I trawl the Internet for news every few minutes, wondering what has changed. I see people’s digital patriotism and ponder if the rumours are true, as photochemical evidence surface on the news as breaking alerts and exclusive footage. If the war is really at an end. The government has no post-war plan outside an IMF bailout package and that looks shady, considering the level to which the country has managed to alienate itself in the stand-off against the western world and media.
What does this mean to us, the war being over? I think the real war is only beginning- the combat against not only poverty, unemployment, illness, disability, and damage but, possible insurgence. It frightens me the uncertainty as Sri Lanka’s future appears to hang in a balance. It seems to be the topic on everyone’s tongue, this impending war victory. The end is nigh, they say as they look for out of season firecrackers. The great feats of soldiers of a government who have managed to “destroy terrorism”. Sri Lanka’s problems always arise from a legacy of myopia we seem to have inherited from the generations before us. We have selective memories and we forget too soon. People are lining up to bid a proverbial Ayubowan to a three decade-long crisis which has no doubt been perpetuated by the poor judgment of the political upper rungs, the ethnic violence and racism which has shadowed our small nation’s history for longer. Real predicaments which run much deeper. Does the end mean, that we forget those who have been truly scarred by the horrors of war? Do we clear our minds of the injustices committed by our own people? Do we choose not to remember the reasons which breathed life into such cruel animosity?
Ayubowan… Welcome. Goodbye. Long life.
Ayubowan… Blood. Death. War.
Ayubowan… Poverty. Displacement. Disease.
I think the war against poverty, inequality and injustice has been going on for many decades. Now noone, the GOSL, the private sector, NGOs, you or I can use the war as an excuse for not having any forward progress. There is a long, hard battle ahead for all of us…but the elimination of the military strength of the LTTE removes at least one obstacle.
N- Removing an obstacle at what cost? 8000 lives in six months?
What would your alternative be or have been?
I do acknowledge that the LTTE is a terrorist group- there’s no denying that they deserved what they had coming for them. However, I did have serious issues with the nature of the offensive, considering the number of civilian lives at stake. The past two years have seen countless deaths, and those are only the ones we know about. The collateral damage was insulting, in a sense that it put a human price tag on defeating the LTTE. From this emerges the question of how those actions are any different to the numerous suicide attacks which claimed the lives of thousands of Sri Lankans.
To answer your question, I can tell you my alternative would not have included 8000 deaths in six months. The LTTE always had a shelf-life as far as I’m concerned, and even though it may have taken a couple of years longer, going by past statistics the casualties would not have been nearly as large or indiscriminate. Moreover, we have to acknowledge that both the government and the LTTE have been tweaking the numbers to suit their purpose in the past few months. Less than a month ago when Nihal Jayasinghe spoke here, he claimed that only 50,000 civilians were in the no-fire zone and no one was being massacred. As soon as the rescue operation took place, they claimed they had rescued 260,000 because it would bathe them in some golden humanitarian light. So these numbers no doubt are conservative estimates of the truth. Or is there a truth in these matters?
Do you think overcoming this obstacle as you put it, means less people will die, less people will suffer? Has a history of world wars taught us nothing? I hate to think of the number of deaths which will no doubt shadow the IDP camps for months to come. In turn, my question to you would be if the final battle so to speak, had by some chance of geography happened in a Sinhalese majority area, do you think the government would have followed the same strategy?
The LTTE was only one head of the monster.
Eloquently put, but a bit over-dramatic and ill-informed. Could I please see the ‘past statistics’ that you mention with regard to the scale of the collateral damage? Equating the suicide attacks against civilian targets (note that I have no issue with the suicide attacks the LTTE committed against legitimate military targets) with the army offensive is a bit ridiculous. Have we any evidence that the army deliberately targeted civilians with Kfirs or shells? Why would the government even do that with the propaganda war that was fought simultaneously not to mention the huge cost of armaments? Did people get shelled inadvertently? Yes there is no doubt, that doesn’t make it ok, but it happens in every war. Also I’m sure some commanders on the field were probably callous when targeting the LTTE and killed civilians in the process. There is however a huge difference between this and the top-down policy implemented by VP of targeting Sinhala/Muslim civilians, of ethnically cleansing the East.
