By Stephen Long, Los Angeles
An exclusive private meeting that was held in the early 1980’s in Sacramento, California, has recently come to my attention. This gathering of approximately five hundred wealthy, influential Tamil expatriates from around the world charted the course for the LTTE, and developed a strategic plan for using it as a vehicle for establishing a Tamil homeland. The motivation was the fact that there were nearly one hundred million ethnic Tamils scattered throughout the globe, but alas, there was no independent sovereign state they could call their own.
These members of the elite Tamil Diaspora felt that they were “step-children” wherever they lived, and their low collective self-esteem determined that it needed a nationalist sentiment with which to identify. They decided that only by having a separate, mono-racial country could they improve their self-esteem, regardless of the fact that all of them were successful professionals who had made material fortunes in their adoptive countries. They felt inferior as “second class citizens” and they wanted a piece of the global pie to make them feel equal and whole.
They chose to take on the struggle of the LTTE against the Sri Lankan government because they couldn’t find another solution anywhere else in the world. Even though Tamil Nadu is the real ethnic homeland of the Tamils, a civil war against India for a secessionist state held no hope at the time. They also realized that to go up against the governments of Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, Canada, or any of the European countries would be futile. The very thought is ridiculous to the extreme.
By proximity and by opportunity, they focused on Sri Lanka as the place where they felt they had their best chance to fulfill their nationalist ambitions. By “opportunity” I mean that the conditions were better there than anywhere else. There was the general disorganization of the Sri Lankan government at the time, and the fact that Sri Lanka had been home to tens of thousands of ethnic Tamils for nearly one thousand years. They also knew that they could take advantage of the existing bitterness between the Sri Lankan Tamil factions that were based on caste and education.
Religion played its part in this decision as well. The Catholic Church had long been the religion of many of the Jaffna Tamils, and a large percentage of the priesthood was made up of men of Tamil origin. This elite group in Sacramento knew they could get support from this ecclesiastical organization if they promised some sort of reciprocity as part of their end game. Catholic Church history is filled with similar arrangements that closely mirror this model, and many of the members of the Tamil Diaspora were now assimilated Christians in their new countries. Fundamental Christianity also played a part in this developing drama, but at a later date with its marauding missionaries.
I have begun to suspect that the meeting in Sacramento went a step further in identifying its real end game: a unified Tamil Eelam with pieces of it in both Sri Lanka and India – in Tamil Nadu to be specific. If the LTTE was able to establish a separate, sovereign Tamil state in Sri Lanka then it would be a perfect launching pad for coordinating the same thing in Tamil Nadu. Funds and arms flowing into the region from other countries could be supplied to Indian rebels over the Palk Straights unobstructed and with ease from a Tamil state in Sri Lanka – much in the same way weaponry and financial supplies have flowed for the past twenty five years, but in the other direction.
Ethnic conflict in India could be easily fomented with enough arms and money pouring in non-stop and un-curtailed from wealthy Tamils around the world, and the Indian government would be faced with a situation similar to breakaway civil wars in other parts of the globe. Tamil Nadu could easily become another Pakistan or Bangladesh. Perish the thought.
The current furor over the Tamil Nadu political position on the war against the LTTE in Sri Lanka is easy to figure out when you think about it. It is to the best advantage of the Tamil Nadu politicians to keep the war going, and to have the Indian federal government step in to persuade the Government of Sri Lanka to halt its operations – ostensibly for peace talks and humanitarian concerns. As in the past, this would give the LTTE an opportunity to re-load for yet another assault on the people of Sri Lanka, and the world goes round and round.
The establishing of a separate Tamil state in Sri Lanka is crucial if this idealized, unified Tamil end game is to be realized. The only way this will happen is if the GOSL succumbs to Tamil Nadu pressure and halts the war, or if the federal government of India succumbs to Tamil Nadu pressure just to keep its fragile coalition alive. Or both. The two sovereign governments need to stay their course at this point, realizing that ending the war against the LTTE is in both of their best interests for both the short and the long terms.
