On March 10, 1959, more than 300,000 Tibetans surrounded Norbulinka Palace in Lhasa to prevent China’s occupation forces, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), from taking the Dalai Lama to Beijing, where he had been invited to travel alone (without any military personnel or bodyguards) for “official tea” with PLA leaders. During the standoff, the Dalai Lama was evacuated to India. On March 21, the Chinese began shelling the palace, killing tens of thousands still camped outside. In the PLA crackdown that followed, the Dalai Lama’s guards were executed and Lhasa’s major monasteries destroyed.
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