contact with Russia to survey known gold mining sites in Tibet.
In November 1902, a Russian named von Grote openly applied to the Chinese government for permission to extend the trans-Siberian railway to Tibet in order to make Tibet's gold exports more economically efficient. - History of Tibetan Exploration
While russian "explorers" searched for Tibetan gold, the British also stepped up their covetousness for Tibet. The East India Company, which was the vanguard of the British Empire's invasion of Asia, developed a "great interest" in Tibet's mineral resources and markets. The Anglo-Indian governor of Bengal, Hastings, actively promoted a "policy of adventurism" toward Tibet.
gold mine
In the mid-19th century, the British were more eager than ever to understand the topography of Tibet in order to preemptively control the area around the Himalayas before Russia. But the opposition of China's Qing Dynasty and the resistance of the Tibetan people made the Anglo-Indian authorities feel that it was really difficult to send white-skinned British into Tibet. So it was decided to set up a special training school nearby to train a group of local indigenous people as spies.
These people, known as "Banzhida" by the locals, grew up in the Himalayas and had the physical strength to travel in the mountains and the special ability to adapt to the environment, so they soon became the eyes and ears of the British and Indians.
With their "help", the rulers of Tsarist Russia, Britain and India recognized Tibet and coveted tibet's rich gold mines. Knowing this history, we can understand why the modern imperialists have launched frequent aggression against Tibet, because they are coveting the rich resources of tibet, including gold.
However, the imperialist aggression against Tibet also directly led to the development of gold in Tibetan areas at the end of the Qing Dynasty. After the Opium War, imperialism stepped up its partition and plunder of China. In 1888 and 1904, the British sent troops to invade Tibet twice; Tsarist Russia also took the opportunity to fan the flames at the side of the Dalai Lama.
At the same time that "Britain and Russia were looking at each other and spying on Tibet," the Qing government "thought that Guchuan was a plan to preserve tibet, and at the same time adopted Cen Chunxuan's suggestion of "coordinating the overall situation in the northwest" to develop the Qinggan Tibetan area. To put it bluntly, the purpose of the Qing government's move was to resist imperialist aggression and strive to unearth local gold for its own use.