{"id":96988,"date":"2019-12-27T12:44:36","date_gmt":"2019-12-27T19:44:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=96988"},"modified":"2019-12-27T12:44:36","modified_gmt":"2019-12-27T19:44:36","slug":"eelam-war-series-4-dedication-in-eelam-war-iv","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2019\/12\/27\/eelam-war-series-4-dedication-in-eelam-war-iv\/","title":{"rendered":"EELAM WAR SERIES 4. DEDICATION IN EELAM WAR IV."},"content":{"rendered":"

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

Eelam War IV was won\ndue to the dedication of those who participated in it. The\ncommanders of the armed forces were confident of victory and, for the first\ntime, the forces experienced a firm political commitment to win. Their morale\nwent up  and they fought\nwith great dedication. \nUnlike in previous years, there were no large scale desertions and\ndisobeying of orders. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gotabhaya Rajapakse\nsaid, the soldiers realised their\nresponsibility to the nation and fought without complaint. They fought day and\nnight, under continuous fire.  They did\nnot ask for anything extra as a reward for their sacrifices.  They knew their country depended on\nthem.  Their perseverance and sense of\nnational duty won us the war\u201d.   This\ncame at a price. 6000 troops died, 5000 were disabled and 20,000 were\ninjured. Some soldiers are shell shocked and out of their minds.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\nwere numerous acts of heroism which the public do not know. A monk who worked\nwith injured soldiers said that soldiers, even when disabled declared that they\nwished to return to the front. They were ready to sacrifice their lives in the\nfinal battle. There was a high standard\nof discipline. There was not a single instance where the army was found wanting\nin its conduct towards women. Soldiers have never been accused of rape. The\nLTTE had raped many of its women. (Stephen\nLong.  Island 5.10.09 p 4).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

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

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

The engineers and technicians\nalso responded magnificently.They forgot about 24 hours notice. In\nan emergency, the time available for the technician was counted in\nseconds.  Aircraft were\nreturned to the flight lines in record time. If a plane was to fly\nat 6 am the technicians\nstarted loading bombs around midnight.\nFor each jet they had to load eight bombs each weighing 500 kg. Technicians worked round the clock to patch up damaged aircraft.  They sometimes worked continuously for 3-4\ndays. They innovated when spare parts were delayed. Battle damage and unserviceability did not deter them. They once\ntook a badly damaged helicopter which was going to be destroyed and repaired it\nwithin a few hours. They coaxed\ntired engines back into fighting mode. They took a life expired engine,\nstripped it, and put it together again. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The electronics\nspecialists kept the electronic systems going despite logistical and\nmaintenance problems. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

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

The dedication of the\nHome Guards, now known as Civil Defence Force should not be forgotten.  This  \nwas a force made up   of\nyoungsters from remote areas, who were given a single barrel shot gun and asked\nto provide security for their villages, which had become soft targets for the\nLTTE. Though poorly armed and outmanned the home guards refused to budge and\npaid with their lives while trying to protect others from the LTTE .615 home\nguards both male and females were been killed. ( CONTINUED)<\/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. Their morale went up  and they fought with great dedication.  Unlike in previous years, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-96988","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\/96988","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=96988"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96988\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}