On what evidence do you base your opinion about the LTTE having a ‘shelf life?’ In case you haven’t noticed, this war has dragged on for over a quarter of a decade. The Diaspora seems more than happy to sit in comfort in the west and assuage their collective guilt by donating to the LTTE. The vast amounts of armaments captured in the offensive gives no indication that the LTTE had any kind of a ‘shelf life.’ At the end of the day military offensives need to take into account more than just human life, as cold and inhumane as that is. Money, attrition, fatigue, moral have to be taken into account and nothing saps those more than an extended campaign.
With regard to the actual numbers of collateral deaths, I have no idea who is telling the truth with regard to this. However again, no war has been prosecuted without collateral damage. The Iraqi invasion for example from March 20 to May 1 cost over 82,000 civilian lives, Operation Speedy Express in Vietnam cost 5,000 lives in 5 months, Hiroshima killed 70,000 in a day. Again I’m not saying collateral damage is ok, the price of war is always paid by the innocents and in a terrible fashion. However blithely saying your ‘option’ wouldn’t have cost 8,000 lives in six months is at best naive. There is a human price tag to war, there always has been and there always will be. That is why war should be avoided at all cost, it is the LTTE and the paying Diaspora that have this blood on their hands. They were the ones who could have avoided all of this, especially the Diaspora but this is what they chose with no consideration for the suffering of their ‘people.’ That in itself should be enough to show that the elimination of the LTTE and its leadership is primary in bringing peace to Sri Lanka and lessening the people who would have died and suffered in the future if the LTTE had been allowed to continue to exist.
With regard to your last point about a Sinhala population not being treated the same (incidentally a line that is always trotted out by LTTE sympathizers when screaming about the non-existent genocide), there was a previous insurrection in Sri Lanka by the JVP which was mostly Sinhalese. This was crushed by the government with over 50,000 people killed in two years, a significant majority being innocent people who happened to be an inconvenient age and hailed from the wrong towns. 50,000 Sinhala people in two years. My family lost a number of members and friends to both the JVP and the army, but I still have no way of figuring out whether crushing that rebellion so brutally was worth it. I think it is dangerously arrogant to pass judgment on what just happened based on an unrealistic idea of how war is prosecuted. War should be avoided at all costs but sometimes it is unavoidable and terrible things will happen. What we do now is what will determine whether this was all worth the terrible cost. For that and the future, I am hopeful but not blind to the difficulties ahead of us, an idealist maybe but also a pragmatist.
Ermm…apologies for the essay of a comment.
That has to be the first time I’ve been called both ill-informed and over-dramatic, but moving on let me elucidate. You’re entitled to an opinion as am I, and simply because we have conflicting opinions does not validate your comments. Just so you know.
First of all, I’m a pacifist. call it naive, call it silly- I don’t endorse killing as necessary whatever form it takes: be it capital punishment, collateral damage or suicide bombing. Logically speaking a 30 year war has seen up until this year (before the government launched it’s full offensive against the LTTE, incited by nothing short of one billion USD in Chinese aid- wonder what their motive is eh?) a reported 70,000 deaths. This year, we have seen roughly 1/7th of that happen in a period of six months. I am no statistician, but to me this seems like more than the average in the past years. Why? Because the government chose a line of offence, and a really careless one at that. Do we have evidence that the army didn’t deliberately target civilians? We only know what people tell us, and the casualty numbers tell me that an insane number of people died. The government doesn’t mention numbers, unless it’s the number of people they rescued or the number of LTTE cadres they shot down. It seems Sri Lankan soldiers have gotten through this debacle remarkably unscathed, or is that just my inner ill-informed drama queen speaking? At the end of the day killing, is killing irrespective of how it was done. So, are you suggesting then that simply because civilian casualties happen in every war, it’s ok that they happen in Sri Lanka? Call it idealistic, but it’s never ok. It is incidents such as Vietnam and Hiroshima which bring together the leaders of world to resolve that we mustn’t let this happen again. Yet, it does and everyone knows that it’s not ok, which is why bodies such as the United Nations were formed. But of course, it’s ok in Sri Lanka so we bar their access altogether.
I am saying the LTTE had a shelf-life based on the internal conflicts which have no doubt had a serious impact on the group. It is admitted that the height of LTTE terror was in the late 1990’s- we all remember the central bank bombing and many others that followed. After the CFA in 2002, things got better- you have to admit it. I don’t claim to know what the LTTE’s intentions were, but they evidently had their own problems. This brings to mind the Karuna and Pillyan factions defecting. Our government has a hard-line anti-terrorist stance, but it’s completely within bounds to appoint ex-terrorists as ministers? Am I to believe a government that names a man who is responsible for the Dalada Maligawa bombing and the use of child soldiers, as the chief minister to the North-East (?) when it says that it hasn’t been shelling civilian targets? If the terrorists are within the government itself, who exactly are we believing? As you seem to imply, all this is ok, because war is evidently played dirty.
