The turn against the ‘rapacious West’ and the re-turn of communalism
by Rajan Philips
“The rapacious West” was the epithet Prime Minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike flung at the West, feeding off the anti-imperialist fodder of the 1960s. That was during her first stint as PM and she chose the occasion of a State Banquet in Beijing to deliver the insult. J.R. Jayewardene, famous for his after dinner wit, would have cracked a few Chinese jokes. Not that anyone in the West significantly noticed, but the world’s first female PM provoked headlines in Colombo more in jest than in admiration.
[Sri Lankan protesters burn placards during a protest outside the British Embassy in Colombo, Sri Lanka, Monday, May 18, 2009.-AP pic]
JR himself would have chuckled at the spectacle, although he was then in his lonely eminence, in his Ward Place residence. Years later, JR would show his contempt for Mrs. Bandaranaike’s foreign forays by breaking with tradition and passing on the External Affairs portfolio to a lesser person when he succeeded her as Prime Minister in 1977. And it was a massively mandated succession accompanied by full throated hosannas to the West and its economies, and one that crushed the SLFP and wiped the Left off the electoral map. What goes around comes around. This karma will not end.
After more than forty years the rapacious West is back in Sri Lanka’s black book. Another SLFP government under a different family rule is now railing against it. But unlike in the 1960s, the accompanying rhetoric of anti-imperialism is fake and surreal, a farcical encore in the tragic unfolding of a bloody war. It is the war against the LTTE and the unfounded assumption that the West was somehow trying to save the tiger bacon that gave the Sri Lankan government the excuse to whip itself into a patriotic frenzy.
The fact of the matter is that without the banning of the LTTE as a terrorist organization by India and Western governments and the resulting crackdown on its international operations, the LTTE might not have been isolated and weakened to the point of imploding so spectacularly in the end. That the LTTE’s so called conventional military strength was highly overrated both by itself and by the government, but for entirely opposite reasons, is a different matter. What the Western governments, while not opposing the war targeting the LTTE, apparently wanted from the Sri Lankan government was its commitment to minimize the impacts on civilians and the assurance of a political solution after the war. No formal commitment was made and no guarantees remain.
The currently popular culture of disparaging the West and disrespecting the UN is in stark contrast to Sri Lanka’s positions more than twenty years ago, yes, under the then UNP-JRJ government, when the fight with the LTTE began in earnest. In the 1980s India was the main outside supporter of Sri Lankan Tamils and a number of Indian government agencies both at the Central and the Tamil Nadu State level either directly or indirectly supported the various Tamil militant groups including the LTTE, in their mobilization activities using Tamil Nadu as base. In 1987, India forced the Sri Lankan government to abruptly stop its military offensive that had just got underway in the Jaffna Peninsula. Decrying India’s bullying and to countervail India’s pressure tactics the JR government pleaded for Western involvement and even for UN presence on the Island. How the tables have been turned in 2009?
Fast forward to Geneva
At the special session of the 47-member UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva immediately after the war, India was alongside China and Pakistan helping Sri Lanka thwart a resolution by mostly European and a few Latin American countries calling for an investigation of human rights violations by both the Sri Lankan Government and the LTTE. India gave all the help it could for Sri Lanka to successfully push through a counter-resolution that amounted to self-congratulation for defeating terrorism and insistence on international financial assistance for post-war reconstruction and rehabilitation. The efforts of even soft-power countries like Argentina, Czech Republic, Chile, Mauritius, Mexico and Switzerland, some of them recovering from their own histories of human rights abuses, to amend the Sri Lankan resolution to allow UN investigation of human rights abuses were also procedurally rejected thanks to India’s objections. Jawaharlal Nehru would have been proud!
