Passive voice

The war in Sri Lanka is heating up, but Indian diplomacy is playing it safe

What started as a familiar Tamil Nadu-India-Sri Lanka spat last month to bail out the Tigers — in the guise of humanitarian concerns for ethnic Tamils — ended in a diplomatic charade. On an unprecedented military high, Colombo rejected Delhi-Chennai's demand for ceasefire, ending the war and reviving the political process. It conceded only to guaranteeing the security of the Tamils caught in the war zone.

Buddhist monks have traditionally reflected the fortunes of war and the national mood in Sri Lanka. In 1987, after India's military intervention they chanted ‘Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF)  Get Out’; when the chips were down in 2000, it was ‘IPKF Come Back’; now, on a winning spree, it is ‘IPKF Keep Out'.

India's reactions to developments in Sri Lanka, invariably determined by domestic politics of Tamil Nadu has perfected into a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP). The National Security Advisor makes a statement or issues a demarche before flying to Chennai. The Foreign Secretary and the prime minister's office make proforma statements expressing grave concerns about the plight of civilians caught in the war, the futility of a military offensive and necessity of reviving the political process. This time, though, the external affairs ministry added: “Government of India will do all in its power to achieve these goals”.

In this instance, there was slight variation in SOP. Foreign minister Pranab Mukherjee went to Chennai to placate Tamil leaders and president Mahinda Rajapaksa's brother Basil Rajapaksa, in charge of the North East, came to Delhi and so on. The dust settled as swiftly as it was raised though residual noises are coming out of Chennai. 

It was India that forced the 13th Amendment on power-sharing in Sri Lanka, merged the Northern and Eastern provinces, established the first elected Tamil provincial government and much later offered the Defence Cooperation Agreement as a means of deterring the Tigers from a military solution as a quid pro quo for devolution to the Tamils. India's disastrous hands-off policy in the 1990s undid all the gains of its coercive diplomacy: merger of the North East, and devolution. The quality of the devolution package has always hinged on the military capacity of LTTE. Bereft of creative diplomacy, New Delhi has played itself out of the game by severing all contacts with LTTE, constrained by Tamil Nadu politics and giving a free hand to Colombo.

Sri Lanka, on the other hand, has changed the canvas. Having installed a renegade LTTE government in the demerged east, president Rajapaksa's refurbished military is on the verge of capturing Kilinochchi, the political capital of the LTTE, bombing the daylights out of a cornered Prabhakaran. Victory is being delayed, say the Lankans, in deference to India's humanitarian concerns, not acknowledging the stiff resistance being put up by the LTTE.

By defining new parameters, president Rajapaksa has changed the optics of war. He contends there is no longer any ethnic conflict, only war against LTTE terrorists. India is giving maximum cooperation and helping in crushing the Tigers, his ministers add.

Devolution of power will be implemented once the Tiger menace has been eradicated, asserts the president. Rajapaksa is rewriting the conventional strategic thought: there is no military solution to a political problem. However, he denies that this is what he is advocating even as India continues to supply defensive war equipment and share military intelligence to keep arch rivals China and Pakistan at bay, both of whom are best of friends with Sri Lanka and active collaborators in the same war.

Rajapaksa's army chief, General Sarath Fonseka is redrawing the map of Sri Lanka, not just through military victories but also by declaring that he believes that “this country belongs to the Sinhalese…” Battlefield success is blinding political and military actors in Lanka to recent history. In 1999, the LTTE was able to recover in nine days, the territory it had lost to government forces over 19 months. Prabhakaran may not be able to repeat that miracle but as the Tiger Air Force demonstrated last week with its stunning air attacks over Mannar and Colombo, the eighth and ninth unintercepted strikes in less than two years, that there is still a lot of fight left in the LTTE. Don't write them off. They will shift from conventional to guerilla warfare.

While Tamil Nadu leaders make believe they've won the last round and India pretends it has gained a diplomatic victory, it is Rajapaksa who is the real winner from the latest diplomatic encounter. Unfortunately the ethnic Tamils whose plight triggered off the October row will continue to suffer in the crossfire. Rajapaksa should implement the 13th Amendment without waiting to defeat the LTTE.

The writer is a commentator on south Asian affairs