Sit Rep 31 Oct 2009

A cautionary note on the present situation re Gen Fonseka. Our task was to allow things to settle down on their own which has worked. However, recent developments led particularly by a section of the diaspora Sinhalese is a cause of concern for DefenceWire.

DefenceWire team's stance up to now has been to avoid commenting on this dispute knowing fully well the capacity of both the present government and SF to come to a compromise on:

1. The direction the Sri Lankan Military will take
2. The direction General Fonseka would have to go

These may not be the most ideal directions for either, yet they are ones that are at best described as realistic and unavoidable.

There are many moves by politically motivated Sri Lankans, including Sinhala groups and also non Sinhala Sri Lankan groups to exploit a disagreement that has unnecessarily spilled over into the public's eye due to politics in the military and a very small section of the military in politics.

These groups, particularly those civilians involved who are not insiders or have little inside information can or will not understand the discipline of a professional soldier to take what he wants and to relinquish duty when required sans insubordination.

A professional soldier is not Dutugemunu. The Sri Lanka Army/Military is a modern Army/Military positioned within a democratic society. The professional soldiers serving in it will know when to let go. By asking them to perform a larger role based solely on selfish motives of individuals in the periphery, they may destroy that soldier and even themselves and their reputation.

The Sri Lankan Military and its leaders are now hailed the world over for their victorious feat. Their role in bringing peace to the country through military means will be remembered for decades to come as the ultimate example of a trained military executing its sacred task flawlessly from start to finish. But remember this, dear readers, military action is a means of achieving the end and the end is always political.

DefenceWire, as an impartial site whose work you have witnessed for over 3 years now wish to appeal to our readers to refrain from joining or supporting either 'camps' and to allow the professional soldier and professional politicians to resolve potentially resolvable issues mentioned above.

Thank you

KP Arrest -- UPDATE

We have received credible information on the arrest of two individuals, one a middle aged man traveling on a non-Sri Lankan passport at an undisclosed location in Bangkok in a joint stint launched by Thai and Sri Lankan authorities. The travel documents and said identity confirms with an alias of LTTE operative Shanmugam Kumaran Tharmalingham.

The man was carrying travel documents both under his own birth name and under other aliases at the time of arrest. A group of Sri Lankan officials is expected to fly the said two individuals to Sri Lanka shortly. Please await further information as it is made available.

by

DefenceWire

KP Arrest

There was an announcement over local media a short while ago that former LTTE International chief and only remaining LTTE senior Kumaran Pathmanathan has been arrested. We are yet to confirm this arrest. Please await further details.

Thank You

DW

Wanni heroes rewarded

Brigadier Prasanna de Silva, the illustrious Special Forces officer has been appointed Director General of Joint Training in the soon to be Office of the Chief of Defence Staff headed by 4-star General Sarath Fonseka.

The 47-year old officer could also receive a promotion as a Major General. Another little-known (by the general public) but equally brilliant officer appointed the Director General of Joint Planning and Development is Major General Mahesh Senanayake also of the Special Forces.

Other notable leaders in the Wanni battle like Major General Jagath "Chula" Dias, Major General Kamal Gunaratne and Brigadier Shevendra Silva have also received new postings.

Maj. General Dias was appointed Deputy Ambassador to Germany and was set to embark on that 2-year assignment when he met with an accident resulting in a broken hip. He was traveling alone without an escort after an unofficial trip. Claims by certain media of a conspiracy to assassinate the Maj. General is completely false.

Major General Kamal Gunaratne was appointed by Army Commander Lieutenant General Jagath Jayasooriya the SF Commander Wanni. He is also the Colonel Commandant of the Special Forces Brigade which functioned independently under General Fonseka until the end of the war. Major General Gunaratne is also to receive a foreign diplomatic assignment while still in service.

Brigadier Shevendra Silva has been appointed Director Operations at Army Headquarters Colombo. These officers will each receive a diplomatic assignment on a rotating basis.

Together these valiant officers will carry forward the farsighted reformations put forward by General Fonseka.

A "Sri Lanka Defence Force"

The newly appointed Chief of Defence Staff, General Sarath Fonseka is preparing massive structural changed to the three forces. He has assembled a team of high caliber officers to a new office to be set-up soon at the former JOC (Joint Operations Command).

The new office appropriately titled Office of the Chief of Defence Staff will oversee, in the coming months, a massive overhauling of the three forces. A Gazette Notification has already been prepared.

The Army, Navy and Air Force of the Sri Lanka Army will become more like the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) where land forces will be combined with air superiority and sea-borne forces will be combined also with air superiority.

Experts and insiders say the boundaries between the Army, Navy and the Air Force could become only superficial under this plan, which, in the long-term will become one massive force capable of operating not unlike the US Marine Expeditionary Force.

LTTE posters inside IDP camps

Mysterious LTTE posters have appeared inside several IDP camps threatening the inhabitants and the Sri Lanka government.

The posters, mainly hand-written on pieces of paper contain the following messages:

"Our National Leader (Thalaivar) is not dead. How can anyone kill him? He is invincible. The Army is lying. Anyone collaborating with the Army will be severely dealt with. The Eelam struggle still continues under our leader."

A careful investigation of the source and origin of these poster messages indicates a huge blunder in the administration of the IDP camps. In some cases, inmates under observation as LTTE suspects have even escaped the camps.

In addition to the civil administration in place at these camps, an Intelligence and Counter-Insurgency/Terrorism function was assigned to the camps due to heavy infiltrations by LTTE cadres.

