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There is also an indication that the detailed information necessary to have pinpointed the location of the LTTE leader in the wee hours of the morning could only have come from within the LTTE itself. It may have been this combination of factors that made the Sri Lankan Defense Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa assert that the government would get the LTTE leadership one by one.
Ironically, at the same time the BBC reported the news of Thamilselvan's killing by a Sri Lankan airstrike, it also reported that an Israeli airstrike in the Gaza Strip had killed a Hamas leader. For several years now the Israeli government has been targeting Palestinian militants with deadly effect, eliminating a large number of them. But the conflict in Palestine does not seem any closer to resolution. Although some of those killings seemed very significant at the time they took place, none of them has led to a solution to the conflict. Instead they have generated still more hatred and determination to retaliate and fight back.
The killing of Thamilselvan is likely to lead to more severe escalation of the present phase of war. It deepens the crisis of violence that confronts the country and serves as a grisly reminder of the tens of thousands of lives that have been lost, including a large number of democratically elected leaders of the government and other political actors. In its statement condemning the government, the Tamil National Alliance, which represents the war-battered Tamil people of the north and east in Parliament, called on the LTTE to reconsider deeply its strategy.
As Thamilselvan was the LTTEs chief negotiator at the last two rounds of peace talks, his death will be a major setback to any possibility of a return to the negotiating table any time soon. The government's choice of him as a target also suggests a lack of belief in the relevance of negotiations at this time.
The weakness of the LTTE that is manifesting itself at the present time has been its inability to convert its military capacity into an equivalent political strength. Only a fortnight ago the LTTE demonstrated once again its capacity for guerilla warfare with its attack on the Anuradhapura Air Force Base. They destroyed millions of dollars worth of aircraft on the ground.
On the other hand, even during the peace process, the LTTE was unable to change the perception of itself as a terrorist organization. Not one of the countries that had banned the LTTE made any move to lift that ban. During even the height of the peace process between 2002 and 2004 the LTTE kept on with its program of assassinating its political opponents and forcibly recruiting children. Although several LTTE delegations visited foreign countries on exposure tours, they failed to make the crucial shift toward a political organization that no longer used violence as an instrument of political achievement.
The question is how the LTTE will respond to the killing of Thamilselvan. Its spokesman has said the group will respond with deeds and not with words. Sri Lanka has grown accustomed to a cycle of reprisals, where each side attempts to outdo the other in inflicting damage and pain. If the past is any guide to the future, the LTTE will attempt to level the score by attacking an equivalent or more important target, be it an individual, a military base or economic asset that would shatter the government's morale. President Mahinda Rajapaksa has warned his government members to be on the highest alert.
Such retaliatory and escalatory actions will be satisfying to the instinct of revenge. Success will also be a morale booster. But experience has shown that such successes are ephemeral and illusionary. The fundamental military balance does not change with one or two setbacks, even if they are important ones. The history of the ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka is full of examples of very high-level people who have been killed, including a president, without altering the long-term trajectory of the conflict to any noticeable degree.
As advocated by the Tamil National Alliance, the LTTE needs to consider a complete shift of approach, and one that accords with the best interests of the Tamil people. As a relatively small ethnic minority, the Tamil people desire a negotiated political solution based on the principles of justice, power sharing and mutual consent, and not one that is imposed by violence, unilateralism and brute force.
At the present time the Sri Lankan government is headed by a leadership whose background and experience of the LTTE has made them think otherwise. The grim outlook is an escalated cycle of violence and revenge that will further dehumanize the social and moral fabric of the country. The alternative is for the government and LTTE to address the political root causes that gave rise to the conflict as a matter of priority. They would then find that the military conflict would become much easier to resolve.
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(Dr. Jehan Perera is executive director of the National Peace Council of Sri Lanka, an independent advocacy organization. He studied economics at Harvard College and holds a doctorate in law from Harvard Law School. ©Copyright Jehan Perera.)
