What a callous and insensitive remark Dayan Jayathilake! Is that the best you can do?

Key principles when facing civilian casualties during a military assault/conflict.

1. A military target remains a legitimate military target, even if it is located in a civilian area. The LTTE hid their mortars and heavy artillery amongst Tamil civilians to prevent the SL govt from legitimately destroying these assets.

2. The use of civilians as shields to try to prevent attacks on military targets is prohibited. Further comment on this aspect of the LTTE’s strategy is futile.

3. “The presence of a protected person [i.e. civilian hostages] may not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations.”4th Geneva Convention, Article 28.

4. The armed forces are not liable where injury to civilians results from unavoidable collateral damage, provided it is proportionate to the military gains expected of the attack.

5. “Civilians do not enjoy absolute immunity. Their presence will not render military objects immune from attack for the mere reason that it is impossible to bombard them without causing injury to the non-combatants.” Oppenheim’s ‘International Law’

Fact 1: The LTTE used the Wanni civilians as a shield to prevent attacks on their forces by SL govt forces. Yes or No? Yes.

Fact 2: The LTTE intermingled their fighting positions amongst the civilians in the ‘No Fire Zone’. Yes or No? Yes..

All of the above conditions existed during the last phase of the crushing of the LTTE. The SL govt did what they could to minimise civilians casualties during the final assault, but they were acting entirely within legal limits noted above.

@ [Edited out.] Heshan: The West has definitively beaten Sri Lanka in the war crimes/human rights abuses game.

http://thecarthaginiansolution.wordpress.com/2011/02/13/sri-lanka-can-never-beat-the-west/

The US needs to capture Iraq intact [Edited out.] Nuking it will be useless because then they couldn’t go back in and steal the oil without radiation poisoning. The only reason the US is there is because of the oil. So the lack of nukes isn’t because the US feel warm and cuddly about the Arabs, but because restraint is to their advantage. Whereas in Japan it didn’t matter, and so they killed hundreds of thousands of civilians for no reason.

“I was in Jaffna in 1987 and don’t recall the LTTE’s practice of using human shields then. I know from firsthand experience that during “Operation Liberation”, it was the SLA that used human shields; we experienced the terror of random shelling by the SLA. Some of my friends got walked for 8 miles as shields by the SLA before they were all taken to the Boosa camp and kept there by Lalith Athulathmudali.”

Well, we’ll have to take your word on that one. Personally, I have never heard of it. I have relatives and friends who lived in Jaffna throughout the ’80s and into the ’90s, and they never mentioned it. I served in Elephant Pass and Vasavilan in the early ’90s and never saw anything like that. However, I did see the children sent forward by the Tigers to run through our minefields and clear paths for the following adults.

“Though the LTTE might have used some human shields during its fight with the use of human shields started mainly after they became a conventional force.”

The LTTE fought as conventional force against Kobekkaduwa’s Op Liberation in ’87. They also attacked as a conventional force in ’91 against Elephant Pass, and later at Welioya. In the ’90s they became increasingly conventional in their tactics, and when Elephant Pass finally fell, it was in a conventional assault supported by artillery. In the last two years too the Tigers fought as a conventional force, holding frontlines against the Army. So if what you’re saying is true, the Tiger use of human shields would have increased over the last 20 years to what we finally saw in 2008.

“The GoSL knew that its strategy of boxing in the LTTE along with the people would produce such a situation, but it diden’t care and was baying for blood.”

The GoSL boxed in the Tigers; but it was the Tigers that took the civilians with them as shields.

“The LTTE had been weakened considerably by the beginning of the war, following the Karuna revolt, tsunami, etc. A large percentage of its cadre by then was conscripted and unmotivated to fight. The GoSL had started to dominate the seas with India’s help. At that point, a state that values the lives of its own citizens could have found many ways to accelerate the implosion of the LTTE without committing mass atrocities.”

Could you detail some of these many ingenious ways? And while you’re about it, could you also show evidence of “mass atrocities”?

Really? How come then the UNP regime killed 40,000 Sinhalese in less than three years before they defeated the JVP and captured Wijeweera? That comes to 10,000 Sinhalese a year from 1987-90. In contrast, about 75,000 Tamils have died over 30 years in the northern war, which makes it roughly 2,500 a year. So 10,000 : 2,500. How do you think it would have felt if the SL Army killed 10,000 Tamils a year? That would have totaled 300,000 Tamils.

