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FLASH!

On The Ground reports (through Japanese TV tonight).

Two of importance:

a) Troops pouring into Tibet from Communist China, are coming in from the furthermost areas with Red China, away from Tibet. i.e. reporters are noting vehicles coming in as far from as former Manchuria (Heiliungjang, etc). This confirms to the traditional Soviet and China crackdown of sending troops to rebelling areas with ethnics not connected in the remotest way to the area to be suppressed, to be more effective. It will be easy to order troops from Harbin to fire upon citizens in Lhasa in this way.

b) PLA troops are covering over their tanks that have the Chinese PLA marks ("81": 八一) for the 8th Route Army, with newspapers, to avoid coverage from foreign media or others (side and front of the tanks where these normally appear--a Japanese military specialist commented on the photos taken out of Tibet by Japanese tourists today). I saw these photos on Japanese TV just two hours ago.

(9:00 a.m. Eastern, Easter Sunday morning)

Thanks for the update. I expect they will use the time-tested Chinese tactic of massacring thousands to get the Tibetans in line. Bush II may have to make the kind of decision Bush I had to make during the Tiananmen Massacre - whether or not to impose sanctions on China. Bush II will also have to figure out whether he'll respond in the way Reagan did in response to Charlie Wilson's statement with respect to the Afghan people's revolt against the Soviets - "The U.S. had nothing whatsoever to do with these people's decision to fight ... But we'll be damned by history if we let them fight with stones."

The Chinese inflicted 100,000 dead on the US during the Cold War by making it possible - via billions of dollars of military aid - for the North Koreans and North Vietnamese to invade our non-communist allies. Maybe it's time we returned the favor.