I am not justifying VP’s own actions of ethnic cleansing, but I do believe that there’s a double-standard as far as ethnicity is concerned in Sri Lanka. If it is naive to say no to war, or the death that comes hand in hand with conflict. So be it, I’d much rather be a part of my idealistic pacifism than accept that collateral damage happens and that it’s ok. It’s interesting you brought up the JVP insurrection, because that underscores the crucial underpinning of all of this; politics. As much as this war is a manifestation of an ethnic divide, it has been festered and perpetuated by a labyrinth of poor political decisions. It’s ironic, that the LTTE wouldn’t have suffered this fate, had the people of the North been allowed vote in 2005. Beneath all of this is a political agenda of Sinhalese First (despite what MR said in his “victory” speech this morning), and that is the crux of the problem. We have seen promises not unlike this been made in the Bandaranayaka-Chelvanayakam pact, and where did all that equality and brotherhood between Sinhalese and Tamils statements go? I will believe it when I see it, when a Tamil person is not detained in a checkpoint that extra five minutes because of the Tamil ink on his/her national ID.
You say “My family lost a number of members and friends to both the JVP and the army, but I still have no way of figuring out whether crushing that rebellion so brutally was worth it.” I think the families and friends of all those people who died inevitably, as you implied feel the same way. This is why I’m making a drama out of this- it’s NOT ok. It’s not ok that people are being massacred. And it’s not ok for a government to play any part in such atrocity by proxy (note the above comment on ex-LTTE as ministers) or directly. Collateral damage is an euphemism for a reason. There’s a lot left unsaid, when we need to feel better about the horrible things that we’ve done.
The scars of these actions won’t heal easily, and as you said rightly it is what we do now that matters. Despite everything that maybe said or done, I won’t ever think that 8000 lives was worth it. It never will be.
Sigh…we could probably argue reams around each other about this and never come to a conclusion given that both of our opinions are based on different worldviews. I do however feel obliged to point out a number of misconceptions in your above statement which lead to the fact that you are ill-informed on a number of the salient issues.
This government did not go to war ‘incited’ by Chinese aid. China was supplying weapons to us throughout the nineties, most notably the MBRLs that prevented Jaffna from being captured in 2000. The government in fact stood firm in the face of much provocation from the LTTE right after the election, hundreds of sailors and soldiers lost their lives before the Mavil Aru incident that sparked this phase of the Eelam war. The government hardly ‘chose’ a line of offence, it was given little choice by the LTTE.
Also your use of ‘statistics’ is hugely flawed. For one thing the 70,000 figure is one that has no basis in reality, it has been in the media for a number of years now and is probably an underestimation of the toll of this terrible conflict. Averaging out is simply lazy, it does not take into account the years of the ceasefire, the years when the LTTE was not a conventional fighting force, the years of attrition warfare with neither side moving FDLs. Like I said, there is really no way to make a significant assessment of how ‘proportionate’ the toll was in this phase on the facts that we have now. However tactically the army used a vastly different methodology than in the past, aerial surveillance and targeted bombing, small units fighting on the Tiger’s terms. There does not appear to have been a ‘scorched earth’ policy given the visuals that we have seen.
As for the control of information, I wouldn’t get too excited about how much press freedom the ‘civilized’ west allows in its wars, reporters in the initial invasion of Iraq were only allowed as ‘embedded’ reporters and all information was carefully managed and disseminated, probably not to the extreme as in the SL conflict, but far from ‘press freedom.’
With regard to the LTTE’s ‘internal strife,’ again I would like to see some evidence. Karuna split in 2004 true (and there has always been a differentiation between the northern and the eastern cadres due to caste, etc) , but there has not been any evidence of splits in the organization since then. There were rumours about Soosai having issues, but as we saw he died fighting by his exalted leader’s side.
Lastly your point about soldiers getting through this debacle ‘unscathed’ is possibly the most ill-informed I have heard. They were fighting one of the most ruthless, well organized guerilla organizations in the world, on the Tiger’s turf, in jungles that they have controlled for almost a decade. There’s a reason why we have not had casualty figures released at all by the government in this phase of the war and that is because if the people of Sri Lanka truly knew what a high price the army was paying, they would probably not have the stomach for it, nor would it do any good for the army’s morale.
