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Going nowhere very fast

by Our Defence Correspondent
These days, the newspapers are full of news about so-called Sinhalese nationalist groups and Buddhist organizations that are vociferously opposing the government’s efforts to start up peace talks with the LTTE.

This opposition has grown ever more demanding over the last few months, rising in volume after each of the LTTE suicide bomber attacks in Colombo.

"How can you talk peace with such murderers’?" they demand to know. "The only solution is to annihilate the Tigers by military force."

For once, it is fortunate that President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga doesn’t pay much heed to so-called public opinion.

Ask anyone in the armed forces whether they can finish off the war by military means, and the only answer you will get is a firm no. In fact even three or four years ago, senior armed forces officers were warning that the solution to the war must come through political means and not through military ones.

To this day, it is the armed forces that are most vociferously advocating peace talks. They don’t need to shout it out at public rallies or press conferences. Their voice is heard through the situation in the north, and their performance on the battlefield over the past four years.

Even a cursory analysis of the war in the north over the past four years shows that the army cannot destroy the LTTE in the foreseeable future.

President Kumaratunga tried to do it that way, through military means. When the LTTE betrayed her at the last peace talks, she vowed to crush the Tigers by force, and bring them to the negotiating table only after they surrendered all their weapons.

She gave the armed forces a blank cheque, allowing them to buy whatever they wanted in terms of weapons, aircraft, battle tanks, etc. And they certainly did, ballooning the defence budget to incredible levels.

The LTTE’s use of massive bombs in Colombo also persuaded most major foreign governments to help Sri Lanka in some way, some giving weapons and training, while others went as far as naming the LTTE as a terrorist organization. All this was helped by some excellent diplomacy by the president and some of her Cabinet, notably Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar and Justice and Constitutional Affairs Minister G. L. Peiris.

Yet, after the capture of the Jaffna Peninsula in May of 1996, nothing has gone right for the armed forces. In fact, the last four years have clearly shown that despite all this support, they cannot beat the LTTE on the battlefield. At the same time, it has also proven that the Tigers can’t win their Eelam through military means either.

Various strategies

The army continues to blame its problems on a lack of manpower. Various strategies have been used, from advertisements exhorting parents to send their sons to fight for the country, to almost continuous pardons for deserters if they return. But it hasn’t been enough.

The army’s shortage of manpower can only be solved through conscription. But the president remains opposed to doing this, although she has hinted about doing it in various speeches. Perhaps her own children, who are now young adults, have something to do with her reluctance.

What’s wrong with the army? With the entire resources and support of our government, and open support from many foreign ones, why can’t it win? Why does it continue to blame its problems on lack of manpower, which is a problem that has no solution?

The fact is that the present system of promotions in the army is the main problem, which saps its officers of any desire to take the initiative.

Despite the president’s attempts to reform the system to one where deeds on the battlefields become the main criteria for promotions, the system remains one in which politics plays the main part.

Over the past few years, officers who have successfully curried favour with their seniors and with officials in the defence ministry, have had little problem in getting promoted.

Meanwhile, those who have languished in camps in the north and east, with little opportunity of coming to the notice of the hierarchy, find it difficult to get promoted.

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But most of all, officers in Colombo have all the time in the world to attend cocktails and meetings and other ceremonies, where their faces and names automatically become noticed by their seniors and politicians, and they are able to make influential contacts.

Meanwhile, officers in the war-zones have to ever be mindful that if they suffer even the smallest defeat at the hands of the Tigers, it will be noted back in Colombo. So they prefer to wait for orders,(Censored)

Gone are the days of Major General Denzil Kobbekaduwa and Vijaya Wimalaratne, who would formulate their own plans, let their superiors know what they were going to do, and lead their men in operations against the Tigers. Today, officers won’t move without massive gunfire support from both the air force and artillery, and a force of at least 10,000 soldiers to launch the operation with. By the time ail these preparations are made, the Tigers are ready for them, and the operation splutters out due to heavy casualties.

The president’s habit of giving promotions and extensions of service to officers who are in the good books of their seniors and politicians, and also to those who profess to support the People’s Alliance, has also created problems.

In short, the army is not in any shape to fight the war to a finish. It’s clearly time for peace talks. The president knows it. The army knows it. And the Tigers know it.

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