ABSTRACT
The Dalai Lama was doing his utmost to lessen Tibetan dependence on China; he had, for example, established an arsenal in Lhasa, supervised by Indian Muslim craftsmen, in which he hoped to make Martini-Henry rifles to equip a national Tibetan army. Ladakh was connected to the Tibetan trade centre of Gartok, under the rule of the two Garpons, or Governors, by a complex of traditional trading missions. In September 1900 R. L. Kennion set out for Gartok, brushing aside some twenty-five mounted Tibetan frontier guards who protested against his entry into their country. The omniscient Dr. Badmaev, whose name was closely linked in St. Petersburg with Russian policy towards Tibet, announced that the Tibetans were seeking help from Russia in the event of British aggression. The India Office, to whom the proposals looked very much like an attempt to provoke the Tibetans into providing an excuse for a mission to Lhasa, obliged Curzon to make certain modifications.
