Sri Lanka rebel attack further detailed

Sri Lanka rebel attack further detailed
By RAVI NESSMAN, Associated Press Writer Wed Oct 24, 4:29 AM ET

A rebel attack on an air base this week caused far more damage than previously acknowledged, destroying eight aircraft, including a vital surveillance plane, Sri Lanka's prime minister said Wednesday.
The admission, in a statement to parliament, came amid growing accusations from the opposition that officials lied about the destruction from Monday's pre-dawn attack on Anuradhapura air base in an effort to limit their embarrassment.
The incident was likely to further damage the credibility of the government, which is already facing accusations it underreports its casualty figures and is downplaying the financial cost of its renewed offensive against the Tamil Tiger separatists in northern Sri Lanka.
"The government is not coming out with the truth to the people," said opposition parliamentarian Lakshman Senewiratne. "They have never come out with the truth."
Military and government officials said Monday that the attack by 21 Tamil Tiger suicide fighters had damaged three aircraft, while a fourth helicopter was destroyed when it crashed due to technical failure. The attack and the crash killed 14 troops and 20 rebels, the military said.
The fighters hit the base with a two-pronged assault, using a small-arms attack on the eastern side to divert attention while their comrades raided the hangars on the western side, the military said. Two planes from the rebels' airwing also bombed the base during the attack.
Senewiratne claimed Wednesday that 18 aircraft — along with sophisticated surveillance equipment — totaling nearly $60 million had been destroyed in the attack. Military spokesman Brig. Udaya Nanayakkara denied that, reiterating that only four craft were damaged or destroyed.
However, minutes later, Prime Minister Ratnasiri Wickramanayake stood before parliament and announced that three helicopters, four training planes and a Beechcraft surveillance plane were destroyed in the attack, essentially confirming the Tamil reports of the damage. He did not explain the discrepancy.
Wickramanayake denied the attack was a defeat for the military and called on all political parties to join together in the fight against the rebels, known as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.
"(The attack) was an act of desperation by the LTTE to build their flagging morale and also to get the attention of the international community," he said. "The forces will not be demoralized by this incident."
The opposition United National Party called the attack a major embarrassment for the government and the UNP's Senewiratne demanded President Mahinda Rajapaksa and his brother, Defense Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, resign.
The rebels have been fighting since 1983 for an independent homeland for minority ethnic Tamils after decades of discrimination at the hands of the Sinhalese majority. More than 70,000 people have been killed in the fighting, 5,000 of them since a 2002 cease-fire broke down in late 2005.
Fighting in the north has escalated in recent weeks ahead of what many believe is a planned government offensive to retake the area and crush the rebels.
On Wednesday, the military announced that two rebels were killed in an attack on army forces Tuesday evening along the front lines between rebel-held territory and government-controlled lands in northern Sri Lanka. Other gunbattles in the north on Tuesday killed nine rebels and a soldier, the military said Tuesday.

Sri Lanka says war plan on track despite air force debacle
Wed Oct 24, 3:22 AM ET

Sri Lanka's top defence official vowed to push ahead with operations against the Tamil Tiger rebels, who launched a devastating attack on a key air force base earlier this week.
Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapakse told the government's main website that the deadly raid by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) on the air base would not alter the army's plans.
He "assured that Monday's attack on the Anuradhapura camp would not in any way upset planned military operations against the LTTE terrorists and their bases in the Wanni," the website said, referring to the rebels' mini-state.
The official, the younger brother of President Mahinda Rajapakse, appealed to the opposition "not to play politics" at the expense of the security forces as the war enters a "decisive stage," according to the site, Lanka net.*(Ed)
"Under-estimating the military leadership or their commitment would only help the enemy who is now desperate at this juncture," he said.
The remarks came as the opposition United National Party (UNP) said 18 aircraft were lost in the rebel suicide attack against the military's main logistics base.
The government has officially admitted losing one helicopter together with its four-man crew as well as 10 other security personnel. The authorities have said two more helicopter gunships were "damaged."
But military sources told AFP a Beechcraft spy plane fitted with sophisticated surveillance equipment and three Israeli-built unmanned spy planes were also destroyed in the raid.
The sources said more than two dozen aircraft were housed at the base but only a handful remained able to get airborne after the attack.
The defence secretary had recently made it clear that he wanted to push into the northern Wanni region after sweeping the rebels out of their last bastion in the east of the island in July.
However, military analysts say a shortage of manpower and monsoon rains could delay further military moves against the LTTE. The latest attack was seen as a further blow to such plans.
The Tigers also sent in light aircraft to bomb the Anuradhapura base, 210 kilometres (130 miles) north of the capital Colombo, in their first coordinated land and air strike.
The latest attack came after a string of setbacks for the rebels following the breakdown of a Norwegian-brokered truce in Asia's longest-running civil war.