I hope that the Prime Minister of India might consider the possibility of an eventual Tamil Nadu uprising, and by doing so realize that if he wants to keep India in tact, the LTTE insurgency in Sri Lanka must be crushed. I also hope that the Hon. Dr. Singh will begin investigating possible links between the LTTE’s assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, and the Tamil Nadu politicians headed by Mr. Karunanidhi. I feel that looking for these links has never been taken seriously, but the time has come.
I congratulate Mr. Rukman Senanayake, the president of the United National Party in Sri Lanka, for joining the GOSL’s position on finishing the war against terrorists, and for his opposition to the popular Tamil Nadu political perspective, which is pushing for a halt to the war. I admire him for putting country first – and party second. I hope that Mr. Ranil Wickramasinge will wise up and follow his party president by adopting this intelligent view.
Peace has never been so close. I urge the Government of Sri Lanka to continue its excellent job of ridding the country of terrorists and their merciless suicide bombers. You’re getting closer than you ever have been before. Be strong. Don’t give the LTTE a single inch. Get Prabhakaran.
- Asian Tribune -
Comments
Thank you sir, for your
Thank you sir, for your concern,inteligent analysis and most of all for your information.
This is what we have been always saying, that this Tamil problem in Sri lanka is a big fraud and a calculated ruse with ulterior motives.We always knew that the WTM (World tamil movement)was fishing in the troubled sri lankan waters.
It may be that the biggest problem the Tamils have is not having a country that can call their own but the unfortunate thing is why they think that the sinhales and sri lanka, that has created the most educated and professional Tamil community in the world, is responsible for that.
When there are people like you it gives us a lot of solace to think that even in this world of unbriddled might, there is still some place for the truth.
Thank you again.
COOMENT:::::> The game is
COOMENT:::::>
The game is simple. Only the Sinhala-Buddhist political parties, their politician and their followers do NOT understand this simple truth.
TRUTH_1 : FACT
That TAMIL NADU an Indian linguistic state is the Tamil Homeland. There are 50-70 million Ethnic Tamils in Tamil Nadu. Much bigger than the entire Sri Lankan population.
TRUTH_2 Is that the Tamils in Sri Lanka will not have more rights and priviledges than those in Tamil Nadu. The attempt by the Tamils in Sri Lanka and their relatives in Tamil Nadu will be to get more rights for Tamils in Sri Lanka which will be used to asks for more rights in Tamil Nadu and then more rights in Sri Lanka UNTIL Tamil Nadu and the Northern+Eastern Province is annexed to Tamil Nadu by India. Later this will include the WHOLE of Sri Lanka...ENDING thousands of years of existence as na independent island. As whole of Sri Lanka will be made unviable state by India. Similar to Taiwan. But we have no powerful allies...therefore we will succumb.
The government of Sri Lanka MUST clearly spell out that there are NO TAMIL HOMELANDS in Sri Lanka. The population density of Killinochchi, Mullativu is 4-5 persons per sq.km in 1871. If there was a thriving Tamil homeland this needs to be up around at least 300-400 person per sq.km.
Tamils in Sri Lanka are nothing BUT migrants from Tamil Nadu and as such are a minority group in Sri Lanka. There rights and priviledges needs to be secured as any minority rights in any country and that is ALL.
India WILL BE THE BIGGEST winner out of this if a separate or confederal or any form that does mean NO UNITARY CONTROL over territory is introduced....IT IS BETTER TO SEPARATE AND GUARD OUR OWN BORDERS THEN.
The fact that TAMILS act like invaders, usurpers is quite evident from the fact that they are negotiating with another state (india) to undermine the government that provide them with basic human amenities.....
There can never be PEACE with these people.
WHAT IS THE BOND BETWEEN TAMIL NADU AND TAMILS IN SRI LANKA ? It is an ethnic bond. Language, world view, culture, food, customs, caste to some extent.
Are there Sinhala people in Sri Lanka ? NO.
There are about (1-2)% Buddhists in whole of India who say they are Buddhists.
