Talk:Treaty of friendship and alliance between the Government of Mongolia and Tibet

Untitled

Factuality of the Treaty

Was this Treaty really signed? Or fabricated after 1924? Everton 20:54, 24 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Does this mean Mongolia still recognises Tibet? Or is that last, enigmatic sentance saying that Mongolia changed its mind about that? Furius 09:06, 29 May 2005 (UTC)

The last sentence was quite unclear, but I believe it refered to the fact that the Republic of China rescinded the recognition of Mongolia - one can still see this from the published official maps of the Republic of China prior to 2003. I do not know the exact status of this treaty, as normally successor states inherit treaty obligations, but I note that it is exceedingly unlikely that the People's Republic of China would have diplomatic relations with a country that continues to recognise Tibet as an independent state.

The 13th Dalai Lama himself denied that he has authorized any representavie to negotiate (nor ratify) any treaty with Mongolia. Even if this treaty did exist, such Tibeto-Mongolian mutual recognition was meaningless as the status of the two parties was itself doubtful. Tibet was even willing to sign the 1914 Simla Agreement later which recognized China's suzerainty over Tibet and claimed, in its Appendix, that:

"Tibet forms part of Chinese territory".(Point 1, Note Exchange of the Simla Convention, 1914)

Furthermore, the Mongolian authority, at least formally, signed the Tripartite Treaty of 1915 with Kuomintang and Russia reaffirming Mongolia's subordination to China:

"Outer Mongolia recognizes China's suzerainty, China and Russia recognize the autonomy of Outer Mongolia forming part of Chinese territory".(Articles 2, Treaty of Kiakhta between China, Mongolia and Russia, 1915)

In Jan 1913, the Russian Foreign Minister, reported the signing of this treaty to the British Ambassador at St. Petersburg, saying the treaty, in his opinion, was not valid; it was nul et non avenu. - So the treaty was signed, wasn't it? Yaan 07:16, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Its just because the Buriat Monk got no officially-appointed atatus. Their seal and signatures were worthless with no binding effect. MainBody 07:06, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

But the thing was signed, it is just unclear whether this constitutes the conclusion of a valid teraty. Yaan (talk) 18:12, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Actually, Bell does express some scepticism of whether anything was signed (on p. 228f and arguably on p. 304), but he leaves the question open. Yaan (talk) 12:49, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

contract??

"and therefore about whether it constitutes a valid contract"

A treaty is not a contract in the ordinary sense of the word, and sub-national entities can conclude agreements falling short of international treaties. Should this be "international treaty" instead of "contract"? --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 08:37, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Possibly. I meant to separate the issues of "Was any treaty document signed" and "Was this treaty ever valid". The first has been put into question by Charles Bell in his 1924 book (but he never visited Mongolia, and also was not just an impartial observer on Tibetan affairs), but is probably solved now (?), the second question is probably more controversial. Yaan (talk) 11:36, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Claims by Prof. Elliot Sperling supported by an interview by Phayul, and an extensive lecture crcuit, indicate that the treaty has lain fallow in a Mongolian archive since last year, and is in fact valid.

http://www.phayul.com/news/article.aspx?article=Tibeto-Mongol+Treaty+of+1913%2C+a+proof+of+Tibet%E2%80%99s+independence%3A+Interview&id=23205 Pdxsays (Talk) 03:55, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

"An interview by Phayul, and an extensive lecture crcuit" do not "support" anything by themselves. We would need confirmation by independent researchers for that.

The surfacing of an originaly copy only proves existence of the treaty, which the article never denied.

Whether it was valid under national and intarnational law still remains very much in doubt. Sperling offers a strong opinion about the possible authorisation by the Dalai Lama, but no actual proof. Technically, a ratification from the Tibetan government would need to be presented to really put it in force. --Latebird (talk) 09:53, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

We could now add something like "Occasionally, the mere existence of the treaty has been put into doubt, but in 2007 an original copy surfaced from Mongolian archives". In fact, something like the first part of that sentence had been in the article until it was erased by an IP here. I think Elliot Sperling is independent enough - his employment is with the Indiana University, not with phayul - the question would be whether on WP, an interview is acceptable as a source for facts. Yaan (talk) 14:35, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

That's a good idea, and actually the only tidbit from the interview that isn't already in the article. While at it, I also fixed the incorrect statement that the found document was in Mongolian, because in the image it can be seen that it is in Tibetan instead. An interview should be a valid source, as long as the interviewee is an expert in the field and we can assume that his statements are reproduced accurately (no reason to doubt that here). --Latebird (talk) 15:18, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Graaah! I just noticed that the Academy of Sciences is supposed to have published something in 1982 already. Was that an original document or just a transcript? The book given as a source is from 1999, so it can't possibly know anything about the new copy from 2007. --Latebird (talk) 15:23, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

I will try to look that up - my guess it's just a transcript (thank god I only wrote "the text" was published - and now it's only "a text"), but in Mongolian language. Right now I am not even sure whether anything in Mongolian was signed, or whether the treaty was only in Tibetan language. My guess is that this Mongolian text is one of the several translations mentioned in the interview, the raw material for the Russian and English translations (IIRC Bell says the English translation was published in 1916). Yaan (talk) 15:33, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

weaseling re. international recognition of independence

One year before World War I, the international situation did not allow recognition of Mongolia and Tibet independance by other nations.

I think this is misleading. The much more stringent explanation is that neither Russia or the later SU nor Great Britain wanted to make a break in their relations to China over somewhat marginal areas like Tibet or Mongolia. Both Russia and GB were quite content with leaving leaving Mongolia and Tibet only de-facto independent, establishing them as strategic buffers and possibly enjoying some commercial privileges on the way. In any case, the reference to WWI seems somewhat misplaced: international recognition for Mongolia came only after 1945, for Tibet it came never. Yaan (talk) 14:16, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

That phrase is trying to sugar-coat the fact that the big powers really had no interest in too many independent countries in the region. A weak China holding nominal control and permitting foreign manipulation was much more practical. In that sense I agree that it is misleading, or at least not NPOV. it is also mostly redundant to the sentence following it, so I'd suggest removing it again. --Latebird (talk) 20:30, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

I have removed it now. I also removed that bit about treaties from the Qing Dynasty: the Russian-Chinese treaty of 1912 was concluded after the end of said dynasty, and the immediate effects of breaking those treaties on Russian/British interests in Tibet and Mongolia does not seem so clear - it is more probably the Russian resp, British interests within China that made Russia and Britain abstain from recognizing Mongolia's resp. Tibet's independence. Yaan (talk) 15:41, 25 November 2008 (UTC)