"Military And Military Sub-Plane" author: Fireworks In the human world
With the take-off and rise of the new Chinese economy, we play an increasingly important role in the international arena, and we also play the image of a responsible big country in the international family.
At present, 180 countries in the world have established friendly diplomatic relations with us, and within the Scope of Asia, 46 countries have established diplomatic relations with China.
However, there is such an Asian country, which is the only one that does not demarcate its borders with China and does not establish diplomatic relations with china. Not only that, this country does not even have the United States, Russia, several world powers it is not a care, this "cow*" country is - Bhutan.
The full name of Bhutan is called the Kingdom of Bhutan, our Great Qing Kingdom has been dead for more than a hundred years, it is still called the Kingdom, so where is this Kingdom?
After opening the map and finding our great motherland, look in the direction of Tibet, you have looked carefully, the time has come to test your eyesight, it is between China and India, on the southern slope of the Himalayas. The land area is only 38,000 square kilometers, which is about the same as our Hainan Island, with a population of about 750,000, which is one of the smallest countries in Asia.
Location of Bhutan (image from standard map service)
Although Bhutan has not established diplomatic relations with China now, in history, Bhutan's relations with China can really be called "cut and straightened out."
The earliest reference to the Bhutan region appears during the Songtsen Gampo period of the Tubo Dynasty, when Bhutan, along with southern Tibet, was collectively referred to as the "Gate Corner".
In the 7th century, the Tubo Dynasty built the Chomba Temple in the Bumtang River Valley in central Bhutan, and the Kechu Temple in the Paro River Valley in western Bhutan. After the construction of the monasteries, the army was stationed, so the establishment of these two monasteries not only represented the religious rule of the Tubo Dynasty over Bhutan, but also showed its military rule.
Later, with the collapse of the Tubo Dynasty, a large number of Tibetan monks fled to Bhutan, among which the Kagyu school of Tibetan Buddhism formed an alliance with some local tribal leaders and nobles in Bhutan, and gradually became a sect that held secular power, in this process, Tibetan Buddhism had a profound impact on Bhutan, to this day, Bhutanese people's living customs, language and culture are still very similar to the Tibetan people.
In 1271, Kublai Khan, the ancestor of the Yuan dynasty, established the Yuan Dynasty, and the Tibetan region was also included in the territory of the Yuan Dynasty, becoming part of the unified multi-ethnic Yuan Empire, and after Tibet was incorporated into the Yuan Dynasty, Bhutan also became part of Chinese territory.
Therefore, Chinese culture has also influenced Bhutan a lot, which can be seen from the "Chinese dragon element" on the flag of Bhutan.
▲Flag of Bhutan
In 1616, a conflict arose within the main Bhagavan sect of Tibet over the reincarnation of the "Bamboo Chin Living Buddha", which soon developed into a struggle in which the abbot of The Relong Monastery, Ngawang Namgye, was forced to flee south in defeat and fled to this part of Bhutan (the Qing Dynasty called Bhutan a Burubak).
When Ngawang arrived, he quickly gained the support of the local lord, the Bhagavan, and he began to use the power of religion to gradually unify Bhutan, which had been in a state of partition for a long time, and in 1637 he completely controlled the Bhutan region, which was the prototype of the modern Bhutanese kingdom.
After Ngawang Namgye unified Bhutan, he began to govern Bhutan in the same way as Tibet, and he himself became the highest political and religious authority, calling himself "Xia Zhong", which means "Foot, Your Excellency". After he became the boss, he appointed his close attendant as the second in command, becoming the eighth or fourth, responsible for handling the administrative affairs of the whole country.
▲ Awang Nanjie
In 1651, Ngawang Namgye died, and the long-accumulated contradictions between the monks and secular groups within Bhutan broke out, and Bhutan fell into chaos. Since then, Bhutan has entered an era of dualism in which the secular leader King Deb and the monastic leader King Dharma jointly rule the country.
