Dilemmas of a nation in war and peace – Part One

“The final result will depend on the power of Sarath to eat into the nationalist vote now in the hands of Mahinda. This is the vote bank that was missing in Wickremesinghe’s camp. He had lost the Sinhala-Buddhist vote because he was aligned too close to the anti-national forces.”
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By H. L. D. Mahindapala

(December 02, Melbourne, Sri Lanka Guardian) War brought out the best in us. Peace has brought out the worst. War helped us to close ranks and hold us together. Peace has blown this apart.

War taught us that we have the capacity to overcome all obstacles and achieve the impossible combating local and external forces. Peace is now throwing us back to primeval politics of wild beasts feeding on each other.

In the light of what is happening now, it seems that war was preferable to peace. No one expected peace to take this destructive turn. Peace has turned inward to fight the very forces that fought for peace. We didn’t fight the war to make peace a bitter battlefield for comrades-in-arms to indulge in dog-eat-dog politics. But that is exactly what has happened.

There is, in a sense, a historical inevitability in this turn of events. Forces that come together tend to fly apart sooner or later. It is a part of the permutations and combinations of bizarre politics that go to make history. But what took everyone by surprise is the speed with which it came and shattered the euphoria of victory. The nation was expecting that it could go to bed without spending sleepless nights. We thought that we had overcome the worst and the future was in our hands. But the split in the ranks of those who fought the common enemies has raised serious doubts about the way we are about to manage peace.

Instead of sweet dreams we are now tossing and turning again once again haunted by the worst nightmares. All this questions the very rationale on which we made sacrifices to win the war. Did our heroic soldiers and the nation at large give all what they had for the politico-military forces to unite the nation under one flag or did they wage a war to create new space for the enemies of the nation to exploit peace to regain what they had lost in the war?

In peace it seems we are back to square one. The unholy divisions have given new life to the defeated forces. They are jubilant and the trumpets of their triumphalism are loud enough to wake up Prabhakaran from his grave and perform his devil dance once again on the 15,000 hectares given to him gratis with the compliments of Ranil Wickremesinghe. The anti-national forces that fought against the advance of the forces to save the nation are now crowing because they have managed, at last, to break up the unity of the troika that pulled the nation out of the morass. The Mahinda Rajapakse – Sarath Fonseka – Gotabaya Rajapakse triumurti was hard to beat. Together they provided the most formidable – if not invincible – power against all-comers. The break-up of that unity at this time is indeed tragic for all parties.

From the little information that I have it seems that it was a petty fight of egos between Gen. Sarath Fonseka and Gotabaya Rajapakse that flared into a national crisis. As Commander-in-Chief Mahinda Rajapakse should have banged their heads together and made them fall in line. As President he had the power and charisma to throw his hands round both and closed the widening gap. But since blood is thicker than military muscle he let the rot set in posing the most serious threat to his seat since he won the consent of the people in 2005.

In the past it was the President who divided the opposition and brought the dissidents into his fold. For the first time Ranil Wickremesinghe feels elated that he has managed to beat the President in his own game. Ironically, his temporary victory is doomed to be his permanent loss. What he is refusing to acknowledge now is that he has embraced a bear who has not yet put out his claws. When eventually the claws come out no cleaners or body bags will be required to pick up Wickremesinghe’s bones.

Wickremesinghe is noted for making agreements that take him nowhere. He signed his notorious agreement with Prabhakaran and what did he achieve? He neither won peace nor the votes from both sides of the divide. He signed another ill-fated agreement with Mangala Samaraweera, hoping to over throw the Rajapakse government in the budget vote. Samaraweera could neither bring over the 17 SLFPers he promised to the opposition nor install Wickremesinghe in the Presidential chair. Then he entered into a pact with Rauf Hakeem hoping to win the east. He lost that too. And he has been losing every election since then. He has also been clever in losing his rank and file.

This time he has done what no political leader with any commonsense or self-respect has ever done. He has sold out the party and his own future to an unknown and unpredictable factor in the hope of achieving what he never can achieve: the Presidency. There are limits to folly but Wickremesinghe has gone beyond folly into self-inflicted stupidity that will seal his fate forever. He has virtually handed over his chicken coop to not a fox but a wolf in sheep’s clothing -- and I say this as a compliment to my friend Sarath Fonseka. Both are playing a vahen horay game – a game in which both are trying to outwit each other by posing as buddy-buddies. Wickremesinghe believes that he can make use of Sarath to pull his chestnuts out and Sarath too is playing the same game.

