What led to the current crisis?

G. D. C. Weerasinghe

Today we publish the ninth part of the serialisation of the book 'Conflict Resolution Lessons for Sri Lanka'. The eighth part was published on April 04. The seventh part was published on April 02, sixth was on March 26 and fifth was on March 19.

It was a war situation that existed and power had to be consolidated in the hands of the Leader. The Leader must have the power to take control of the war machinery and issue directions.

The British have no written Constitution but Churchill seemed to have assumed virtually absolute control of the machinery of government from what he says on page 13 of his book. "... The fundamental changes in the machinery of war direction were more real than apparent. 'A Constitution', said Napoleon, 'should be short and obscure' The existing mechanisms remained intact. No official personalities were changed.

"The War Cabinet and the Chiefs of Staff Committee at the beginning, continued to meet every day as they had done before. In calling myself, with the king's approval, as the Minister of Defence I had made no legal or constitutional change. I had been careful not to define my rights and duties.

I asked for no special powers either from the Crown or Parliament. It was however understood and accepted that I should assume the general direction of the war, subject to the support of the War Cabinet and the House of Commons. The Key change which occurred on my taking over was of course the supervision and direction of the Chiefs of Staff committee by a Minister of Defence with undefined powers.

As this Minister was also the Prime Minister, he had all the rights inherent in the office, including very wide powers of selection and removal of all professional and political personages.

Thus, for the first time, the Chiefs of Staff Committee assumed its due and proper place in direct daily contact with the executive head of the Government, and in accordance with him had full control over the conduct of the war and the armed forces..."

The reality

Today, we are at war. It might not be called as such, but, the reality is that there is a war. It has been a festering wound for about 20 years. It is time our politicians got together and formed a National Government as the British did in 1940 at a time of grave threat to their country.

The territorial integrity of the country and the people today face a grave threat. This threat applies to all our citizens. The Sinhalese, the Tamils and the Muslims should all get together to fight this fascist monster. The terrorists have been able to obtain an area of occupation because of the wrongs and the grievous decision made by President Premadasa.

When the Indian army vacated Sri Lanka on his orders President Premadasa should have asked the Sri Lankan Army to occupy the regions in the North and the East vacated by the Indian Army.

The Tigers took over control of these areas and established a de-facto mini state. Another decision that had serious repercussions was the order he gave to the army and the police in those areas to surrender to the LTTE. The Army defied this order fought their way through and came to the South. The Police surrendered to the Tigers.

They were executed and we still do not know where these policemen were even buried. The 600 odd policemen who were executed have no known graves and their families are still unaware of their burial places.

This was a crime of murder even under the Geneva Convention. President Premadasa supplied armaments etc. to the Tigers and funded their fighting capacity. He also used the state apparatus and the other publicity organs to carry out a campaign to denigrate the Indian forces.

Contrary to diplomatic protocol, no formal request was made to the Indian government to remove the Indian forces from Sri Lanka. The announcement in which he directed orders to the Indian troops to leave was declared at a temple meeting. It is no doubt true that he was under pressure to request the Indian troops to leave Sri Lanka. If he was a Statesman however, he should have weighed the implications of these directions.

He should have waited until the Indians had finished up the Tigers. This may have taken only a few weeks more. After the Tigers were vanquished, he could have directed them to leave Sri Lanka.

His haste to win cheap popular support cost the country dearly. If Prabhakaran was eliminated in a jungle hide-out by the Indian army, we would not be having this problem today. We are paying very heavily for that disastrous decision.

In the war situation we are in, we cannot follow normal legal processes. I have quoted Winston Churchill in order to highlight how he obtained virtually unlimited powers. We have still not taken steps to meet this situation. The Tigers came to Colombo Airport and blew up a large number of planes. Apart from the serious material damage, the international image of Sri Lanka was destroyed to a great extent. The incident clearly shows that we cannot even guard the single airport we have.

It is obvious that there has been a great dereliction of duty amounting to treachery on the part of a number of officers posted to safeguard the Airport. Those responsible should have been tried by Court martial. If grave dereliction is proved they should have been executed. This is how wars are waged. In war time you cannot have long time civil inquiries.

In 1940, France had fallen and the British were fighting the Axis powers alone (Germany and its allies) In the book The eloquence of Winston Churchill we find this quotation, "...We shall go on to the end.