In 1730, Bhutan's tenth Debu king, Mipan Wangbu, clashed with the leader of western Bhutan, Gabi Dunzhu, and as a result, Kabi Dunzhu overestimated his own strength and was not a rival of Mipan Wangbu at all.
At that time, Tibet was already in the territory of the Qing Dynasty, and after receiving the "sos" from the neighbor LaoGa, the Qing Dynasty minister in Tibet, Ma La, and the Tibetan king Po Luo Nai immediately sent troops to intervene in Bhutan's internal conflict, and soon quelled the civil unrest.
After the civil unrest was settled, both sides of the conflict sent emissaries to the Qing Dynasty, hoping to gain the approval and support of the Qing Dynasty. The Reigning Yongzheng Emperor at that time was also "difficult for a Qing official to break the family affairs", so on the one hand he gave Mipan Wangbu the title of "Erdenidipa" and on the other hand, he gave The title of "Gabiton Rob who is in charge of affairs", and awarded the seal letter and the edict respectively, and neither of you should toss around. Since then, all debu kings in Bhutan have to obtain Qing dynasty canonizations according to the regulations.
Just when the Bhutanese were about to live in peace and security, the British came again.
Since the 17th century, the British established the East India Company and began to carry out colonial expansion in the South Asian subcontinent. In 1772, the Governor of the East India Company in Bengal sent troops to attack southern Bhutan, and the Bhutanese army was gradually defeated, and soon the British army occupied several parts of Bhutan. The Bhutanese side hurried to Tibet for help, and the 6th Panchen Lama of Tibet immediately wrote a letter to the governor.
Upon receipt of the letter, the Governor immediately ceased his continued offensive against Bhutan. Of course, it was not persuaded by this letter, because the ultimate goal of the British was Tibet, and since the current conditions were not ripe, the steps were given.
After the Opium War, the British began to accelerate their invasion of Bhutan. In 1864, the Anglo-British War broke out, and Bhutan fought back against the British and Indian armies, but due to the difference in strength, it was eventually defeated. In November 1865, the British forced Bhutan to sign the Treaty of Sinchura, which not only ceded 2,000 square kilometers of land, but also forced to open the border crossing, and became a British colony.
At the time of signing this treaty, tibet or the Great Qing Dynasty were completely unaware, and when Tibet and the Great Qing Dynasty learned about it afterwards, they dared not let go.
▲ The picture shows the British army attacking Dewangiri in southeastern Bhutan
By the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, as the British Empire's control over the South Asian subcontinent had weakened, the national independence movement in Bhutan was also in full swing, and eventually returned to independence and unification under the leadership of the macho Uyan Wangchuk.
In 1907, he abolished Bhutan's last King Bu and established the Kingdom of Bhutan. His own combination of political and religious power and hereditary succession to the throne of the king made the Bhutan region a centralized state, and Uyan Wangchuk is considered the founder of the modern kingdom of Bhutan.
Uyan Wangchuk
In fact, Bhutan has not given up its illusions about Tibet and the Great Qing Dynasty, and they have always hoped that the Great Qing can mediate and give Bhutan a chance to survive in the cracks.
But then the Bhutanese finally understood that they could not count on the Great Qing Dynasty, so they began to move closer to the British, and on January 8, 1910, the two sides re-amended the previous treaty of Sinchura and signed the Treaty of Punaka, which stipulated that the Kingdom of Bhutan was subject to British "guidance" in its foreign relations.
Nominally called guidance, to put it bluntly, all diplomatic activities in the Kingdom of Bhutan must be completely listened to by Britain, and in the future, who you want to establish diplomatic relations with, what kind of foreign policy you want to determine, how you want to carry out commercial exchanges, etc., all depends on the mood of Britain.
It was then that not only strange foreign relations began to emerge.
After the end of the Second World War, the world pattern has undergone earth-shaking changes, Britain is no longer the same day that does not set, with the decline of international status, the former colonial rule has also collapsed, and the South Asian subcontinent is among them.
India's independence on August 15, 1947, ended centuries of British rule in India, and centuries of colonization turned the formerly fragmented India into the ruler of the South Asian continent.