It has been entertaining, but like I said…we could argue til we’re blue in the face and you’d still be a pacifist and I’d still be a pragmatist.
This really could go on forever. First of all as for the Chinese aid- it peaked in 2005. The aid donation leaped, the year MR came into power, and if as you say China has been providing all this money for weaponry- why didn’t the inevitable offensive happen before? And this was when the war was at its worse as well. The only reason the MR government came into power, is through their anti-terrorism propaganda which spewed out that RW wanted to sign over 1/3 of the country to the LTTE. Why? Because a CFA automatically meant that the UNP was on the LTTE payroll, and that country had to be reclaimed into the Sinhala hands spawning from Dutugemunu. Remember what happened when Sri Lanka last rolled around in Chinese silk- the Sirimavo regime, and I’m sure no one would like to take a trip back in time to those days. I’m now waiting for a hundred flowers campaign and thought reform camps to start mushrooming in Sri Lanka. Oh yes, that’s right we don’t have media freedom in Sri Lanka. You oppose the government, and you get mauled by Mervin’s thug buddies or get shot in the head during traffic. Now what does that remind me of? There was an understanding and a militaristic one no doubt, considering that Hambanthota has now become a pearl on China’s string. And of course, the arms had nothing to do with it. So, the government’s choice of offence, is what got it in power, and that is where the LTTE made it’s biggest mistake.
You say 70,000 is an underestimation. You’re right and I’ve said it time and again, but I can’t pull numbers out of my head I need to use what has posited as the number of civilian casualties in the Sri Lankan war which is 70,000. I’m sure it’s thousands more. You say it’s lazy the averaging, the CFA lasted 3 years- so a rough 30-3. 70,000 in 27 years, does that make it better? But of course, as you repeat it’s all a part of war right? It’s ok that thousands of people die.
I am not ignorant to believe that the media has its heroic golden reporter ideals, and that it a global Hermes revealing the truth to all. It is at the end of the day an industry which needs to profit. But, as I said before I am not willing to take the word of a government either- what makes them more credible than the media. Especially in Sri Lanka of all places? So why not embedded reporters? If Western journalists wanted access and were willing to take care of themselves, why not let them have a shot? They didn’t ask for the government’s protection. Unless of course the government was accidentally on purpose shelling civilian targets. What do they call that these days? Do you think that the LTTE published its own version of the Sun then, where it reported the latest gossip on its internal strife? I must track down this gossip portal on Tamilnet. We have little knowledge on the inner-workings of the LTTE anyway, don’t you think if the rest of the world was aware of its internal problems it would also know enough to have crushed them sooner? If Karuna and Pillyan are anything to go by, I think I’ll take my chances with my statement. It’s interesting that you don’t respond to the involvement of these two in the government. So now that the LTTE id finished, is MR going to withdraw their ministries and throw them in Boosa, before they are tried for war crimes?
I apologize that WordPress doesn’t have a sarcasm button, so maybe I should start highlighting those bits in red or something. I said “It seems Sri Lankan soldiers have gotten through this debacle remarkably unscathed”, indicating the government’s lack of numbers on soldier deaths. You practically have already labelled me a sensationalist, so let me tell you my concern for war deaths doesn’t end with the civilians, it includes the soldiers and the LTTE cadres themselves too. Because, I don’t think that a 13 year old they handed a weapon to, is the enemy, I think of him/her as a Sri Lankan who has also paid an immense price for this war. You say “the people of Sri Lanka truly knew what a high price the army was paying, they would probably not have the stomach for it, nor would it do any good for the army’s morale”. Let me put it as straightforwardly as possible, I don’t think all those people labelled as collateral damage in the no-fire zone should have had to stomach death pending by minutes either. If the government cared about the Sri Lankan people (I am aware here that your notion of Sri Lankan is limited to the South), it wouldn’t have resorted to the measures it did. Moreover, don’t you think that the soldiers would be well aware of how many of their friends and colleagues never returned from the front line? Every day I spent in Colombo in January, I would see the army body truck parked outside Jayasena, funeral after funeral. I am Sri Lankan, and I found that hard to stomach which is why I’m so opposed to these killings. It’s never going to be right, simply because it’s an inevitability.
Yes, I’d still be a pacifist and you’d still stay civilian deaths are a part of any war.
Which is why pacifists, like myself say NO to war.