Lessons from Lanka: In war, fight to the finish:

Hey folks,this post is an officious one, straight from the op-ed section of Deccan Chronicle. Here's another piece from Vice -Admiral Arun Kumar Singh. His articles are a treat to read as it is written in simple and lucid language and he conceives his points only after an in-depth analysis of the situation. My salutations to you sir! The excerpt is as follows:

“ Over the last four decades, I have had some exposure to Sri Lanka, though I cannot call myself as an “expert”. As a young officer I first went to Colombo in 1971 on a war ship when some Indian Navy units were deployed, at the request of the Sri Lankan government, to tackle a Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) uprising. In 1989, I spent a few months in Trincomalee as part of the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF).
In 2000, as the Eastern Fleet Commander, I wondered whether the LTTE had won a decisive victory when some 60,000 Sri Lankan Army personnel were trapped in northern Sri Lanka. I subsequently visited Colombo in 2004 when the LTTE was still on the upswing. Finally,in my last job in 2007, I studied Sri Lanka closely and came to the conclusion that this conflict would continue forever. I may hastily add here that this might still be the case today unless the LTTE surrenders or it is totally destroyed and the Lankan Tamils are visibly rehabilitated into Sri Lanka's mainstream at the earliest.
Something had happened in the last 18 months which has made me revise my earlier assessment. Media reports coming in since June 2007 indicated a new resolve in the attitude of the Sri Lankan political and military leadership. Many fierce battles were fought on sea and on land and it slowly became clear that the LTTE, despite its past record of victories, was now facing a more determined and professional Sri Lankan military. How did this come about? The answer lies in new-found political will, along with adequate funding and reorganization of their military and intelligence network, to fight the war to the finish. In addition, the LTTE made a cardinal mistake of shifting from guerrilla warfare to a more conventional war-fighting against a larger military force.
The LTTE, which since from 1983 had gradually evolved into the world's first terrorist force to boast of an Army, Navy, Air Force and even a fledgling submarine force, is slowly but surely facing defeat. The various factors which have resulted in the LTTE being limited to a small 250sq km pocket, with just the sea behind it, are as follows:

post 9/11, the world accepted that there are no “good terrorists” or “freedom fighters”. Global crackdown on terror networks and funding (37 countries banned the LTTE) had a decisive impact on the LTTE's ability to bring in supplies into Sri Lanka.
I 2005, the Sri Lankan military increased its strength by 40% and its Navy completely cut off ingress of seaborne LTTE supplies of arms and ammunition, in addition to evolving new tactics to defeat the LTTE sea Tigers. The Sri Lankan Army received fresh supplies of artillery and rockets from Pakistan and China, while its Air Force was gifted a few fighter jets by China. India's contribution was understandably severely limited due to the strong emotional sentiments emanating from Tamil Nadu.
The Sri Lankans revamped their intelligence and took decisive measures to drastically reduce the capability of LTTE to strike targets in major cities. Once forced to fight a conventional war in the jungles, the numerically inferior LTTE became vulnerable to the superior Sri Lankan firepower and manpower.
Unlike India, which has been debating on the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) issue for decades, Sri Lanka decided to introduce a four-star CDS in 2005,(the three service chiefs are three-star). This ensured that the government received direct, single point professional military advice and there was greater synergy between the three services.
There has been a qualitative change in the leadership of the Sri Lankan military with deserving young officers being promoted and given demanding combat roles.
On the diplomatic front too Sri Lanka has displayed strong political will and reacted with flexibility to the international outcry (including from India) against collateral damage and loss of civilian life, while continuing the fight against the LTTE to its logical conclusion.
The lessons for India are self-evident. I will only add that the long-overdue police reforms need to be introduced, and the 1.5 lakh existing police vacancies filled up at the earliest.

India has boundary disputes with two nuclear-armed neighbors who are openly colluding to dismember us after having initially grabbed some territory in Kashmir and Aksai Chin. It would be extremely foolish to expect Pakistan to dismantle its terror network or to give up its nefarious designs to destabilize India. Adding to this complexity is the possibility that the new Obama administration may attempt to link the Kashmir issue to the war in Afghanistan and also enforce the implementation of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) followed by the Fissile Material Cut-Off Treaty (FMCT)- these two treaties will ensure that our strategic deterrent, already handicapped due to insufficient testing, will never provide even “credible minimum deterrence”.

The possibility of nuclear-armed Pakistan either disintegrating and becoming another lawless Somalia or another Afghanistan is fast becoming a reality with the Taliban imposing its writ in NWFP, Fata and Swat, while parts of Baluchistan are in flames. In either scenario, India will be flooded with millions of refugees along with thousands of jihadi terrorists. These will add to the security and economic problems caused by about 25 million illegal Bangladeshis already in India. The expected influx of Tamil refugees along with the LTTE, from Sri Lanka to Tamil Nadu will have its own security implications.
Post 26/11, India is internationally perceived as a weak, indecisive nation, unable to defend its own citizens, leave alone provide any regional leadership. Indeed, a few think tanks which earlier clubbed India with China, have begun to delete any reference to India as a superpower- that position is now being reserved only for China.

What will be the political implications in case LTTE supremo Prabhakaran is captured and extradited to India? What steps is India taking to counter or preempt the latest LTTE threat that “the war will now be fought in Sri Lanka and Tamil Nadu?” why has the DRDO consistently failed in various high-profile projects costing thousands of crores when even the LTTE appears to have built midget submarines in jungles?

In response to these questions, I can only quote, a line from a popular anti-war song by Bob Dylan..”How many deaths will it take , till he knows that too many people have died.. the answer my friend is blowing in the wind” “

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