In the Geneva debate, perhaps the high-water mark of his inconsistent political career, the Sri Lankan Ambassador to the UN in Geneva allegedly waxed eloquent on his government’s commitment to implementing the 13th Amendment that is already part of Sri Lanka’s basic law. Regardless of what was said or how it was said in Geneva, Sri Lanka could not have got a stronger endorsement of its commitment to the 13th Amendment from anyone other than India. For it was India that took a certain blame for forcing down the 13th Amendment on an unwilling Sri Lankan government, and it is again India that is now taking a different kind of blame for blessing a different Sri Lankan government to wage ‘unlimited war’ against the LTTE on the understanding that the 13th Amendment would be implemented after the war.
Strangely, or not so strangely, one hears positively about the prospects of the 13th Amendment more in New Delhi than in Colombo. Even the alleged commitment to the 13th Amendment in Geneva entered the Sri Lankan news circles as a result of the attacks against it by JVP-JHU-NPM forces. Rather than praising the man who brilliantly saved his benefactor’s bacon in Geneva, the JVP-JHU-NPM attack dogs are criticizing him for what they consider to be an unnecessary commitment. The more transparent 13th Amendment plus or minus advocates within the Rajapakse government are reportedly receiving worse treatment from the same attack dogs than the Ambassador in Geneva.
It used to be said that by raising the extreme separatist demand, Tamil politics had forced the Sri Lankan governments to seriously consider federalism as a constitutional option. The 13th Amendment came as a half-way compromise. Then it was said that with the LTTE around, nothing could be done, neither the 13th Amendment, nor plus or minus. So the LTTE had to go. It is gone now for all intents and purpose, unless you believe that it is not fully gone until every child, woman and man in the 300,000 Tamils interned in the Vanni is screened and cleared.
Even that should not prevent activating the dormant 13th Amendment. Not so for the JVP-JHU-NPM folks. What was killed as separatism at the front door should not be allowed through the backdoor as the 13th Amendment is their argument. The LTTE is gone, but old communalism has returned.
All the while, President Rajapakse is sticking to mute mode when it comes to saying something, anything, positively about a political solution to the Tamil problem. May be he has lapsed into the now common denial mode that with the LTTE gone, gone too is the Tamil problem. Even if he does not care a damn about the wretched Tamils, he could do something to save his moderate supporters from his extreme attack dogs. He is not all that mute when it comes to insisting on Sri Lanka’s unitariness, or establishing his political lineage to the old kings of Sri Lanka.
Some in the President’s camp would want him to be King. It is not the Philosopher King in the Platonian model that they have in mind, but a kingdom of thieves with no checks and balances where they could reap the riches. In such a kingdom, it doesn’t matter whether you have the 13th Amendment, the 17th Amendment, or anything else. It would be a homemade kingdom like Burma, and not a ‘supermarket of Constitutions’ that Socrates envisaged for Athens. And only such kingdoms and not the contemporary constitutional mosaics of the West, where many Sri Lankans of all ethnic and hybrid hues live as free people and not the King’s subjects, that could properly be called ‘rapacious’.
21 Comments
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Sinhala - Tamil problem will never be solved as long as Tamils are there.
The only solution is to rid of Tamils, either by killing them or chasing out of the country or by forcing them to become Sinhalese.
In this situation, the best option for so called Tamils is to become Sinhalese.
If all are Sinhalese then there is no problem. Yes, the Western nations, UN and maybe India may issue statements condemning it, but who cares.
Lets' make Srilanka only a Sinhala Nation. Then there will be no civil war, no Sinahala - Tamil issue.
The only issue will be who will be the 'King" ;- Mahinda or Gotabaya.
:-)
I don’t know if Aratai is man, woman or thing.