Sri Lanka opposition says Rs. 6.6 billion lost to Air Force due to Monday’s LTTE attack
Wednesday, October 24, 2007, 11:41 GMT, ColomboPage News Desk, Sri Lanka.

Oct 24, Colombo: Sri Lanka's main opposition United National Party (UNP) issued a list of damaged or destroyed aircrafts due to Monday's predawn Tamil Tiger rebel attack on the Anuradhapura airbase.
Addressing a press briefing this morning UNP Badulla district MP Lakshman Senevirathna said that 18 aircrafts of the Air Force were either destroyed or damaged and the total lost to the country is Rs. 6.6 billion.
UNP Anuradhapura District MP P. Harrison speaking during the debate on the Local Government and Provincial Councils (Amendment) Bill yesterday told at Parliament that 18 aircrafts worth more than 439 million US dollars had been damaged. He further said he was making the disclosure to the House with responsibility and challenged the government to prove him wrong.
The loss from the Beach Craft and its equipment alone is US $ 28 million (Rs. 119.3 million). Sri Lanka had two such Beach Crafts and only the destroyed one was usable, the MP said.
According to the UNP MP, the damaged aircrafts and their value are as follows:
Three PT6 Trainers each worth of US $ 350,000 were destroyed.
One K8 Advanced Jet Trainer worth of US $ 3,500,000 were destroyed.
Two MI-24 Helicopter Gun ships were destroyed and cost of each helicopter is US $ 5,000,000.
One MI-17 Helicopter Troop Carriers was destroyed and the Cost is US $ 5,000,000.
One Bell 212 Helicopter worth of US $ 5,500,000 was destroyed.
The value of the Beach Craft destroyed is US $ 13,000,000.
Thermal imaging and surveillance equipment destroyed are worth of US $ 15,000,000.
Three UAVs were destroyed and each unit costs US $ 1,000,000.
Cost of each camera is US $ 500,000.
Six Cessna aircrafts valued at US $ 150,000 each were destroyed.
The MP said that three more aircrafts were damaged and the details of them would be revealed in the future.
UNP said it revealed all these details as a responsible Opposition since the public have a right to know the truth. He urged the Defense Secretary and the Air Force Commander to admit the responsibility and to resign.

