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One swallow doesn’t make a summer!Editorial Courtesy The Island 29th October 2007As a shower is to leeches in suspended animation, so was last week's
LTTE attack on the Anuradapua airbase to the Tiger sympathisers, who
had been without something to hang on to for more than a year. The e-mail
Tigers are cock-a-hoop and their local print media counterparts are
on cloud nine like kudukarayas who have got a sufficient dose, having
fought a prolonged bout of withdrawal symptoms. They would have us believe
that the LTTE has turned the tables on the military with a single attack
and carved out Eelam! And the war, we are being told, is not winnable
for the state and the LTTE is invincible. Paradoxically, they grudgingly
accept that the offensive capability of the SLAF is not seriously dented. Every dog, it is said, has its day. So does every Tiger! But, one swallow
doesn't make a summer. In a war debacles are inevitable and the victory
hinges, inter alia, on one's ability to absorb losses. The LTTE is lucky
as this country has never experienced a total war situation similar
to what prevailed in America during the Civil War, when the scorched
earth policy was given full cry and Lincoln's army bragged that if a
crow were to fly from the East coast to the West coast, it would have
to carry provisions. Such was the widespread destruction that it wreaked
on the enemy territory. We don't advocate total war, lest our intent should be misunderstood. But, in a real war situation, where no quarter is asked and no quarter given, as for survival, the Tigers will stand the same chance as a cat in hell. In 1987, during the Vadamarachchi battle, India had to intervene to remove Prabhakaran to safety. In 1995, he had to run all the way to Kilinochchi, leaving behind his empire in spite of the myths floated before Operation Riviresa by his sympathizers that the army would lose as many as 15,000 troops, if it ever tried to retake Jaffna. Hence, one sees a high octane performance on the part of the LTTE sympathizers including its international allies who are waving the bludgeon of R2P (Responsibility/Right to Protect civilians-a euphemism for direct foreign intervention) and the whole caboodle of dollar-driven pro-Tiger NGOs to keep the conflict at a manageable level. For, in a low intensity war, it is always guerrillas who stand to gain.
Now that the military has baulked at marching on the Wanni, the LTTE
has time to go on the offensive. Moreover, the military is now engaged in peacetime activities such
as grand motoring events like the Gajaba Cross, which happened on the
eve of the Anuradhapura attack and helped the Tigers with infiltration.
The LTTE lost its Black Tigers unnecessarily, as we argued the other
day. It could have overrun the airbase with its baby brigade. Had a
few pilots of the Prabhakaran & Son Company accompanied the attackers,
they, so to speak, might have been able to remove some of the SLAF aircraft
to the Wanni without destroying them wholesale. The airbase debacle is more attributable to the lapses on the part
of the SLAF than the LTTE's ability. The LTTE is, no doubt, a formidable
outfit not to be taken lightly but if it is so capable as it is made
out to be, why hasn't it been able to wrest control of Jaffna yet? And
why couldn't it defend Mavil Aru, Muttur, Vakarai and Thoppigala? The LTTE is promising a separate state shortly. But, the question is
whether it can achieve its goal with sporadic attacks which are few
and far between. At this rate, how long will it have to go on fighting? The LTTE propagandists claim that Prabharkaran ordered the Anuradhapura
attack in view of his heroes' day speech next month. (Some of them are
offering gratuitous advice to the military to expect more such attacks!)
If so, he is acting like the much-maligned politicians of the South,
who are playing politics with the war effort. Are we to gather that
Prabhakaran, too, has become another edawela tours (a derogatory term
for a private bus operator dependent on his daily collection for survival-which
the JVP uses to ridicule the Rajapaksa government) and is resorting
to ad hoc offensives to keep himself going? But, if Prabhakaran is a real leader, then he will have to explain
to those who fund his war why he lost eight arms ships fully loaded
with military supplies within one year, fled Mavil Aru and abandoned
the East, the be-all and end-all of Eelam. Most of all, he will have
to own up to the near total collapse of his international arms procurement
network and admit that for the first time he has lost control over Jaffna
and the East at the same time. The present phase of war, it may be recalled,
began not with the Anuradhapura attack but in June last year, when the
LTTE captured the Mavil Aru anicut. Prabharakaran, therefore, will have
to elaborate on his debacles as well in his grand speech. We don't want to hear the stock excuse of LTTE sympathizers for Prabhakaran's
Forrest Gump type marathon via the East-as a local saying goes worshiping
his feet: Guerrillas always run away to fight another day. For, the
LTTE claims to be a conventional military force capable of routing the
state security forces. It also claims to have put in place infrastructure of a de facto state.
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