But the Tamils here and elsewhere will take your “Final Solution” formulae seriously. It might not be planned in the same way it did in Europe during WW2 because Sarath F and friends do not have the technical resources. But other insidious forms are already in motion. I have warned of this in these columns more than once. Some dry-runs were practiced in Cbo and many more will be in the future. The idea is to gradually make it impossible for Tamils to live in the South. Muslims know they are next in line and are preparing. The alleged killing of LTTE stalwarts including old men, women and children (carrying white flags as pre-arranged with the army) in execution style is yet another sample of the undiminishing racial rage within many Sinhala men in the armed forces. It is this resource that will be utilized to wipe out “the Tamil menace” from the pure land of the Sinhalese. This has even blinded them in killing in cold-blood the Sinhala wife of an LTTE front-liner as well.
As to the main article, many who know President Rajapakse are convinced he is not going to give in to a solution along the 13th Amendment – with or without the merger. He will procrastinate and try to fool India and the world despite the many verbal and other assurance to the contrary. He has proved to the world he is no reincarnation of Arichandran of ancient Hindu heritage. He may like to but in his own admission “he is a prisoner of the JHU/WW/JVP” and so he is more likely not to. He knows all too well the latter combine has the backing of influential sections of the army – now the most potent political force in the country (Parliament?? eh! eh! eh!)
Tell me what will be the sales pitch of this extremist cabal with the Sinhala electorate once the 13th amendment is implemented to the fullest – merger and all. They have enough political cunning not to present themselves as damp squids. Dayan Jayatilake means well when he gave the assurance at Geneva because he can see the future and is aware of the ways of the world. He wisely treats India with much circumspection. One must recall whom the President called 1st and 2nd after he received VP was gone for good. That is the hard reality we have to live with. Dayan and Tissa Vitharna may be progressives and may like to move towards peace and unity. But there are others within the Govt with other plans that is as clear as day and night.
ISS
"Maybe India", Never.Because of India we,Tamils, suffer.
Because of LTTE we,Tamils were unable to be slave of Sinhalease.
Now we have been freed of LTTE to be the slave of Sinhalease.
Thanks to India and The Veteran Anti LTTE journalists.
Ok. Any body who opposes tamil eelam views is hired by Sri Lankan government. Unlike for tamil diaspora and the crooks who are leading them Sri Lankan government does not have 500million dolors to spare.
Real support from these white masters to eelam will be shown when these funds runs out as its very unlikely that diaspora can raise this kind of money when sun god is not arround.
White masters? Spare $500 millions? .. and now arresting astrogolers? What a mad house. Yes, it may be impossible for Tamils to live in a place like this. But I would wager that Sinhalese might also find themselves in the same poistion ... living in an aslysum and answerable perhaphs to Chinese masters. If that is the choice, I would rather answer to an Indian master whatever the wrongs of the past. Aratai, I would take it a step beyond your solution. Let's stop being Tamils and Sinhalese and lets all join India.
Viduthalai! Viduthalia! Jaya hai! Jaya Hai!
Vande Mataram! Vande Mataram!
Like all Sinhala Leaders before him Pres Rajapaksa is scared of the radical sinhala nationalist in the south. I don't think he has the courage or forsight to solve the problem. I pity Sri Lanka.
Mr. Rajapaksha never had any long term strategic plan. His only plan was to consult Keralite-Malayalee soothe sayers. He is waiting for the auspicious time to act the way he wants. He will do so when he is advised.
aratai,
Even if only sinhala people are left, the Buddhists and Catholics will still fight.
I just watched a very interesting film. "Amazing Grace" it is called. It goes through the journey William Wilberforce and those like minded had to go through before the slave trade became illegal throughout the United Kingdom. It is based on his true story. I would highly recommend most who comment here to watch it if they have not yet done so. "All men are created equal" he states. There are many lessons to be learned for all; the Tamils, Sinhalese and Muslims.
I am convinced that Sri Lanka will never have true peace till the majority community decide to be just.