The only reason aircraft weren’t used against the JVP was because they never captured and held territory like the Tigers. There was nothing to bomb.

“You seem to believe that mass atrocities against civilians are justified if the state doesn’t have the technology or the competence to handle insurgencies without killing a large number of civilians.”

But there haven’t been any mass atrocities as you suggest, Agnos. The war was conducted within the laws set by the Geneva Conventions. If you somehow think that war can be conducted according to some Enid Blyton ideal where no innocents are harmed, you’re living in some sort of fantasy world. People die in war, and in modern war it’s often innocents. The Tigers chose to fight in the most callous and cynical manner, selecting a strategy which would be the most harmful to the very Tamils they claimed to represent and defend. In such a situation, the state is obliged to take as many reasonable precautions to minimise loss of civilian life, and I believe the GoSL and the military did so. If these precautions weren’t taken, tens of thousands more would have perished, and while that’s no consolation to the dead and maimed, nor to their families, at least they can rest assure that no more such innocents will die as they did in the last thirty years.

“Deliberately disregarding the distinction between civilians and combatants is a crime for which Sri Lanka will pay a heavy price.”

But there was no such disregard; in fact, the Army lost lives trying to protect and free the civilians held at gunpoint as shields by the Tigers.

“The US problems in Afghanistan have to do with a lot of other factors”

They may be different factors to the ones here in SL, but that doesn’t mean that the factors here can be dismissed as you do. The war in SL had its own unique factors that prevented it being finished off quickly and efficiently; and the fact that it lasted thirty years is pretty much evidence of those difficult factors. In the circumstances, the conclusion of the war in a mere two years by this regime and its military commanders is testament to its competence.

“like lack of intelligence, collaboration with Pakistani intelligence, which ironically nurtured–and segments of which still support–the Taliban.”

A lack of intelligence cannot be used as an excuse, it is a failing that must nevertheless be surmounted, and the Pakistani factor is a result of a failure of US foreign policy in the ’80s and ’90s. No general is provided with a perfect battlefield; you do the best with what you have, and try to win. That’s war.

“It is a war in a faraway country with a lot of logistical problems.”

Rubbish. This isn’t the Crusades or the German invasion of the USSR. The US is a global superpower with regional commands more powerful than most nations. The US isn’t supplying their military in Iraq along an ocean-wide logistics chain. There is no shortage of weapons, ammo, food, fuel, or any of the other material needed for making war, so logistics isn’t a factor in its inability to target the enemy top brass.

“The US has the technology but it is not enough when other factors don’t align.”

What other extenuating factors are there in Iraq that are not there in similar form in any war?

“You can’t compare that to Sri Lanka’s war in Mullaithivu/Puthukudiyiruppu.”

So which war would you feel comfortable in comparing our war to?

“And Sri Lanka had the Karuna group, with its rich intelligence on the LTTE, on its side.”

The Karuna group’s usefulness has been widely exaggerated, particularly in the Northern Province. They were quite useful in the East where the fighting was more fluid and the Tigers were maneuvering to exchange territory for manpower. It was a different story in the North, particularly after the Mannar area was captured and the Tigers were falling back to the A9. After that it was a war of attrition, two armies fighting toe to toe with no room for flanking actions. In addition, the SL military didn’t have the airmobile capability to exploit the third flank which would have saved time and lives. Instead, they used infantry and armour in hammer strokes against the anvil of the Navy. After Kilinochchi fell there was no room for finesse, we just hammered them til they collapsed. It was like watching Tyson get an opponent against the ropes. Moments of good fortune, like the cutting off and surrounding of Anandapuram were rare. By the last months, even special forces were useless except as shock infantry.

“Despite being a third world country, India has good satellite technology. I have heard from remote sensing experts here in the US that Indian satellite programs come pretty close to those of the US and Canada.”

Lol, stop watching all those Hollywood movies, Agnos! You can’t fight a war via satellite, as the US is learning in Iraq and Afghanistan. Satellites, UAVs, and aerial recce can only do so much. After that you still have to go in with rifle and bayonet and kill them in their holes.