The Myopic Understanding of War and Development
By Kusal Perera-The Independent

The war hype that was maintained by the faulting Rajapaksa regime over the past two years through economic filibustering was busted by a Black Tiger group supported by two of their crude air planes in a single attack on the Saliyapura Air Force base in Anuradhapura, in the wee hours of the morning of 22nd October. The attack the first ground and air co-ordinated attack by the LTTE was by any standard, devastating. Numbers do matter in war, but what matters here most is the military penetration the LTTE was able to make into the main hub of logistics and resources that networks Vavuniya and Trincomalee and through Trincomalee the whole of Jaffna peninsula. What follows next is the political impact such an attack would have on the politics of the South. Its about this war that Defence Ministry Secretary, Gotabhaya Rajapaksa said he knows better than Counter Terrorism Expert Dr. Gerard Chaliand*, just two days before the worst ever attack in the history of the Eelam war. According to Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, the government has already proved to the world that LTTE terrorism can be defeated. And for him, this war provides an opportunity for economic development too.
While answering a question posed by one of those journalists who are usually invited for Presidential media bashes, Gotabhaya Rajapaksa said last Friday (19th October) on a live TV discussion with the President, a selected bunch of Ministers and a few top officials including the Presidential Secretary in attendance, he had provided over 70,000 jobs and salaries paid to over 30,000 more armed voluntary vigilantes in “threatened” villages known before as “border” villages and that brings in a big cash flow into the rural economy. Now that, in his understanding of development, is what needs to be appreciated by all others. And mind you, he feels proud even the private sector can not match him on numbers.
What ever the job(s), wages do provide a source for cash flow and it is true these soldiers pump in some cash into the rural economy as they are from the villages and not from the middle class urban families. Hundred thousand and more jobs in the security forces despite a savage war being fought, is a big number within the rural economy in our country and it was one important component in village economies all through two decades of war.
In little hamlets, though the landscape is disturbed with “heroes’ tombs”, families with a soldier earn a respect too, within the hyped “macho” image of the Sinhala patriot, who comes home on leave once in about three months with daring and adventurous stories to be told to the young and the old at the “kada pila”(front porch in the little village boutique). He often leaves at the end of his short vacation, with an addition to the brick and cement house he started the previous time he came, or with a new plot of land cleared either to start a new building or for big cultivation. All of that is enjoyed by the rural society that does not know what war is otherwise, to live with. That in fact is one reason the Sinhala rural society in the South backs the war cry.
It is this employment through war Gotabhaya think is good enough rural development. What he does not understand is, they are all “rolling jobs”. They go with replacement necessities every time a soldier deserts his regiment, goes missing in action or comes home in a polythene bag. During this period when the war was sporadic with limited and selective attacks by the government, the LTTE opted for more politics than war. They were extremely selective in taking only military targets and their politics is not in the South for the Sinhala people to engage in, but obviously international. Thoppigala that saw no heavy fighting and the clearing of the East that sees some clash some where almost every day and security forces being inflicted with damage, the government was capitalising on exaggerated victories on the battle front. That definitely was its survival, with the JVP and the JHU too wanting the continuation of the war.
Yet what the government could not do with markets and what Gotabhaya does not understand is that those young men who get their hands on some cash, don’t have much in the markets for that money. The economy was grinding to a halt. There isn’t any growth in production. Neither in consumer production nor in agriculture. That drives inflation higher and would go beyond the present 15%. That depreciates the rupee and had driven the bank interests to over 18% during the past year. The private sector is thus caught in an avalanche of price hikes in all overheads and raw material sourcing. This crunch on the economy leaves the private sector if not shrinking, then trying to survive. The rural economy can not grow on its own and stands stagnated, unable to absorb youth who enter the job market. Where could they turn to for a living, except to the war that Gotabhaya feels he could win?
So, Gotabhaya feels he is doing miracles adding to development with jobs in the security forces. But unfortunately for him, he could not himself survive with his miracle for more than three days after declaring its success. The war is a fluctuating business. Geographical gains as projected by the government is not everything. The LTTE giving up the East and then denting the logistic capacity of the security forces at its nerve centre creates a vital shift in military power on the ground and then politically on the psyche of the Southern society. The immediate reaction among most who thought the government was winning the war and thought they would bear the economic burden, was shocked out of their dream of defeating the LTTE.
Thus its worth taking a cue from counter terrorism expert Dr. Challand, even if political forecasting of rational minds are not heeded. LTTE is the product of discrimination of Tamil aspirations. Those legitimate aspirations have to be met within a power sharing mechanism, before taking on the LTTE. Development as seen by Gotabhaya is thus myopic and totally counter productive in defeating the LTTE. This truth is naked if you do not know how to dress it with political understanding.
* Dr. Gerard Chaliand is a counter terrorism expert who had worked with the EU and was invited to make a keynote address at a seminar on counter terrorism at the BMICH. His interview on what Gotabhaya contradicted him was given to Reuters on Saturday 20th October, in Colombo.