For those blaming India
Blame Sonia and blame the pro-LTTE Vaiko and DMK for ditching BJP in 2004 and joining Sonia and giving 40 TN MP seats to Sonia alliance
As far as Indian masters, it should be fairly easy in the next 30 years to force merger with India as another linguistic state
First step would be to re-start all the buddhist ruins in India, Nalanda, Sarnath, Vikramshila, Odantapuri and Bodh Gaya and Ellora and so on and give posts in them to Sinhala buddhist monks to bribe them
Next, like the annual Haj Subsidy for Indian muslims, an annual buddhist pilgrimage subsidy for several lakh sinhalese buddhists, perhaps offering them semi-permanent camps near Bodh Gaya
I also expect Rajapakse to go overboard, by oppressing his sinhala opponents, the current screwed Lankan economy with 25% inflation rate, will give India opportunities to give jobs to sinhalese youth in the Indian economy, expected to cross US GDP in 30 years
India will have millions of sinhalese tied by various bribe hooks, to sing Vande Mataram voluntarily
Historically it is inevitable,
even a strong TN dynasty has repeatedly conquered Lanka, a strong Indian center can force Anschluss by carrots and sticks
Shyamsunder,
There are other players around. British Indian Ocean territory is just about 600 to 700km South of Maldives. My strong guess is that the West encouraged LTTE to go against India at one point and then threw them like dead rat. Sri Lanka Government also did its part. Reason is not known to me. If India can bribe Sri Lanka then China too can and China can through Burma too under the guise of Budhism. Another thing, it is not 9/11 made things difficult for Tamils. It was not Bush, but Clinton who banned LTTE.
You are dead wrong to say that LTTE made DMK and co to ditch BJP to Congress. LTTE has no hands in that. LTTE media has been very unkind to Karunanithy for a very longtime. They do not use decent language to refer to him. It is very strange that even at the last final hours Pirabhakaran did not send an SOS personally to Karunanithy. BJP has been toying with AIADMK and Karunanithy pulsed the feel to make a change. BJP has to find new leadership. Not that Athvani is wrong or anything like that. He is about 85 and people have heard him long enough to get agitated. BJP top guys are too old.My kids won't listen to me as they did to me when I was 40. I am now 60 and BJP top bras are in 70s and 80s. People have an uncanny way of telling their opinions. BJP has to change its image. Muslims are 15% and they vote against BJP in toto. In democracy, it is a huge percentage to ignore. If not for Vijakanth, DMK/Congress would have got a thrasing in TN. Karunanithy advised Congress, as I hear from TN news, to give Vijakanth quite a lot of money but not to go in alliance with him. It worked.
Even though you have not touched on it, I want to add one thing about LTTE military debacle. Sri Lanka security forces could not advance even a kilometer from Mannal aru and from Muhamali till the very last. Also there was no Navy landing to make beach head from Manal aru to Muhamalai coast. These two show few things. One is, with any amount of supply, Sri Lanka war machine has no appetite for casuality. Second is, Pirabhakaran is a real fool to leave entire western flank undefended/unfortified. Third, there were many so called LTTErs in the Tamil Diaspora to praise the strategy adopted by Pirabhakaran as of marvellous master plan, real crooks to the A Degree.
Easwaran
While I sincerely doubt Sri Lanka will become "Communist" we certainly will become more Communist Friendly. After all we will always be more closer to India as our neighbor and trading partner and we have many dealings with Australia, and Singapore and Malaysia and Japan so for the culture to become Communist will take an Invasion not a attitude shift. It is time we start cutting ties with the West and pushing them away from us. They can non longer be consider true allies after their Appalling Tiger Supporting Behavior under the Guise of Humanitarian concerns.
Embracing China, India and Russia is the Smart thing to do. The next Global Super Powers are going to be in Asia for the most part. The West is in Decay.
Britain lost its Empire to the Second World War, only to see America Gain its Empire Status in the past 60 years. Now there is no more room for the American Empire to grown. It too is now in Decline, it cannot hold onto its power Financially or Militarily. This can bee seen in their Feeble Attempts to Colonize and Convert (DEMOCRATIZE) other countries that are Strategic Interests to them.
