History8217;s lost chances

President Chandrika Kumaratunga8217;s plans to divert all but essential funds to the war effort and the sweeping powers given to the police and armed forces by an ordinance convey the sense of crisis gripping the government. As dramatic as these measures appear to be, they will not be half as effective in altering the military situation in the north as the long-range guns which the army is said to be trying to acquire now. Had those guns been available earlier the army would not be looking at its worst ever debacle. As a disastrous scenario builds up in Jaffna, with some 40,000 to 25,000 troops holed up there and civilians preparing to flee the fighting, Sri Lankans would not be wrong to ask why it has taken so long for the government to galvanise itself to meet the situation. It was no secret that the LTTE would try to regain Jaffna or that they had moved cadres and weapons closer towards the peninsula in recent months.

Once again in Sri Lanka, as in many other places at other times where small armed groups outmanoeuvre armies several times their size, it all boils down to motivation and morale. While a peace initiative was developing in Sri Lanka this time with the help of the Norwegians, there was no pause in the LTTE8217;s plans to recover Jaffna. The government, in contrast, appears to have lowered its guard so much so that no emergency measures, including seeking munitions abroad, were considered even as the LTTE moved to recapture the crucial Elephant Pass. When military action leading to the fall of the Pass was taking place, the Sri Lanka government looked for all the world as though it was on holiday: Kumaratunga who is also defence minister was abroad as were seven or eight other members of the cabinet and the seniormost remaining minister was the ailing Sirimavo Bandaranaike.

It is a truism that long wars between nations obliterate the original causes that led to war. The reverse is true of long running wars within nations as in Sri Lanka where the civil war is deepening ethnic conflict. During the long years since the LTTE emerged as the sole group under arms fighting for Tamil Eelam, attention has inevitably focussed on the bloody course of the civil war. Changing fortunes, body counts, waves of innocents fleeing battlegrounds, new weaponry and military tactics these have been in the forefront, not the ways in which ethnic tensions can be defused and a multi-ethnic society be built. The government8217;s devolution proposals are sound but have been a non-starter. As the gains and losses of war accumulate adding to ethnic histories8217; and memory, the burdens of ethnicity grow and the opportunity to create a multi-ethnic national history recedes. Because of its high educational levels Sri Lanka is better placed than the other countries of South Asia to build a cohesive society in whichethnic differences are tolerated rather than be allowed to tear people apart. But as the war continues it is going to be harder to overcome the past and forge a new society. This is a critical juncture. If the government loses Jaffna, it will have lost all the military advantages gained at huge cost to civilians and in men and material in 1995. Worse it will have lost the best chance it ever had to bring this long bloody war to a close.