The kingdom of Bhutan, which is close to India, was miserable, and just sent away John and ushered in the third brother. In August 1949, India signed a "Permanent Treaty of Peace and Friendship" with Bhutan, which stipulated that India would inherit the british right to continue to provide "diplomatic guidance" to Bhutan, and Bhutan could only be restricted to India as it had been to Britain, and this situation continues to this day.
At this point, you may wonder why Britain and India have to guide Bhutan's diplomacy. Is Bhutan itself not diplomatic?
Of course not, this brings us to the meaning behind "guiding diplomacy."
This brings us back to 1648, a year in which a historic event took place, namely, the official end of the Thirty Years' War in Europe.
Prior to this, the Habsburgs of Spain, the Holy Roman Empire, the Habsburgs of Austria, and the princely states of France, Sweden, and Bavaria found that they had been fighting each other for thirty years without solving any problems.
So the tired people sat together for a meeting, known as the "Westphalian Peace Conference", which is considered to be the earliest international conference in European history. The final result of the conference was the signing of a "Westphalian Treaty", which contained many contents, the most important of which was that the concept of sovereign state was widely recognized and accepted by the West, which is also one of the common norms in the world today.
Later, Napoleon Bonaparte declared himself emperor in France and exported revolution to Europe by way of war, and these feudal monarchs in Europe were afraid that one day the revolution would come to them, so they formed an anti-French alliance to resist France.
After Napoleon's defeat, the victorious European monarchs convened a new conference in Vienna, redefining the feudal order and state system of Europe. Relations between States have once again changed, and the diplomatic rights of States are considered a way of exercising State sovereignty, but not "completely inviolable sovereignty".
▲The picture shows the Vienna Conference
That is to say, if one country controls the diplomatic rights of another country, it means that the country can control the country to the greatest extent possible without infringing on the sovereignty of other countries.
Therefore, both Britain and India are happy to carry out so-called "diplomatic guidance" to Bhutan, called guidance, which is actually control.
Of course, there is no free lunch in the world, and "diplomatic guidance" is not in vain to listen to your blind guidance, and there will be some other additional provisions, such as the guidance country is responsible for the national defense and administrative expenses of the guided country. In 2007, India and Bhutan signed a new Treaty of Friendship between India, which stipulated that all expenses for the Bhutanese army, equipment and government employees would be borne by india.
So why would the third brother rather spend money than know, and what benefits can guide Bhutan bring to India?
First, Bhutan is located in the southern part of the eastern part of the Himalayas, between China and India, and is strategically as important as Nepal. At the same time, there is a "Siliguri Corridor" between Bhutan and the city of Siliguri in the north of India, which connects India's six northeastern states, and if India loses the "screen" of Bhutan, the security of the entire northeast of India may be threatened.
▲The picture shows the location of the Siliguri Corridor (image from the standard map service)
Second, since the demarcation of the border between Bhutan and China has always been controversial, and if China and India want to agree to resolve the border issue, the first thing is that the two countries must first establish formal diplomatic relations. Therefore, India controls Bhutan through "diplomatic guidance" so that it does not establish diplomatic relations with China, which can "plant mines" in China to a certain extent, and India can use Bhutan as an excuse to engage in "border disputes" with China at any time in the future.
Once China and Bhutan establish diplomatic relations, it is bound to strengthen exchanges between Bhutan and China, especially commodity trade exchanges, so that India's control over Bhutan will be weakened, and further down, it may undermine India's control over the entire eastern region.
It can be seen that although Bhutan is small and poor, its strategic significance is extraordinary, and the diplomatic relations between China and Bhutan are like a domino, which can bring about a chain reaction that affects the whole body.
Based on the above many factors, it is also clear that Why Notdan has not yet established diplomatic relations with china.
Of course, in addition to these external causes, there are also internal reasons for Bhutan itself.