The remaining Western Countries are in Decline... they are ageing Socialist Societies with no "Fight" left in them. The next global Conflict will see the Rise of the East and therefore as a small country Sri Lanka is making the right steps to align themselves with the next victors.
Shyamsunder
I do not think this in the end much bribing of the Sinhalese will be required. Many years ago writing an undergraduate thesis on Indo-Lankan relations, I came accross a note prepared by JR Jayawardene setting out his scheme for the union of Lanka with India. The note I remember is reproduced in a collection of papers published by the GOSL and edited by Michael Roberts. The logic stood in the 1940s and is still compelling. I raised the matter with a member of his family a few years ago who confirmed the high degree of comfort he had with the idea even in later years.
In the end the sheer compulsion of economic logic may of itself be sufficient to convince everybody whether Sinhalese or Tamil or Muslim that this the way to go. One hopes that the same logic could also in the end apply Pakistan and BD although that is admitedley a different kettle of fish. In the end hopefully something like the EU spanning the entire region might arise. I think that only force that could halt something like this is China.
I do think that many Tamils need to go beyond their anger towards Congress and the DMK and take a broader view of things.
To Easwaran, regarding Sinhala distaste for casualties
I remember back in 1999, something like 50,000 sinhalese had deserted
Regarding Burma, the ruling military junta has just switched several ports from China to India, because they were getting worried about millions of illegal chinese immigrants. Gen Maung Aye, in his earlier days was injured fighting chinese backed communists and he was getting scared of too much chinese influence in Myanmar
To Amrit, for the next 50 years, Chinese naval power cannot threaten Indian coasts including Sri Lanka
The reason is difficulty of projecting naval power several thousand miles
Even Hambantota does not seriously worry the Indian navy
Shyam:
You will serve the cause of peace in SL very much if you provide further details on JRJ's note to align with India. Michael Roberts is around and we can then open this for a public discussion. Depite Dayan's attempts to produce some form of enlightenment, one see's now the destructive and divisive extreme Sinhala chauvinist cabal getting ready to cut MR's neck.
The poisonours and opportunistic JHU announced 2 days ago they will get out of the Govt and bring MR nd Bros down if a solution is attempted along the 13th amendment (forget the bogus PLUS the regime is trying to fool India and the world with) As I suggested elsewhere Dayan is next on the firing line of this conspiratorial gangs - after they attempt to finish Tissa Vitharna.
Devinda, While I have my own thoughts if we have seen the end of the US lead in today's economic, social and political worl, I am with you in building closer links with China, Russia and the emerging powers. The USA is far too possessd with financial, intellectual, production (agricultural and industrial) capacities than the British empire ever was for Uncle Sam to be destroyed. They have the resilience and capacity to come back. The fact 4 banks have made sufficient profits to return nearly US$3 billion to the US Govt
in around 6 months is suggestive of this. Besides, the American system is not individual or group centred. It draws its strength from the inexhaustible strength it has in its academic and intellectual class - that is matchless.
Besides, US political policies are generally moral-ethical based and this
ensures their acceptance by most countries. The more desirable approach would be to strengthen our ties with all power blocs around without taking ideologigcl or other options. It is good to think of a future where we can integrate our education, economy and general well being and political approach without going against India while not surrendering our poitico-economic independence to them. Remember Lee Kuan Yew's approach to China in the 80s/90s while Singapore remained an unabashed capitalist economy? With my own experiences with the Indian establishment, I know they will respect this. We should in no way get involved with Tamilnadu or Indian politics in a manner we get identified with their party politics. WE must remain neutral here, as far as possible.
ISS
I regret my error. The JRJ note came from the pen of Amrit here and I ask him
to respond. If this is the Amrit (M) that I know, I am glad he is taking part
in the debate. He knows his political history and he likes the Sinhalese and
Tamils as we all do. With his graduation in a prestigous Madras U he knows
the history of the State and India as well too.
