India, Sept. 22 -- "Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst." So Sikyong Penpa Tsering sums up the Tibetan cause. "We are prepared to carry on this movement, even if it will take several more decades in the future," he says.

After more than six decades in exile, the movement faces a double test: whether Tibetans can ever bring Beijing to the table and, increasingly, whether the cause can stay politically relevant while China grows stronger and the generation shaped by the 14th Dalai Lama approaches an uncertain handover.

I recently spoke to Tsering about the Middle Way Approach, talks with China, life after the Dalai Lama and the interests of India and others. His reading is unsentimental. "Every country has their national interest...