Cease the cries for ceasefire

By Swarnajith Udana

(March 31, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) From a considerable number of organizations there are loud cries for ceasefire. That itself is not a bad idea. Any reasonable person (This excludes LTTE and its supporters.) would want to save civilians. What I cannot see-may be due to lack of military expertise and not being privy to sufficient information- how can a ceasefire save even a single civilian life if the LTTE does not agree to release the civilians during a well determined ceasefire? Do the people who crave for a ceasefire care to tell the Sri Lankan Government how can the civilians be saved even if the LTTE would choose to tighten the noose around the civilians? I am not saying that there are no such methods; the problem is that I cannot perceive such methods due to limitedness of my mind. If any body can show this I will be crying for a ceasefire too since it cuts the noose around the civilians and tightens around the LTTE.

How did our affairs develop into this sorry state that International community at large is blind to these realities? There is no doubt the LTTE is a unique phenomena in the stage of international arena. They are cunning, innovative and resourceful. All these aspects rise from one single black hole; A black hole that usurps all positive human qualities and x-rays only sinister ruthlessness reinforced by no-remorse-no-guilt-no-shame spirituality of True Godly maxims. This is true but are we to believe or say that the LTTE is invincible? Who offered them this invincibility? We can say Masters did. It may be also true. So, if that is the whole truth, nothing but the truth, then aren’t we doomed and accepting that the LTTE is undefeatable?

If we really want to defeat the LTTE militarily and spiritually then we need to look at our roles in granting the LTTE its invincibility. Only by seeing that it is us, more than any body else, who grants the LTTE its divineness then we can empower us to truly take out their invincibility. Otherwise, we will have to wait until the LTTE sheds its invincibility by itself and the Masters take it away. That is not going to happen.

How did we give the LTTE its invincibility? Recently Mr. Thomas Johnpulle writing on Sri Lanka Guardian claimed that Jaffna Tamil people gave up the idea of independence state for economic reasons. Yes it is true that one of them claimed they need 50/50 representation. It is also true that colonial powers had ignited racial friction between the ethnic groups. Even then the Jaffna Tamils choose not to ask for an independent state. (I am not a historian-so I may be wrong here in detail but my basic tenet would still be correct. For that matter, even if I am a historian I may still be wrong regardless my sincerity since even exact sciences cannot claim to achieve absolute truths.) Whatever the situation is it is absolute truth that there was racial disharmony and friction fuelled by colonial powers (This statement does not exonerate Tamils or Sinhalese for keeping the fuel working on themselves.) and still the Tamil people choose (may be reluctantly) agreed to live in one Sri Lanka or Ceylon. Now what did our politicians do quell the fires deep insides of hearts.

Rather they themselves choose to fuel the racial disharmony and sold their souls for foul votes. Dear Sinhalese do not ask what Tamils did or did not do to soothe the situation and nurture National identity among all. If you do then you are surrendering control of yourselves to another group. Dear Tamils do not ask what Sinhalese did or did not do either. You both people need to stand for fairness to all and throw away animalistic tribalistic world view in favour of more humane version of patriotism and ethnic love. If it is impossible to you, then you are choosing war. If we do not choose to change ways of our hearts we are fuelling Sinhalese and Tamil extremist groups. The Sinhala version of LTTE or the upgrade version of LTTE may not be far away. (Please do not interpret this as a support for power devolution, federalism or separatism. In fact some time ago, I happened to be a supporter of separatism or at least federalism. In principle, I am not against separatism or federalism, yet in practical terms federalism or power devolution in racial lines could spell disaster for both Tamils and Sinhalese, is what I believe now.)

It is evident that the LTTE blissfully welcomed 1983 riots. They knew the right buttons to push to make it happen. How did they know? They knew it because they accurately gauged the sentiments of Sinhalese politicians and some segments of Sinhalese population. They did not kidnap our politicians and make them burn the Jaffna Library. Some of our politicians did it voluntarily. The LTTE did not take the hands of Sinhalese mobs and raise those hands and planted them with swords then landed the hands on Tamils to unleash lethal power. Some one is saying even these mobs were led by Tamils (LTTE) themselves. If any Tamil went near by such a mob they would have been killed by the mob instantly. We should not LTTE type games with truth. Why did JR wait so long to address the Nation and ask for calmness? Was it because he was abducted by the LTTE and kept hostage until enough damage was done to satisfy the horrendous plan of the LTTE.

If we want to decimate the myth of LTTE invincibility we need to take control; control of ourselves, that is, not of Tamils. We need to clearly understand how a segments of Sinhalese people themselves ignited racial disharmony. Then Even a larger segment physically or attitudinally follow these sentiments fuelled by racial hatred. If we see this collectively we can free ourselves from this evil and reach out to our Tamil brothers and sisters. Do not leave it to them. Let us be strong assertive and reach out them without yielding. Is this impossible? Alright then we have the luxury of war and suicide bombing.

Upon arrival of this LTTE menace, having helped them to establish themselves as a military power what did our politicians do? The LTTE became a gold mine for some of our ministers and army officers. They let our young people to be slaughtered at the will of the LTTE and virtually sold their corpuses to fill their coffers with dollars. Some of our politicians and army officers made every possible buck from commissions obtained by purchasing ineffective bullets and non-protective bulletproof vests. The list goes on and on. We ornamented the LTTE with the myth of invincibility and we celebrated their invincibility with pious feelings of reverence. We can blame India, NGO and many other evil forces. By doing that what we only do is to hand over the control to somebody else. We are subliminally saying to us “They are so powerful and we are helpless.” For the credit of this current Government, this feeding of one’s own coffers using the beggars wound of the war seems to have almost eradicated. It seems like that now the soldiers are looked after and being well disciplined.

True Sun God may be planning to do a Jim Jones; commit mass murder and suicide as it happened on 18th of November 1976 in Guyana. One may argue this suicide-murder was initiated by the visit of Congressman Leo Ryan. If such a heinous crime happens in the safe zone then some of our masters may be waiting to blame Sri Lanka for initiating the crime by choosing to defend its sovereignty. I wish that True God will have sanity enough not to commit such thing since I cannot bear that harm of this magnitude coming to our brothers and sisters not because some are waiting to tarnish the image of Sri Lanka.

-Sri Lanka Guardian