We shall fight in France we shall fight on the seas and oceans. We shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Island whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender....."

It is in this spirit that wars have to be fought. It is because we do not have this spirit that we are fighting for the last twenty odd years. There was one President who supplied arms and money to the terrorists.

We had another President who provided passports and helped Prabhakaran to get his children to foreign Universities. This is our tragedy. In the ultimate analysis it is the spirit of man that matters. This is why Ho Chi Min said "the most important thing is the man behind the gun".

I wish to give here an illustration of a true warrior. In 1944, five soldiers of the Japanese army in the Philippines were directed to stay in the jungles and carry on the war and were directed not to surrender.

The war was over, but they refused to surrender. Even though many attempts were made to make them surrender, they carried on the battle. In 1975, they were tricked to surrender. The only remaining soldier ceremonially surrendered his sword to Ferdinand Marcos who was the President of the Philippines. On his return to Japan this brave soldier wrote a book No Surrender, My thirty Year War by Hiroo Onado.

Another such incident is referred to by Prof. Gilbert in his book "The History of the Second World War" on page 740.

I am referring to these incidents to show the importance of indoctrinating our troops with a sense of patriotism.

The country is at war. It should therefore be put on a war footing. Wars cannot be waged in half measures. A war requires total and complete commitment. It must be waged aggressively and ruthlessly. An example is Guantanamo the American base in Cuba.

The attack on the September 11, 2001 changed attitudes altogether. People captured in Afghanistan and other countries were taken to Guantanamo. These bases are supposed to be beyond the jurisdiction of American Courts.

According to evidence available people have been kidnapped from various countries and taken to secret camps. This is the result of just one attack on America. We have had terrorist attacks for over 20 odd years. And we are asked to negotiate with these terrorists, whilst negotiating with terrorists, we must effectively attack the terrorist. Then, they will not be able to perpetrate acts of terrorism.

The primary task of our Government should be to instill in Sri Lankans a sense of patriotism. This should be done by getting every child to salute the National Flag and to pledge an oath of allegiance to the country every morning. Sinhala has to be the National Language since it is spoken by about 74% of the population of the country. But Tamil and Sinhala should be considered as National Languages.

This is an exceptional situation where even though about 74% of the population are Sinhala, Tamil and Sinhala are given equal status. I have given examples of what discrimination is earlier and the necessity for inter-mixing of children of all communities in one class room.

The circular ordering that children of Tamil parents should study in the Tamil medium and Sinhala students to study in Sinhala should be withdrawn. By doing this, children of all communities could study in one classroom and thereby develop bonds of friendship. It will prevent extremist ideas being inculcated in the minds of the children.

This circular is the most pernicious order issued by the Department of Education. This is how the ground work was laid by the racists for the establishment of Eelam. Let us take the example of Switzerland. The Swiss population is composed of 70% German-speaking, 20% French-speaking, 09% Italian-speaking and 01% of those who speak Romansh.

The parents were at liberty to decide the language in which children are educated. This is a democratic right of every parent. Nobody is compelled to educate his child in the language the state decides. Sri Lanka does not grant this democratic freedom. Every Tamil child must be educated in Tamil and every Sinhala child must be educated in Sinhala.

This is an insidious method by which the Eelamists laid the foundation for the creation of Eelam and it is extremely important to remove this circular for the purpose of creating a united Sri Lanka. This will enable Tamil and Sinhala children to get together as it used to be earlier. The importance lies in the fact that ideas are inculcated in children. When children are separated, the risk of racist and separatist ideas being inculcated in the minds of children is greater. This danger must be eliminated.

Assessing the Tigers

In any war situation, one of the most important tasks is to assess your enemy. In this case, you have to determine as to how the fascist leader - Prabhakaran's mind works. It is my view he is not interested in the rights of the Tamil people. It is a ploy used for the purpose of establishing a fascist kingdom to be ruled by him.

Sadly we must admit that the incorrect policies of the Government made his task easier. The first public knowledge of his activities came to light when he murdered Alfred Duraiyappah, the then Mayor of Jaffna in 1976. He then murdered Inspector Bastian Pillai who was said to be an able investigator sent to investigate the murder. There were two others who were also murdered with Bastianpillai.

To be continued