{"id":55484,"date":"2016-06-11T22:16:32","date_gmt":"2016-06-12T04:16:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=55484"},"modified":"2016-06-11T15:01:20","modified_gmt":"2016-06-11T22:01:20","slug":"dedication-in-eelam-war-iv","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2016\/06\/11\/dedication-in-eelam-war-iv\/","title":{"rendered":"DEDICATION\u00a0 IN EELAM WAR IV."},"content":{"rendered":"

KAMALIKA\u00a0 PIERIS<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

Eelam War IV was won due to the dedication of those who participated in it. The commanders of the armed forces were confident of victory and, for the first time, the forces experienced a firm political commitment to win.\u00a0 Their morale went up and they fought with great dedication.\u00a0 Unlike in previous years, there were no large scale desertions and disobeying of orders.<\/p>\n

Gotabhaya Rajapakse said, the soldiers realised their responsibility to the nation and fought without complaint. \u00a0They fought day and night, under continuous fire.\u00a0 They did not ask for anything extra as a reward for their sacrifices.\u00a0 They knew their country depended on them. .\u00a0 Their perseverance and sense of national duty won us the war\u201d.\u00a0 \u00a0This came at a price. 6000 troops died, 5000 were disabled and 20,000 were injured. Some soldiers are shell shocked and out of their minds.<\/p>\n

There were numerous acts of heroism which the public do not know. A monk who worked with injured soldiers said that soldiers, even when disabled declared that they wished to return to the front. They were ready to sacrifice their lives in the final battle. \u00a0There was a high standard of discipline. There was not a single instance where the army was found wanting in its conduct towards women. Soldiers have never been accused of rape. \u00a0The LTTE had raped many of its women.<\/p>\n

Troops suffered untold hardships in the battlefield. There was thirst and exhaustion. The Malaysian army faced insurgents armed only with rifles. \u00a0\u00a0The Sri Lanka soldier faced an enemy equipped with sophisticated weapons. Army got its new ammunition only in 2008,\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 even then they never had all the ammunition necessary. Soldiers fought in heavily mined territory and .many lost their limbs. \u00a0There were no mine plucking machines\u00a0 \u00a0and the engineers had to de-mine the area.working \u2018blind\u2019, while LTTE fired at them.\u00a0 Touching slowly with their hands, they detonated the mines using\u00a0\u00a0 S-Lon tubes.\u00a0\u00a0 This was done under fire almost every day.\u00a0 Many engineers sustained injuries, most lost eyes, arms and legs.<\/p>\n

Air Force declared that it had been stretched to the limit and\u00a0 \u00a0that what it had had achieved with available resources was tremendous. The Indian Air Chief had admired the way they had used its limited resources.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Air Force fought the war by itself. Pakistani pilots were not involved. Pilots performed under trying conditions. They carried out 1000 missions in the Vanni, amidst civilians. They had to airlift 500 army personnel using helicopters meant for 30 persons.<\/p>\n

They underwent much hardship. When they were short of pilots, available pilots went up 3 and 4 times a day. \u2018This is very tiring for a pilot.\u2019 Surveillance pilots risked safety to obtain real time imagery. They burnt the midnight oil peering into the screen to catch enemy moves on the grounds.\u00a0 They were on surveillance for 6-7 hours at a stretch.\u00a0 Pilots bravely went as low as 7000 feet to attack targets.\u00a0 Around 38 pilots and 430 other officers and rankers died, about 350 were wounded.<\/p>\n

The engineers and technicians also responded magnificently.They forgot about 24 hours notice. In an emergency, the time available for the technician was counted in seconds.\u00a0 Aircraft were returned to the flight lines in record time. If a plane was to fly at 6 am the technicians started loading bombs around midnight. \u00a0For each jet they had to load eight bombs each weighing 500 kg Technicians worked round the clock to patch up damaged aircraft.\u00a0 They sometimes worked continuously for 3-4 days. They innovated when spare parts were delayed. Battle damage and unserviceability did not deter them. \u00a0They once took a badly damaged helicopter which was going to be destroyed and repaired it within a few hours.They coaxed tired engines back into fighting mode. They took a life expired engine, stripped it, and put it together again.The electronics specialists kept the electronic systems going despite logistical and maintenance problems.<\/p>\n

The navy also showed considerable dedication. \u00a0During the final blockade off Mullaitivu, Navy staff did not want to go on leave till they had finished off the LTTE. \u00a0The sailors had to stay in great discomfort on the seas, in small boats filled with equipment, with hardly any room to move. They had to swim to get there and stay in their wet clothes all night. They endured all this discomfort willingly.<\/p>\n

Military personnel injured in the war were treated at the government hospitals of Colombo, Anuradhapura, Sri Jayawardenapura, Kalubowila and Kandy. Anuradhapura hospital had the biggest load. Anuradhapura staff nursed thousands of injured soldiers with great dedication. The army gave them a special upahara award. Anuradhapura sent its difficult surgical cases to Kandy.\u00a0 They were looked after by the Kandy hospital staff with no additional assistance. Routine operations were cancelled\u00a0\u00a0 and surgeons worked round the clock. \u00a0\u00a0All worked willingly, no one grumbled, though their security was also under threat. The minor staff had their leave cancelled but did not complain. The injuries were gruesome and required complicated surgery. In the orthopedic wards,\u00a0\u00a0 no one had to have a higher amputation, no one died and there were no serious infections in spite of the severely contaminated wounds.\u00a0 At times there were over 100 seriously injured soldiers. Five beds in each ward were set aside for them and none of them were ever put on the ground.<\/p>\n

The dedication of the Home Guards, now known as Civil Defence Force should not be forgotten. \u00a0This\u00a0\u00a0 was a force made up\u00a0\u00a0 of youngsters from remote areas, who were given a single barrel shot gun and asked to provide security for their villages, which had become soft targets for the LTTE. Though poorly armed and outmanned the home guards refused to budge and paid with their lives while trying to protect others from the LTTE .615 home guards both male and females were been killed.. http:\/\/archives.dailynews.lk\/2010\/06\/18\/fea09.asp<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KAMALIKA\u00a0 PIERIS Eelam War IV was won due to the dedication of those who participated in it. The commanders of the armed forces were confident of victory and, for the first time, the forces experienced a firm political commitment to win.\u00a0 Their morale went up and they fought with great dedication.\u00a0 Unlike in previous years, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-55484","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kamalika-pieris"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55484","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55484"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55484\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55484"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55484"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55484"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}