First Take on LTTE Air raids on Colombo

By Col R Hariharan

(February 21, Chennai, Sri Lanka Guardian)The ability of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) to shock and surprise once again came into play when two light aircraft of its air wing made a daring bid to bomb the headquarters of the Air Force in Colombo and the Katunayake air base near the capital around 9.45 PM on February 20, 2009. But unlike the LTTE's earlier six bombing raids this time the two aircraft did not return home. Both were shot down by the much maligned Sri Lankan air defence system that got into action quickly on spotting the aircraft.

The LTTE reported that the "successful" air raids were carried out by two elite Black Air Tigers Col Rooban and Lt Col Sirithiran, both decorated pilots having flown earlier bombing missions of the LTTE. The pro-LTTE TamilNet website reporting the news displayed a photograph showing the two smiling pilots standing with the LTTE chief V Prabhakaran in the middle with his arms around them. Of course, there was no smile on his face.

The army reported one of the aircraft dropped a bomb on the Internal Revenue building near Air Headquarters, but crashed between third and twelfth floors breaking into pieces. Body parts of the pilot and parts of the air craft debris have been recovered. . According to the government newspaper Daily News, 50 people injured (including two of them who died later) in the incident were admitted to a Colombo hospital.

The other aircraft on the mission to bomb Katunayake air base was hit and crashed nearby. It was later found in a badly damaged condition with the dead pilot inside the aircraft. Bombs and explosives it carried were found intact in the aircraft according to defence sources.

The air raid has come at a time when the operations weighted heavily against the LTTE so far are in the last lap. In fact, the security forces, encircling the last patch (less than 100 sq km according to defence website) northwest of Mullaittivu, reported further gains in nibbling into the LTTE territory both in the north and west of Puthukkudiyiruppu.

Though the missions appear to have failed they give some useful pointers into various aspects of the situation:

* Planning and carrying out an air raid after losing seven air strips shows that the LTTE has not lost its nerve yet. So any call to the LTTE to abandon its fight and surrender its arms is unlikely to yield any results. And that means the unwelcome baptism of fire of civilians trapped in the war zone is likely to continue. This is grim news for everyone. It also means the security forces operations will further be slowed down.

* The failure of the air raid has shown that the security forces air defence system was not lulled into complacency when the LTTE went on its last legs of fighting. This would indicate that the security forces had an inkling of residual air capacity of the LTTE as the aircraft were not recovered so far. More importantly they had factored in the possibility of the LTTE surprising them.

* One of the important question remaining to be answered is from where did the two aircraft emerge. I had written about the possibility of mothballed aircraft hidden in underground defences for future use. Apparently it was not done like that. That would indicate the LTTE had the confidence of safely taking them out and launching them on a mission, even though it might sound like its last hurrah.

* Lastly, the Vanni area east of A9 highway is saturated with troops. If the aircraft had taken off from one of the secret airstrips remaining in the jungle between the A35 Paranthan-Mullaittivu road and A32 Mankulam-Mullaittivu road it might have been detected early by troops on the ground. It is not known whether air defence got such a warning. If not, is there a secret airstrip outside the Vanni area say south of Mannar, which is lightly policed, from where they could have taken off? When the air force pieces the details together, would probably be in a better position to answer these questions in the coming days, I presume.

Even in this is the first take one thing appears to be certain. The war is not going to end so easily; so probably Karuna is correct in his assessment that it would drag on say for a year or more.

(Col. R Hariharan, a retired Military Intelligence specialist on South Asia, served as the head of intelligence of the Indian Peace Keeping Force in Sri Lanka 1987-90.He is associated with the South Asia Analysis Group and the Chennai Centre for China Studies. E-mail:colhari@yahoo.com)
-Sri Lanka Guardian