Strategy,
Tactics, Minus
The “Blah! Blah! Blah!”
By Chandi Sinnathurai
29 March, 2007
Countercurrents.org
The
Sri Lankan Government (SLG) is shocked to the core. The aerial-attack
on the Air Force Base by the Tamil Tigers’ Air Force (TAF) on
Monday, 26th March has raised many concerns.
The Sri Lankan Armed Forces
had intelligence concerning the build up of a Tamil Air Force for quite
some years. They also did posses details of the exact location of Tigers’
air-strip with the benefit of the “communication and intelligence
sharing” of the US satellites. The Sri Lankan Air Force bombed
the 1250metre Tiger runway. They even suggested that the Tiger aircrafts
were nothing but dummies. Destroying the runway, they thought, have
sorted the matter out.
In January 2005 Military
Analyst Iqbal Athas wrote in his Situation Report Column:
The Sunday Times (Situation
Report - January 16, 2005) revealed how on Wednesday (January 12), an
Israeli-built Searcher UAV spotted a light aircraft on the ground. It
was on the newly-built airstrip east of Iranamadu irrigation tank. The
next day, Thursday (January 13), the Searcher UAV was on a night sortie
when its infrared cameras picked up thermal images of another light
aircraft. [1]
Nothing prepared the SLG
for such a conventional air strike. The target of this attack was to
hit the Sri Lankan air force hangars of MIG25 and the Israeli Kafir
supersonic bombers which had been used for indiscriminate bombing of
thousands of Tamil civilians – women, children and men in the
North and East. The SLG however, reported that the Tigers missed the
target. News reports trickling from capital Colombo seems to suggest
that not only the mission was accomplished “below the radar”
but also the TAF air crafts safely reached the Tiger heart-land Vanni.
An assessment of the attack
issued by the Institute for Topical Studies, South Asia Analysis Group
[SAAG] observed among other things in its analysis, the following:
The TAF's air strike was
well-planned and equally well-executed. It was a night operation taking
advantage of the weak capability of the SLAF for night operations. It
was a precision attack, which carefully avoided causing any casualty
or damage in the international airport, which could have roused international
ire. There were no civilian casualties----targeted or collateral. As
a result, it would not be possible to characterise the attack as an
act of terrorism. It was pure and simple a conventional air strike.
[2]
This attack adds a new dimension
to the Eelam-Sri Lanka conflict. The Tamil Tigers have now revealed
their multi-dimensional capabilities. Tiger aerial attack has created
shock and awe among the Sinhala polity. It is perhaps, no longer just
a rumour that, Colonel Soosai’s Sea Tigers [3] have submarine
warfare capabilities.
The strategy of the State
was to portray the Tigers merely as a guerilla armed group and they
were going to beat them back to the jungles in the next three years.
This they did to under play the “equal status” that was
afforded to the Tiger Defacto state by the CFA. Under this agreement,
in full view of the international community, demarcation lines were
drawn between Tiger controlled territory and territory under Sri Lankan
state. Some political observers saw the CFA as a provisional document,
subtly “legalizing” the reality of the state-in-waiting.
In the Tamil Street it is
spoken that, this attack signals not only the beginning of the unfolding
of new tactics and strategies. It must also indicate that this is the
ending of all that is "Blah, blah" - frothy rhetoric, inflated
with hot air. The Tigers have gained a spectacular victory psychologically.
This is crucial for the Tamils in the Diaspora in particular, especially
when continuing to loose territory in the East. However, the Tigers
have refused to gloat on this news. In fact, they have played it down
just limiting to publishing only facts and figures of this operation.
They know only too well, there needs to be many more battles and struggles
that has to be faced.
Five years of Ceasefire
Agreement [CFA] and multiple rounds of talks on CFA have ended up in
smoke. The intransigence of the Sri Lankan state has not helped.
The SLG sadly is interested
ONLY in a military campaign. Their strategy is to recapture the Tamil
territories and win the hearts and minds of the Tamils of the East.
None can bludgeon and bomb and starve the people and expect “hearts
and minds” to be warm. Iraq stares in the face, as a glaring example.
Already fierce fighting is taking place in the East, in the Batticaloa
district. Over 153,000 civilians are internally displaced without food,
medicine or protection – sheltering under trees and open spaces.
Already a conservative estimate of some 1500 civilians has perished
and some 600 civilians have disappeared since January.
People are quite rightly
sceptical about any peace talks. Previous talks have been fraught with
subterfuge and duplicitous deals. People want REAL peace that would
translate into tangible reality and impact their lives for the better.
They want jobs, food, education, development, security, honour, dignity,
freedom of movement, restoration of civil liberties and democratic rights.
Thousands have lost their livelihoods. Tamils need not live under constant
threat to their lives in their homelands.