May You Live Long & Prosper
We had no proper leadership
We had no proper leadership and the guts to walk the talk until now.
Totally agree with Stephen
Totally agree with Stephen Long. I wonder where this is going to end. It is very clear that the whole issue is about the unwilllingness of 12% Tamils to accept their minority status in Sri Lanka and looking for the greener pastures of a greater Tamil State consisting of parts of India, Tamilnadu and possibly parts of Malaysia and Singapore. There is very little that anyone can do for this matter now. It has become a bad dream for all Tamils.
In looking for a possible solution, they started attacks in a small country. Although Sri Lanka is a small country, we are determined to maintain our independence and sovereinity. This made us fight back only to maintain our independence.
In the process, Tamils have damaged themselves considerably. I meam "Tamils" and not just the LTTE.
The word "Tamil" is now synonimous with the word "Terrorists" all round the world.
In Sri Lanka, they not only carried out ethnic cleansing of Muslims and Tamils in the North and parts of the East, they bombed places like the Temple of the Tooth and attacked places of worships in Anuradhapura. These will go into the history books.
Then again the leading Tamil policitians ran to India, publicly calling it their motherland. They even wanted India to take over the island of Katchativu, close to Jaffna.
When these are recorded in the history books, even the innocent Tamils are likely to be treated with suspicion for years to come.
The economic destruction of Sri Lanka planned and executed by Tamil diaspora over the last 3 dacades is another record that goes into history books.
Although people talk about defeating LTTE and a political solutions, the damage done in the last 3 decades is unlikely to be erased for over a century of years.
This record will go into the world history because of world-wide involvement of Tamil diaspora. Many coutries are now considering Tamils different from the rest of the Sri lankans.
I have written once before that a foreigner introduced myself to another as a "Sri Lankan from Colombo" I wondered why he used the words "from Colombo". Later I realised that he was trying to identify myself as "non-Tamil". This was during a professional discussion and had nothing to do with politics.
In another news item I read that there was a group of Tamils carrying out a protest march in Toronto recently and a by-stander (a British couple) used the words "suicide bombers!" while talking to each other.
Thank you Mr.Stephen Long
Thank you Mr.Stephen Long for sharing this info. I always suspected that there is a bigger hand behind this whole issue and the SL opposition UNP led by Ranil W are a part of it. When I worked in the Middle East in early 80's, mostly catholic Tamils were involved in the LTTE work and Hindu Tamils had a suspicion that it is the work of the Church.
As you have explained, the issue is not a simple one for a tiny country like SL. Thankfully the current president has taken up against the terrorist menace and hopefully they will achieve the final goal of eliminating the LTTE fully and giving freedom of living and breathing of fresh air to the suffering Tamil community there.
Rukman Senanayake is from a patriotic background and all these days he would have kept quiet in order to maintain the party's policy under RW and now he has spoken up. There are other UNP leaders we would like to see doing the same thing including Sajith Premadasa after his father’s assassination by the LTTE killer bomber Babu. His quietness shows he is a cunning fellow waiting for a good time capture power. But it is not a leadership quality and his father had much more strong personality and a political vision.
IF Sajith does not come forward, in support of the Govt, we will have to brand him along with Ran-nil as supporters of LTTE.
However, things are bit okay now the way MR and the Defence Secretary’s handling it.
Your contribution in many issues related to SL’s situation is highly appreciated especially "When troupes come home" article sometimes ago.
Please keep up your good work and we will remember all your contribution.
An excellent perspective of
An excellent perspective of the story of Sri Lanka's Tamils and the Eelam cause, which needs to be told and retold since many people who have developed an interest in this story are unaware of the early events. The extension to the "Greater Eelam" objective that involves India, has been largely obscured in the media's focus on events centered in Sri Lanka.
Stephen Long has presented an analysis that is by and large correct, except that there may be some minor inaccuracies, as for example in the dates at which the assault against the Sinhala-dominated GOSL was planned and launched. This well preceded the 1980 date cited, for by the late 1970s itslef TamilNadu had got into the game already set in place, and India had started training the Tigers.
