EXCERPTS FROM THE BOOK “CHOICES”

The Indian government therefore was in intense and constant touch with the Sri Lankans and President Rajapaksa, using a “troika” arrangement consisting of National Security Adviser M. K. Narayanan, Defence Secretary Vijay Singh, and myself as Foreign Secretary, on our side; and Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, Secretary to the President Lalith Weeratunga, and member of Parliament and the president’s political right hand, Basil Rajapaksa, on the Sri Lankan side. (Both Basil and Gotabhaya were President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s brothers, which made decision-making easy and quick, but the decisions, once made, were also final and hard to change) India’s External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee took a personal interest and was actively involved throughout, as was Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. I vividly remember the atmosphere of crisis that built up during that period, and the repeated visits to and from Colombo in the first five months of

2009. Particularly memorable were midnight visits to Colombo with Pranab Mukherjee when we flew into Colombo at 8.00 p.m. and went straight to the Presidential Palace for a military briefing by Fonseka and a political one by President Rajapaksa, and had a long conversation exploring options until we left the palace after midnight to fly home on the Indian Air Force’s ‘Embraer’ jet.

In those conversations with the Sri Lankans, we concentrated on attempting to save civilians. To prevent attacks on civilians, we asked that there be safe corridors for them to exit the fighting zone, that an amnesty policy be announced and enforced visibly, that fighter jets not be used in the conflict to strafe LTTE positions surrounded by civilians (as most of them were deliberately located by the LTTE), and so on. To their credit, while the Rajapaksas negotiated hard to avoid limitations on their ability to wage war against their mortal enemy, they did agree to allow safe passage corridors and to create safe zones for civilians in January and February. Later in March they also agreed not to use heavy-calibre weapons when the LTTE had trapped a large number of civilians with them in a tiny area along the coast in the final stages of the war. More significantly, the Rajapaksas implemented these commitments in practice.

At the same time, Norway and the United States were attempting to secure a ceasefire to negotiate exile for Prabhakaran and to explore other exit strategies that would effectively keep the LTTE alive to fight another day - politically or militarily. For politicians and leaders in India, whether in Tamil Nadu or in Delhi, this was not an acceptable stance or outcome. Political leaders across the political divide in Tamil Nadu knew that the only way Prabhakaran could lead Tamil Eelam would be to physically eliminate the real leaders of the Tamils who were in India, just as he had already done to other Tamil leaders in Sri Lanka.

But peace is more than an absence of violence and the presence of basic infrastructure. It is also in the mind. And this is where Sri Lanka has failed since the war. A victorious regime under Mahinda Rajapaksa and the Sinhala majority did not show the magnanimity in victory that true peace requires. Equally, the Tamil community does not have leaders left who can make peace.

On the other hand, international opinion shifted after the war to seeking a reckoning for war crimes and human rights violations. Since the LTTE had been eliminated as an organization, in practice, this meant calling the Sri Lankan government to account for its conduct of the war and its human rights violations. The United States took the lead in piloting stronger and stronger resolutions through the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) after the war.

I found that, as Defence Secretary, Gotabhaya had a clear view of Sri Lanka’s interests, one that was compatible with ours. Immediately after the war, he reassured the Indian troika about the nature of Sri Lanka’s defence relationship with China, and helped Indian companies re-enter the reconstruction of Colombo. Security was Gotabaya’s sole preoccupation, which made him sensitive to India’s concerns, while his brother Mahinda was much more compliant with Chinese demands, having built a political machine on Chinese money. The basic assurances that Gotabhaya and, more reluctantly, Mahinda Rajapaksa gave us were that India’s security interests would be respected and that there would be no surprises in Sri Lanka’s relations with China.

The Sri Lankan civil war is one of the few instances I can think of where terrorism (but not separatism) was successfully eradicated by purely military means. It is arguable that some brutality was inevitable in a war of this kind, against a violent terrorist group that had shown no qualms about terrorizing its own people and physically eliminating all its potential adversaries; Tamil or Sinhala. Indeed, one must logically ask the question, would an earlier adoption of the more brutal methods of the last thirty months of the war have brought it to an earlier end and actually have saved lives and minimized the war’s deleterious effects? (This is a recurring problem in statecraft. It is also the strongest justification for the use of atomic weapons to end World War II).

This was also one of the longest civil wars in history, which only heightened its impact-political, psychological and in other ways. While rehabilitation was possible and fast, reconciliation has been virtually impossible. And as time passes it seems less likely that there will be a reckoning that satisfies all concerned. The world is ready to move on, as are the victors, the Sinhala. But in my view, the Tamil sense of grievances unaddressed makes the return of separatism and radicalism in another form a matter of time. Much will depend on how politics and society develop in Tamil Nadu, the true land of the Tamils in the years ahead. For the present, there is declared sympathy but little real support in Tamil Nadu for the causes or the methods that the LTTE adopted.

I found that, as Defence Secretary, Gotabhaya had a clear view of Sri Lanka’s interests, one that was compatible with ours.