As mentioned earlier, Bhutan has a close relationship with Tibet and Tibet, and the inheritance of Buddhism for hundreds of years has made nearly 80% of the people in Bhutan are loyal followers of Buddhism, and under the influence of religion, they pursue a life of "six pure roots, no desire and no desire", which is now very popular "Buddhism".
90% of the country's GDP from Buddhism to Bhutan is supported by agriculture and forestry, the degree of industrialization is extremely low, and natural resources are almost completely untapped.
Therefore, Bhutan also retains a large number of original scenery that is rare in the world, and its forest coverage rate is as high as 72%, which can be said to be a pleasant scenery and beautiful. As a result, it has become a tourist destination, and every year tourist enthusiasts from all over the world come to Bhutan.
▲ Bhutanese live comfortably
According to common sense, there are such good natural resources, give full play to it, engage in tourism, the people of the world come to you to play a circle, eat and stay and buy things, come and go, whether it is the national finance, or the pockets of the people, are not all bulging?
But people Bhutanese people do not think so, they feel that money is not earned, and the land and environment is more important than money ten million times, it is not cost-effective to exchange the environment for money, so Bhutan will limit the number of people entering Bhutan, up to 7500 people per year.
It wasn't until 1999 that Bhutan had a television, the last country in the world to have opened television and networks, mobile phone and Internet penetration was as low as 30% and 5%, and there was only one airport and no railways in the country.
▲Bhutan's only paro airport in the country
The backward economy and closed environment make not only the country's GDP only about 2.5 billion US dollars, this figure is not as good as a poor county in the western part of our country.
It is hard to imagine that in today's high-speed development society, there is such a place as Bhutan that is incompatible with modern society.
If you come to Bhutan, there are no high-rise buildings, no factories everywhere, no noisy vehicles, only the villages full of local atmosphere next to the green mountains and rivers, under the blue sky, cooking smoke rises, as if you are in a paradise.
▲ Bhutanese villages
In their eyes, being able to eat and wear warmth is the greatest happiness, and excessive pursuit of desire will only make them fall into the abyss and cannot extricate themselves.
So, even though Bhutan is one of the least developed countries in the world, its happiness index is one of the best in the world.
The desireless attitude to life made Bhutan a member of the Non-Aligned Movement very early, and even without India's "guidance", they were reluctant to deal with other countries. So far, Bhutan has only established diplomatic relations with 22 countries.
Since China and Non-Pakistan have not established formal diplomatic relations for a long time, the border dispute between the two countries has not been resolved, and the border between the two countries is about 600 kilometers long, and there are 6 border dispute areas. Since 1984, China has repeatedly tried to resolve the boundary dispute between China and China through negotiations, but the talks have not yielded results.
It was not until 1998 that China and Africa signed the Agreement on Maintaining Peace and Tranquility in the China-Africa Border Area, agreeing that until the boundary issue is resolved, the two countries will each side and not disturb each other. Therefore, at present, there is only a traditional customary line between China and the two countries.
▲The picture shows the disputed area between the central two countries
Although Bhutan has not established diplomatic relations with China, Bhutan's relations with China have always been good. In 1971, Bhutan voted in favour of restoring China's legitimate seat in the United Nations; after 1979, the leaders of the two countries exchanged congratulatory messages on National Day every year.
In the 2012 border talks, China and Pakistan also publicly mentioned the "establishment of diplomatic relations", but now that many years have passed, there has still not been much progress.
In 2021, things have turned around. On October 14 last year, after discussions and negotiations, China and Bhutan finally signed a memorandum of understanding on a "three-step" roadmap for accelerating negotiations on the central boundary.
▲Wu Jianghao, representative of the Chinese government and assistant minister of foreign affairs, signed the Memorandum of Understanding on Accelerating the "Three-Step" Roadmap for Accelerating the Central Boundary Negotiations in Beijing
The signing of the memorandum will speed up negotiations on the border issue between the two countries and lay a good foundation for the establishment of formal diplomatic relations between the two countries in the future.
It can also be seen that Bhutan is gradually trying to get rid of India, restore an independent foreign policy, and make unremitting efforts to safeguard and develop its own interests.