Meetings in New Jersey (mainly North, but South as well) of TULF aupporters were commonplace, and they happened almost every weekend at the luxury homes of Lankan Tamil doctors, all of whom had emigrated to the USA armed with MBBS degrees from the Ceylon University, obtained AT NO COST, and had become multimillionaires even as they declared themselved a discriminated group!!.
It is in the NewYork/NewJersey area that the early hatchings of the plot to take over Sri Lanka were conceptualized. Perhaps the 1980 Saramento meeting was where they crystallized their plans as a global Tamil objective.
The Vaddukoddai Resolution goes back to 1976, in which the 'youth" (The Boys - Prabhakaran et al) were called in to join the TULF fight. Even then, way before 1983, it was consistently foretold that Eelam in Sri Lanka was going to be the 'springboard' for a Greater Eelam including Tamil Nadu, and that it would lead to even further fissiparous effects in India.
Was India listening????
India has in recent times been misguided into action against Sri Lanka several times at the instigation of TamilNadu and always at the brink of a General Election -
First - when Mrs. Gandhi decided to provide training for the Tigers at TamilNadu's behest in exchange for TamilNadu support of the Congress Party at the General Election.
Second - when Rajiv Gandhi sent the IPKF to Sri Lanka, and it had to return in embarrassment.
Third - The Indo-Lanka Accord which again at the behest of TamilNadu was foisted on Sri Lanka's Jayewardene who had little option but to accede to a political arrangement that did not have the support of the Sri Lankan people, was not debated in Parliament and was undemocratically enacted, resulting in what has all but destroyed Jayewardene's UNP.
Hopefully India has the wisdom of those experiences and will find diplomatic ways to let Sri Lanka find her own solutions without undue outside pressure, for that is the ONLY way in which an ENDURING SOLUTION can be ensured, and from which India itself can learn and find answers to ensuring the health of its own Union.
West support for these
West support for these communities to establish seperate states on ethenic lines is disgusting. As a basis for democracies they make a mockery of it. How are these minorities are treated in these very countries are also questionable. However, one should keep in mind that ethenic minorities also had been unreasonable, making demands on ethenic basis from the federal governments. When the ethenic numbers are significant they generate political clout by making block votes for different parties. How come India who was always on sidelines at most important times have begun to promote peace talks. When LTTE is running havoc on the Sri Lankan government, and eleminating the political leaders by suicide bombings, killing civilians indiscrimantely, India was silent. That was the reason Norway got involved in Sri Lankan affairs and made even a worse circus. Mr. Lang and other contributors have done a wonderful analysis of Sri Lanka.
Very interesting facts from
Very interesting facts from both the author and a commentator about the conspiracy against Sri Lanka by ethnic Tamil elite.
It is also of interest that in 1812, the British who did not yet have complete control over Lanka (their invading force earlier had been massacred) had sought to establish English schools in the colony in Yapapatuna (called Jaffna by Europeans) which they had inherited from the Dutch (treaty of Amiens- Ceylon being the only prize kept) who in turn had inherited it from the Portuguese. The latter had certainly subjugated the entire population of Yapapatuna who by 1812 had learnt to be obedient colonials. It appears that the basis for Comprador method of controlling colonies had been well established in this vestige by then. I understand that elite "English education" had not reached the South of Lanka for yet another 40 years.
Thus by the time of declaration of "Eelam" in 1919, even though a sizeable sinhala elite had caught up to the "Tamil" elite (The word Tamil only emerged in the mid-19th century as a corruption of the Sinhala word "Demala" or Pali Damilla), the "Tamils" were a significant elite force. Schoalrs have indicated that the cost of land under British Colonialism was equivalent to London (?!).
One has to consider then what it was like for a small elite minority who had such a sense of power and control to be faced with the spectre of Universal Franchise.