“I don’t need to read Indian military types, who had unfinished business with the LTTE, or journalists. I have my own sources on the ground, and the UTHR has produced several reports.”</em"

“These are far more credible. Now AI, HRW and ICG, all credible organizations, are coming out together with war crimes charges”

There will always be war crimes in war, Agnos. No war is free of them. But you’re talking about widespread atrocities, a policy of disregarding civilians or even intentionally targeting them. AI, HRW, or anyone else has been unable to show any evidence of such things; which is why there are no war crimes charges being formulated against the GoSL, nor are there any sanctions, UN resolutions, or anything else.

“All available evidence, from multiple sources, points unmistakably to war crimes by Sri Lanka.”

Please tell us what this evidence is.

“Given India’s technological capabilities, let Sri Lanka ask India to produce real-time satellite imagery to prove there were no war crimes by SL forces.”

How can you prove that something doesn’t exist? You can only prove that somethingdoes exist. The absence of evidence is the evidence of absence.

Excellent piece. I guess these sentiments must surely be similar to those of any people who have suffered a defeat, however unacceptable and tyrannical their leadership might have been — Germans in 1945, Iraqis today, etc. Hopefully with the emergence of the TNA into the political center — something I was hoping for and recommending for over a year now — the Tamils will begin to feel better represented and capable of getting the Sinhalese to also compromise in the long term.

“If Sri Lanka and India had jointly found ways, using whatever technological advances possible, to eliminate the LTTE’s top leadership without visiting this catastrophe on the Tamil people, it would have been hard for even the hardcore LTTE people to complain. Tamil people would have been able to appreciate the resulting peace.”

Agnos, while this Utopian sort of warfare is ideal, it almost never happens. If only our leaders were willing to fight like David & Goliath or Dutugemunu & Elara, but that is fantasy. I remember JRJ challenging Wijeweera to a boxing match at Galle Face, but that was a bit of a joke. With all its technology the US can’t get Bin Laden and couldn’t get Saddam without invading and killing thousands. There are no laser beams and x-ray vision to conveniently find the leaders and zap ’em like James Bond. You need informants and spies and lots of cooperation from the general population to find these guys, and there wasn’t a lot of the latter. In spite of this, we had a few successes and got guys like Thamilselvam and Shankar. That’s the best you can hope for.

“I recall reading in some sources that there was some violence against Tamils in the 1960?s as well,”

The 1961 Satyagraha?

Dear Agnos,

Sorry I didn’t reply. I lost track of the thread. My thanks to eeurekaa for resurrecting it.

“This is the kind of drivel that DJ writes; he has zero credibility,”

DJ’s credibility can be questioned, but what do you think about the credibility of the voices screaming about war crimes that were dead silent when the LTTE was conscripting Tamil children and butchering Tamil dissidents?

“Once they falsely accused a little girl in Delft who was raped and killed– and her body dumped into a well– by SL Navy personnel, as having indulged in prostitution. They apologized for it later but the damage was done.”

Could you please show me which report this was?

The fact that UTHR acknowledged making mistakes sets them apart from practically everybody else who has reported on the war and gives the UTHR much more credibility. Unless you can show a more credible source?

“They were nowhere near to being a conventional army at that time, so they simply mined the areas close to the camps and then withdrew with minimal casualties to their cadre.”

Very interesting. Since you were there, could you please explain how the LTTE was able to withdraw “with minimal casualties” but the civilians were not??????

You were in Jaffna when the LTTE started destroying the other militant groups in 1986-7. How did that make you feel to watch Tamils massacring other Tamils? Did it occur to you that if the LTTE had not done this, there would have been enough fighters to slow down the SLA without forcing civilians into that task?

“By the same logic, the hardcore LTTE people would ask: “Did any critic of the LTTE provide us with the arms, the anti-aircraft missiles, or even the nuclear bomb, to liberate the Tamil people and establish Tamil Eelam once and for all?””

Dayan was asking specifically about how to minimise civilian deaths. You seem to be asking how to maximise these deaths.

“the LTTE’s conscription of children and suicide bombings were a result of its lack of manpower and more advanced military hardware.”

If lack of manpower or weapons were really an issue, the LTTE would have ended the war in 1987 when the IPKF pulled the plug on Operation Liberation. The result would have been the defeat of the SL govt since it would never have beaten the Indians. As it turned out, the LTTE conscripted Tamil children because it (and its supporters) viewed these children’s lives as worthless.