In this game Wickremesinghe has lost already. By handing over the leadership of the presidential race to Sarath it goes without saying that Wickremesinghe has publicly confessed that he is no leader who can win the confidence of the people. The people too have conveyed this blunt message to him several times and knowing the outcome awaiting him if he runs for presidency he has thrown a front-man whom, he thinks, has the most likely chance of beating Mahinda Rajapakse. It’s the biggest gamble of his political career and the chances are that he will lose again.

But it must be conceded that Sarath is posing the most serious threat to Mahinda Rajapakse – bigger than even Prabhakaran. It would have been a cake walk for Mahinda if the troika worked together under his command. The tragic split has weakened the horse power of three and reduced it to horse power one – Mahinda Rajapakse. It is now a race between Mahinda and Sarath. Gotabaya is out of the race. The troika was effective in the battlefield. Now that the war is over and now that Sarath too has left his uniform the battle has shifted to the political arena where only the two political candidates matter. It’s new ball game in which different tactics and alignments come into play.

The final result will depend on the power of Sarath to eat into the nationalist vote now in the hands of Mahinda. This is the vote bank that was missing in Wickremesinghe’s camp. He had lost the Sinhala-Buddhist vote because he was aligned too close to the anti-national forces. The people saw him as a despicable traitor and he behaved like one particularly at the height of the war when he and his fellow-travellers scoffed at Gen. Fonseka’s valiant efforts to defeat the common enemies.

It is on his alignment with Wickremesinghe that I disagree with my friend Sarath. As a general in the army he fought just not to win victories in the battlefield (which he did and for which he deserves 95% of the credit, as he claimed) but to protect the nation from the external and internal enemies. It is unthinkable that he should join the enemies of the nation who are still lurking in the background to win all what they lost due to the heroic efforts of Gen. Fonseka. He claimed that 95% of the victory was due to his strategies and the efforts of his forces. If he claims 95% of that victory for himself then it is his bounden duty to give 100% of it back to the nation that stood by him every inch of the way.

I agree that 95% of the victory is due to him. Whether it is Mac Arthur or Eisenhower the credit goes ultimately to the overall commander in the field. It is true that the allied forces, political and military, contributed their part to the victory. But the ultimate responsibility was with the commander of the ground forces. All military victories are measured in terms of winning territory and there is, no doubt, that Gen. Fonseka planned it meticulously to lead the forces to the last battle in Nanthi Kadal. But how much of the heroism will go to Gen. Arthur and Gen. Eisenhower if, after the war, Mac Arthur joined the Japanese or Gen. Eisenhower joined the defeated Nazis? In fact, after the World War II Mac Arthur continued to play his constructive role in Japan in winning over the enemies to the Western camp and turning Japan in a dynamic democracy. It was when he began to play politics in the North Korean war that he was cashiered by President Truman.

Besides, Gen. Fonseka’s 95% claim places a huge responsibility on his shoulders to see it through to the end because the enemies whom he fought are raising their heads again. What is unpardonable in this saga is that the enemies whom he fought are using him now to destroy the very forces he fought to protect. He was accepted as a hero because he fought to defend the nation. Every battle he won was seen as a victory for the nation threatened by the enemies. Of course, a share of it goes to him too. But the war was won not for Sarath Fonseka but for the nation. How can he now join the same old enemies who continue to threaten the nation? How can he now get out of his uniform and destroy the very ideals that he fought to uphold and protect?

Heroes die with their boots on defending the causes they fought for. They don’t change their uniforms and turn against the forces that lifted them into the high pedestal of heroism. This is the tragedy of Gen. Fonseka. He has turned against himself. He was trusted, admired and hero-worshipped when he fought for the nation. Now he is seen as a civilian fighting for his own glory. This has undermined his reputation as a selfless defender of the nation. This not only questions his character and motives but also his commitment to fundamental principles to which he pledged his life. “Over my dead body,” he said committing himself unequivocally to the principles which he swore to defend. This has placed his followers in a serious dilemma. Whom are the voters going to trust: is it the civilian Sarath Fonseka playing politics with the enemies of the nation or the Gen. Fonseka they knew as their hero? By joining his former enemies isn’t he committing hara-kiri? He seems to be the typical flawed Shakesperian character like Coriolanus whose hubris brought him down, despite his brilliance in the battlefield.

-Sri Lanka Guardian