They certainly could not consider the control of the state being in the hands of uneducated rabble as Sir P Ramanathan had said (in not exactly those words). It is then understandable that SJV Chelvanayagam would utter that Tamils were too great to be ruled by the Sinhalese.
In the context of this article much comes to light regarding the psychology of the elite created and groomed by 500 years of colonialism. Given that the Catholic Church as an extension of the Holy Roman Empire had a close hand in all this it is thus not surprising that "Tamil" Comprador priests collaborated as late as 1980's, for they had done it all along. Thankfully, vast majority of Catholics of the south have not followed suit. It is also of interest that sections of the Catholic church collaborated with the fascist Nazis during World War II. It is thus fitting that yet another section would collaborate with Fascist Tamils (The Dravidian answer to Aryan Nazis) during Eelam Wars.
In the treaty of Amiens which was between his Britannic Majesty and the French Republic and its allies- His Catholic Majesty (Spanish Emperor) and the Batavian Republic (Holland)- perhaps set the scene for the once colonial servants to consider a similar meeting in Sacramento 180 years later in which they made a secret and unsigned pact. The pact of the Planet Circling Greater Dravidastan. One only has to visit tamilnation.org to read of thier dreams. In which they lament the loss of language and culture among those ranging from Trinidad to Mauritius to Fiji whom they would name "Tamil". As the Aryan Nazis labeled people so that they could carry out their "Othering" project of demonising the Intellectualy Disabled, Gays and Jews, the Dravidianist Tamils have started labeling oblivious people around the World as theirs so that they can expand the othering process they began by demonising a small group of people called Sinhala.
Watch out West Indians, Mauritians, Fijians, Malaysians and the people of Karnataka and Kerala.
I would like to point out to
I would like to point out to gamarala it was you said in one of your comments not long ago that "all the Tamils are not suicide bombers and all the suicide bombers are not Tamils". How can one say like that in Toronto? Even it happened, someone said it, it shouldn't have been brought to here in this comment box.
And another comment saying that Tamils are invaders in Sri Lanka, Please study the history of Sri Lankan people.
I have to mention some facts I have written in another column here (I am sorry editor)
The Sinhalese people are probably the result of aboriginal inhabitants mixing with Indo-Aryans who began migrating from India c. the 5th century BC. The Tamils were later immigrants from Dravidian India, migrating over a period from the early centuries AD to c. 1200. Buddhism was introduced during the 3rd century BC. As Buddhism spread, the Sinhalese kingdom extended its political control over the island but lost it to invaders from southern India in the 10th century. Between 1200 and 1505, Sinhalese power gravitated to southwestern Sri Lanka, while a southern Indian dynasty seized power in the north and established the Tamil kingdom in the 14th century.
The first Sinhalese arrived in Sri Lanka late in the 6th century B.C. probably from northern India. Buddhism was introduced in about the mid-third century B.C., and a great civilization developed at the cities of Anuradhapura (kingdom from circa 200 B.C. to circa A.D. 1000) and Polonnaruwa (from about 1070 to 1200). In the 14th century, a south Indian dynasty established a Tamil kingdom in northern Sri Lanka. The coastal areas of the island were controlled by the Portuguese in the 16th century and by the Dutch in the 17th century. The island was ceded to the British in 1796, became a crown colony in 1802, and was united under British rule by 1815.
Now Wickramasinghe know who you are.
So please try not to comment on something without knowing the entire history and facts.
My God I thought I was
My God I thought I was reading Sidney sheldon's 'Doomsday Conspiracy"
Every Indian should read this piece of information for thier long life as united India.If they let this go,the dark and the bloody years will follow in the years to come.
Mr. Long as always I admire your concern towards sri lanka and its people.
Sri Lanka is playing a crucial game agianst all odds at this time and the odds are so wicked and cruely and vicious.
This is the time sri lanka needs all friends whom she helped to help her back.She needs us for her last fight for survival.
Mr.Long watch over sri lanka keep vigil,Sri lanka needs a son like you.
Let's hope this Doomsday Conspiracy will be soon over for sri lanka once and for all
Post new comment