Jawaharlal Nehru called them the single most dominant race in the history of the world. Their empire, the largest ever conceived, stretched over millions of kilometres from modern-day Vietnam to Hungary. Nations and races knelt to their supremacy: their political, social, religious and commercial advances have helped shape the world we live in: and according to genetic evidence, one in every 200 men alive today is related to their greatest leader. Yet, today, the still-proud Mongol race lives under constant threat of seeing its culture, religion and traditions further eroded.
Spread across the Mongolian Republic, the politically-independent Buryatia in Russia and the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region in China, the Mongols do not appear at first glance to be struggling culturally. In Mongolia, most street signs appear in both scripts, the Mongol tongue is heard very frequently and images of Genghis Khan compete with those of Chairman Mao to take pride of place in living rooms. But still Mongols still feel that they are slowly losing their grip on their culture and traditional ways of life.
In common with much of China’s sparsely-populated regions in the1960s and 70s, Inner Mongolia saw vast influxes of Han settlers come in to make full use of the land, in line with Mao’s hopes for a self-sufficient China. China’s staggering population has seen the Mongol presence drop in the region from over 60 per cent half a century ago to a lowly 15 per cent. The arrival of so many outsiders forced the Mongols up into the steppes to the north of the capital, Hohhot, and stretching northeast towards the Russian border.
After Deng Xiaoping’s opening up of China, the Mongolian grasslands became a prime tourist spot for affluent Chinese and foreigners. Of perhaps greater damage to the remnants of the Mongol culture in China is the perfidy of the Inner Mongolia local government in subverting elements of this culture for profit. Genghis Khan’s legacy lives on across Mongolia, but his primary impact today is that of filling the coffers of other governmental agencies.
Although the struggle for independence in Inner Mongolia has gained far-less attention than those in Xinjiang or Tibet, the Inner Mongolian People’s Party  is doing their best to make their cause known. While their claims may be somewhat inflated, there is little doubt that Mongol culture is reeling. Mao’s desire to populate every area of China with Han and to keep ethnic minorities as tourist draws and quirky little footnotes in China’s epic journey has largely been successful. Many Inner Mongolians, deprived of visa rights, are sneaking into the Republic of Mongolia to seek better lives and jobs. The gulf between Chinese and Mongol that caused the building of the Great Wall and arguably set Genghis Khan off on his world conquest is getting wider, not closer.