Now what is the solution?
This perennial question raises the core of the problem. Tamils have
been struggling for self-determination since 1976 - for over 30 years.
During the initial stages of peace talks in Thailand in September 2002,
a theory was floated that the Tamil self-determination could be realised
by internal self-determination. That is, staying within a united Sri
Lanka – possibly a federal arrangement. Should that be not acceptable
to the Sinhala state, Tamils will have no option but to fight for external
self-determination. Some saw this theorising only as a tactical manoeuvre.
The state has never been agreeable to a federal solution since independence
from Britain in 1948. Others thought, this posture hardly reflected
the kernel rationale of Tamil liberation. Many adherents felt, at its
best it was a doctrinal deviation – a heresy if you will. At its
worst, some rejected such move as a misleading distraction. Oslo was
blamed for the wayward departure. This was NOT at any case, the original
stance of the Tamil Resolution of 14 May 1976 [4a] upon which the struggle
was built and thousands of Tamil youth have poured their life as ‘sacred
offering’ for freedom [4b].
The wider semantic fields
and political phonetics have to be explored in further depth, in this
context, for the following much used words: Self-determination; freedom;
liberation. During the imperial Raj the Brits wanted the Indians to
have their “freedom” - self-government (Swaraj) within the
context of the Empire. That was not necessarily seen as self-determination
or freedom. The primary reason was that, the English doubted the Indians
could ever rule themselves. MK Gandhi at that juncture strived for dominion
status. The young blood within the movement however, vowed freedom means
complete liberation from alien domination. India at any rate was a complex
colonial construct.
The question is: Are the
Tamils psychologically prepared to believe that they are self-sufficiently
a nation and can effectively rule themselves? Now for the Tamils does
self-determination mean emancipation? Will the principle of self-determination
allow Tamils to determine their political future and destiny? In other
words, will it allow Tamils to be no longer enslaved either by the tyranny
of the majority or by the tyranny of a minority? Until such fundamental
and simple questions are answered, all else will be, mere punditry and
verbal gymnastics. We will be simply running in circles.
The ground reality nonetheless,
has repeatedly proven that the Sri Lankan State is prepared for neither
option. They have not moved away from the posture of a unitary state
and one single nation. Hence Talks were merely an eye wash, an international
media-circus, a tactical time-bidding and a shambolic bungling. Nothing
more than a cosmetic exercise.
The results of the Oslo-inspired
peace talks and its defunct CFA have led analysts to believe that the
Tamils will be forced to opt for the latter option. Any future dialogue,
one would think, will have to first consider, reflect and determine
from which premise one has to journey, in order to arrive at an honourable
solution. If the premise is not agreed upon there and then, there will
only be a dialogue of the deaf. Of course, there will be no longer any
elbow room for Blah! Blah! Blah!
The nascent state of Eelam
released a statement soon after the attack on Monday: "The attack
is not only pre-emptive but also to safeguard our people from indiscriminate
bombing by the SLAF. Other Sri Lanka military installations will also
be targets of our future attacks."
If one were to take the whole
picture, the aerial attack opens a new vista. Put in perspective, it
is only just one battle, significant though in its psychological impact.
But there are many more to come. In the end, in order to achieve the
goal, the War – political, psychological, diplomatic, conventional
and otherwise - fighting in the air, land and the sea has to be won;
both in the East and the North. Tamil Tigers are aware that the liberation
struggle is not a tea party.
As for now, a false peace
cannot be thrust upon the Tamils.
NOTES:
[1] http://lakdiva.org/suntimes/050123/columns/sitrep.html
[2] http://saag.org/%5Cpapers22%5Cpaper2185.html
[3] http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Jan06/Sinnathurai07.htm
[4] a)The Vaddukodai Resolution clearly stated: "This convention
resolves that restoration and reconstitution of the Free, Sovereign,
Secular Socialist State of TAMIL EELAM based on the right of self determination
inherent to every nation has become inevitable in order to safeguard
the very existence of the Tamil Nation in this Country."
b) “And this Convention
calls upon the Tamil Nation in general and the Tamil youth in particular
to come forward to throw themselves fully in the sacred fight for freedom
and to flinch not till the goal of a sovereign state of TAMIL EELAM
is reached.”
Political Resolution unanimously
adopted at the First National Convention of the Tamil United Liberation
Front held at Pannakam (Vaddukoddai Constituency) on 14 May 1976 presided
over by Mr. S.J.V. Chelvanayakam, Q.C, and M.P.
Fr Chandi Sinnathurai
is a peasant-priest. He has written extensively on the Sri Lankan-Tamil
Eelam conflict. He maintains a blog at: http://chandi.eponym.com/blog
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