Orphans Of The Cold War America And The Tibetan Struggle For Survival [Paperback]

John Kenneth Knaus (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 25, 2000

The secret war for Tibet, told by the CIA veteran who helped run American covert operations to support the Tibetan resistance and the Dalai Lama.. For decades, the United States ran covert operations into Tibet in an attempt to help Tibetan exiles take back their country from the Chinese. These operations have never been discloseduntil now. John Kenneth Knaus, the CIA station chief who ran these covert actions in the late 1950s and 1960s, gives us both a vivid history of Tibet and a thrilling look inside the Tibetan resistance and their American counterparts. Like a cross between the work of Peter Hopkirk, John le Carr and Jonathan Spence, Orphans of the Cold War is a gripping tale of geopolitics, skullduggery and courage on the roof of the world.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

From the Chinese Revolution of 1911 until after the Second World War, Tibet enjoyed de facto independence from China. When China invaded Tibet in 1950, some in Washington saw support for the Himalayan nation's self-determination as a legitimate challenge to resurgent world communism.

Orphans of the Cold War is the inside story of America's clandestine support of Tibetan resistance, written by a 44-year veteran of the CIA who helped organize the training of Tibetan agents in Colorado and their deployment on the high Tibetan plateau. America's military aid to Tibet was much more substantial than generally realized, with airdrops of supplies into the interior and the maintenance of 2,000 guerrillas in Mustang, Nepal, throughout the '60s. John Knaus's description of these daring operations is contextualized by excellent analysis of the diplomacy of the period, especially at the UN. This is a colorful adventure story, supported by unique photographs of the "Roof of the World," with a cast of characters that includes presidents, ambassadors, Tibetan herdsmen, and the Dalai Lama. It is also a heartbreaking story of courage operating against ultimately impossible odds.

By 1974, after rapprochement with China, America ended its paramilitary support of Tibet. The Dalai Lama sees this as positive: before, American support was largely a cold-war tactic, but now, he says, "the help and support we receive from the United States is truly out of sympathy and human compassion." --John Stevenson --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

Knaus brings a dose of realpolitik and detailed history to the often romanticized subject of Tibet. A former CIA officer and a friend of the Dalai Lama's family for 40 years, Knaus became involved with the CIA's clandestine operation to support Tibetan self-determination in 1958 and watched it sputter, flourish and fizzle under Eisenhower, Kennedy and Johnson. At a CIA-staffed training base in Colorado, Tibetan resistance fighters learned guerrilla warfare, and the CIA air-dropped those Tibetan men, arms and equipment into Tibet. By 1959, large pockets of central Tibet came under rebel control. But most Tibetans were unwilling or unable to adopt guerrilla tactics, and the CIA, according to Knaus (who retired from the agency in 1995 and is now a Harvard East Asian scholar), greatly underestimated China's willingness to decimate the Tibetan resistance. By 1974, having opened diplomatic relations with China, Washington cut off support for Tibetan paramilitary and political programs. Although the Dalai Lama accused the U.S. of sacrificing Tibet to the exigencies of Cold War geopolitics, Knaus portrays Western politicians, operatives and diplomats often motivated by altruism or idealism. Nevertheless, as the title implies, this remarkable book demonstrates that the Tibetans have been triply "orphaned": by the U.S., which never delivered on its promise of sustained support; by India, which gave sanctuary to the Tibetan government-in-exile but pursued an equivocal policy designed to placate China; and by the UN, where support for Tibetan autonomy faded as China's star rose. This thorough diplomatic and political history is vital to an understanding of the tragedy of modern Tibet. 53 pages of b&w photos.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 416 pages
• Publisher: PublicAffairs (April 25, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1891620851
• ISBN-13: 978-1891620850
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,129,130 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A truly magnificent effort that comes off beautifully, December 14, 1999

By 

Steve (United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Orphans of the Cold War: America and the Tibetan Struggle for Survival (Hardcover)

A beautifully researched book that covers the US's involvement with Tibet from 1942 to 1974. The author only spends one chapter to his personal involvement with the Tibetan resistance, the rest is the interesting political maneuvering done it the time period. The author spent several years interviewing many of the principal characters and researching the available archives. Just about every statement the author makes is backed up by a primary source. The author makes a very good attempt at an objective portrayal of the events described although his main sources, understandably, come from Tibetan, Indian and western sources. The Chinese view comes mainly from published speeches. This book is also a good source to other books about Tibet. One book by Sydney Wignall, 'Spy on the Roof of the World' is also a interesting account of Chinese/Tibetan relations in 1957.

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Essential in understanding position of Tibet/China/USA today, July 8, 1999

By 

Angus MacLean Thuermer - See all my reviews

This review is from: Orphans of the Cold War: America and the Tibetan Struggle for Survival (Hardcover)

As one who knows the author, has visited Tibet, and was involved in the fringes of the operations, I can only say that Ken Knaus has given us the background we need to understand the situation as it exists in Tibet today and the role USA/CIA played in it. A Must Read book.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Essential to an understanding of Tibet in the 20th Century, February 6, 2002

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Philip A. True (Fairfax, VA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Orphans Of The Cold War America And The Tibetan Struggle For Survival (Paperback)

As someone who knows the author and who provided some assistance for the initial phases of the resistance effort, this review will suffer from bias. Nonetheless in my opinion the author has done an excellent job in presenting not only the operational details in the CIA's involvement with the Tibetans, but he has mined the diplomatic sources to provide invaluable background on the genesis of our assistance. Why we became involved will become much clearer as the complex relationships and interests of India, ourselves, China, and others are detailed in the book. Although the Tibetan resistance movement is not much more than a lengthy footnote in the history of the Cold War, nonetheless it an interesting and often tragic event made even more so by the fair-minded analysis of the author and the entertaining style used in the telling. "Orphans..." is a must read for history buffs of this period and our relationships, overt and covert, in this part of the world