In doing so, the various IDP camps in Vavuniya, Jaffna and Mannar were divided-up among the various intelligence agencies.

These agencies included the Directorate of Military Intelligence (DMI), The Terrorists Investigations Department, the Criminal Investigations Department (CID), the police Special Branch etc.

Based on our observations it was evident that the posters were coming up at Non-DMI administered IDP camps. Many outstanding Intelligence Officers we spoke to were somewhat alarmed at the proposition of smoking-out remaining terrorists when so many agencies are in charge.

UN on Sri Lanka: A Comedy of Errors

These days, talking about Sri Lanka means talking about the Sri Lankan military, its elite politicians and diplomats and…oh yes…The UN. Are we trying to single-out the UN or the “West” here? Not really. The UN is singling its own self out. In fact, the UN looks more ridiculous now than it did when it allowed the Tutsis to be killed in 1994. If you want proof, read the news items in the world press about ‘leaked’ UN reports where the dead Tamil civilians increased from 6,000 to 20,000 almost overnight. In another report, 13,130 civilians had ‘disappeared’ after arriving in the camps.

The UN, certain “Western Governments” and the pro-LTTE Tamil Diaspora are all saying, pretty much the same thing these days. They just cannot accept the fact that Sri Lanka, comprising of all ethnic groups, have prevailed over racist separatism. But this is a simplified way of looking at things.

The United Nations is primarily a tool to police developing countries—to keep them in line with the “West”. It seems that the morally righteous “West” is trying to make the rest of the world tag its line. There is no evidence to prove otherwise. The UN has a track record of selective interventions. The reasons for not intervening, for example in Rwanda, were because President Bill Clinton thought it inappropriate. So we know very clearly who is behind the current UN ‘actions’ against Sri Lanka.

An intervention by the UN in Rwanda was ‘inappropriate’ in 1994 because the UN, backed by the USA were humiliated in Somalia just before the Rwandan genocide started. The use of the word genocide was forbidden in the description of the violence in Rwanda. What in the world did the failed Somali excursion of the USA have to do with those poor Tutsis? Why were they punished by the same International Community who now screams genocide at the Sri Lankan state for wiping out the LTTE? The question on every Sri Lankan’s mind today is why did they all jump in to save the LTTE when they themselves opposed it and when the entire country of Sri Lanka and the rest of the free thinking world (even Communist China) wanted otherwise? What does China’s naval domination in south Asia, Iran’s generosity and Libya’s friendliness to Lanka have to do with Sri Lanka’s right to decide its national security?

The same groups running the UN from the "Western world" today allow a section of the Tamil Diaspora looters the free and undisturbed use of the word “Genocide” to describe the massacre of terrorists in Sri Lanka. How are these two things similar? Where were the Milibands, Kouchners and Clintons when Tutsi’s were massacred in the thousands for 3 months until the Interahamwe gave up on its own, tired? In fact, UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros Ghali refused to even visit Rwanda after the genocide. He was taken, almost by force to a Rwandan church to witness the horror with his own eyes. All he did even then was lie to the survivors that the UN wanted to help those dead Tutsis. Perhaps a Tutsi should have held Navi Pillai’s current position. Then that job would have made some sense.

Now that was a real genocide. Compared to that, what have the Sri Lankan Tamils faced? Large numbers of Tutsi’s were systematically removed from educational institutions in Rwanda. Even the most brilliant ones weren’t spared. In Sri Lanka, Tamil university students come to Colombo and help run the LTTE networks while surviving on government scholarships. Giving birth to a Tutsi child was a crime before and even after 1994. The birth of a Tutsi child was a closely guarded secret. The Tutsi mothers never saw the inside of the local hospital during that entire ordeal. In Sri Lanka, you walk to any hospital, even those in the south; you will see hundreds of ‘minorities’ obtaining free treatment.

No UN documents ‘leaked’ to the press about Rwanda back then. Why do they ‘leak’ now? How and why do these ‘leaks’ occur in the absence of evidence when actual facts about the Rwandan genocide could have been ‘leaked’ handsomely both before and after April 1994?

But the biggest question in our mind is that why do the Diaspora Tamils sitting comfortably abroad perpetuate such hatred when they themselves have nothing to lose or gain from continued violence in the name of separatism? The latest claim was for a Tamil Homeland. Why do Sri Lankan Tamils take this so seriously? Why do Tamils in South India, South Africa, Malaysia (including Prabhakaran’s father and Chelvanayaham), Singapore etc are demanding that the SRI LANKAN TAMILS MUST FIGHT FOR A TAMIL HOMELAND? Why don’t they do it themselves? WHY ONLY THE SRI LANKAN TAMILS, THE POOREST TAMILS ON EARTH, HAVE TO DIE IN THEIR THOUSANDS? Why can’t the Sri Lankan Tamils say NO. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH! TO HELL WITH YOUR HATRED! IT HAS BROUGHT US ONLY MISERY AND SHAME. WE CHOOSE TO LIVE, PROSPER AND COEXIST WITH THE SINHALESE. WE HAVE FINALLY EARNED THAT RIGHT!!!

If you look very closely, you will realize that the Tamil Homeland concept seems to be driven by a group of greedy Tamil elites more than lower class Tamils. The latter plays the subservient role of trooper, suicide bomber and child soldier while the rest live in luxury abroad and perpetuate the hatred. But mark these words. The day moderate Tamils start raising their heads AGAIN isn’t far away. This is all thanks to whom? Who else but the Sinhalese of course! The days of the Tamil racist is numbered in Sri Lanka.

dA