ISS
The note from JR is set out in a four volume collection of documents of the Ceylon National Congress published by the GOSL in the 80s (edited by Michael Roberts). I am happy to email a PDF version. ISS, I graduated from the University of Sydney not Madras. I am not sure I am the person you are thinking of - but for what its worth you describe accurately me views.
TO SURVIVE SRI LANKA MUST DEPEND ON THE WESTERN COUNTRIES. TODAY THE SRI LANKAN GOVT. BEGING THE WESTERN NATIONS TO ALLOW THE 1.9 BILLION IMF LOAN, WHICH WAS WITHHELD BECAUSE OF THE HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATION COMMITTED BY THE SRI LANKAN GOVT.
THE WESTERN COUNTRIES KNOW VERY WELL THAT THE IMF LOAN WILL BE USED AGAINST THE TAMIL MINORITY COMMUNITY. OVER 300, 000 INNOCENT TAMILS BEEN HELD BEHIND ELECTRIFIED BARBED WIRE FENCES DESPITE WESTERN COUNTRIES CONDEMNATIONS.
Shyamsunder and ISS
I have found the document I referred to earlier. You will find it in M Roberts (Ed), Documents of the Ceylon National Congress and Nationalist Politics in Ceylon 1929-1950, Vol IV, Colombo, 1977 pp 2802-3. Here is one of the pithy quotes:
“I visualise a greater future for Lanka and its people, Sinhalese or Tamil they may be by race [question this in the light of the data produced by the genome project], I visualize a greater future for Lanka and its people. Sinhalese or Tamil they may they be race, yet citizens of a great and powerful India.”
When I first read the document in 1984, I did think "yeah, right on!" but could not come to terms with the fact that these words were penned the by President in charge during July 83.
I think that these words are even more true now than they were in the 1940s, when they were written and hope that in my lifetime, this vision will be realised.
Strangely, the Australian PM has recently put forward a proposal for an Asian Union. "Wondrous are the ways of the Lord" if the wisdom of Bandung in 1955 now comes from a "White Asian" in the distant antipodes.
Devinda Fernando, I think you obituary for the West may be premature. I would commend to you an essay in the latest edition of Foreign Policy by Michael Lind, a reformed American neo-con who is I believe one of the most interesting American commentators around. He foreshadows an America peopled by a billion people by 2100 with a demographic base equal to that of India or China. Do not write off America yet. If Mr Lind is correct and if "demography is destiny", America is here to stay.
If anyone would like the JR piece, happy to email a PDF version (it is only two pages). If Michael Roberts would like to comment, I think we would all be interested to hear from him.
Amrit,
Michael Lind is a NEOCON BARKER. (FYI - NEOCON is the New word for White SUPREMICIST) I have seen his Grandstanding on the FOX NEWS NETWORK and they resemble the ramblings of a Mental Patient. I would not take anything of what he says seriously.
The population of America makes no difference. The end of Their Empire is inevitable as they are unable to militarily enforce their Empire. Their industries have all been outsourced to CHINA and INDIA... and the Next Global Conflict will see the End of their Dominance of the globe.
Devinda
I have read some of Lind's books and did not sense him to be white supremacist (but someone who may have once been one) - hence my description "reformed neo-con". However, I have not heard him speak and will take your word for it. I do find his writings interesting, even if unusual. As for white supremacists, yes , they are still around. Although one might have thought of them as dangerous 30 years ago, in the context of the return to the centre of China and India, it now has a ring of absurdity about it. Strange to see white supremacsist still carrying on - when they depend on Chinese money to keep the show going.
I agree with your proposition of American decline - but I am not sure that this will wipe them out altogether in the near future. It would be dangerous for anyone to forward plan on ths basis of writing them off - those predictions were made in the 70s' following their decisive defeat in Vietnam. We are getting a little bit off topic I guess - but a declining empire is particularly dangerous as usually it thrashes around irationally and blindly eg Iraq.