From the Eyes of a Tiger: Schizo-affect resulting from being a former child soldier – Part III

The civil war in Sri Lanka from 1983-2009 was generally viewed as one of Asia`s most prolonged ethnic conflicts of the 21st century. It was and still is a conflict born out of ethnonationalism, where nationality, ethnicity, identity, religion, and culture played a significant role. It refers to the use of unconventional methods as part of a multi-domain warfighting approach because the Tamil Tigers, or LTTE, were a unique non-state actor among other terrorist organizations worldwide that waged a bloody campaign in land, sea, air, underwater, and in cyberspace. It is thus considered hybrid warfare, initially referred to as a conflict between a state and an irregular non-state actor with advanced military capabilities.

Despite relying on one man as the sole decision-maker and supreme leader, the LTTE had a central committee facilitating the organization’s policymaking. The central committee of the LTTE believed that the definition of terrorism is fundamentally flawed as it has been vague and ambiguous. During an interview, LTTE’s political ideologue Anton Balasingham once stated, “In the context of the war on terror, any non-state actor, who are terrorists according to one nation-state can be a legitimate entity for another nation-state and vice-versa. Thus, in my opinion, the definition of terrorism is viewed by whose side of the fence you are on”.

Therefore, according to Balasingham, the war on terror is a power projection among great global powers using non-state actors as proxies for the former`s sphere of influence. That is, once upon a time, the LTTE was regarded as a freedom-fighting organization, according to Prime Minister Indra Gandhi’s administration. Meanwhile, President J.R. Jayawardena’s administration saw the LTTE as terrorists. Then, there was a sudden shift in Indo-Lanka relations between 1987 and 1990. While Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s administration saw LTTE as terrorists, President Ranasinghe Premadasa called the LTTE freedom fighters and invited them for talks, which led to the ousting of the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) from Sri Lanka.

Veluppillai Prabhakaran and the most prominent members of the LTTE didn’t consider their tactics terrorist acts, classifying them instead as asymmetric or guerrilla warfare, which is a war between belligerents whose relative military power differs significantly or whose strategy or tactics differ significantly. Because the Sri Lankan military had more fighters and arms, the LTTE was justified in not playing by the rules of engagement and using all the resources available to defeat it. Prabhakaran used urban guerrilla warfare inspired by Argentinian Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara, using hit-and-run and ambush tactics, utilizing smaller teams to set land mines, and attacking concealed locations near hideouts. The LTTE used these tactics in the 1980s but then moved away after a time— into the 1990s; they didn’t want to be mischaracterized as a terrorist organization.

The LTTE’s alternative to suicide bombings can probably be traced back to Subhash Chandra Bose’s Indian National Army, which included dedicated suicide bombing squads. Even though the devastating effects of the 1983 Hezbollah suicide attacks against French and American troops in Lebanon could hardly have gone unnoticed by the LTTE leadership, the Indian Freedom Movement had a more significant influence on the Tamil struggle for independence from its inception.

Velupillai Prabhakaran emulated Subhash Chandra Bose’s tactics, as the latter was the first in the subcontinent to commit suicide attacks against the British Imperialist Army. Notable military analysts today define suicide bombings as asymmetric warfare rather than terrorism. As the Tamil struggle for independence evolved, the LTTE pioneered suicide bombing and using airplanes and small boats to attack military targets.

Although the LTTE was a brainchild of India’s foreign intelligence agency, the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), it was rumored among the LTTE circles that Prabhakaran had ordered the assassination of Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi based on information that Gandhi had instructed one of the generals in his IPKF to assassinate Prabhakaran. The general had reportedly refused because it was not allowed in the rules of engagement of the Indian Army. Recently, the Commander of the IPKF in Sri Lanka, Major General Harkirat Singh, claimed in his book “Intervention in Sri Lanka” that J.N Dixit, then India’s High Commissioner in Colombo, twice ordered him to exterminate Prabhakaran while attending a meeting at his Headquarters in Palaali. Based on this intelligence, Prabhakaran had reportedly decided to pre-empt Rajiv Gandhi by having him killed first.

Since it was a significant killing that led to the LTTE being banned as a terrorist outfit not only by India but also by the US, Europe, and some 18 countries in all, I have doubts about the LTTE’s dubious intelligence rumors and its justification that Prabhakaran decided to kill Gandhi before he could get at him. Because the Palaali meeting took place before the 1987 October war between LTTE and IPKF. Gandhi was killed in May 1991, one year after the IPKF left the shores of Sri Lanka.

Moreover, contrary to what was framed by the mainstream media to the laypeople, the primary rationale behind Pirabhakaran’s popular international press conference in Killinochi in April 2002 was a clandestine operation orchestrated by the international intelligence community. The cover story was that Norway, as a mediator, arranged a press conference for the LTTE supremo Prabhakaran to speak to the global media. Still, it was facilitated to corroborate Pirabhakaran’s voice signature to match an audio cassette stolen from the LTTE intelligence wing’s databank by an LTTE cadre operating as a mole for the Indian intelligence RAW. Evidently, in the stolen audio cassette, Prabhakaran elaborated on how LTTE plotted the assassination of Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, which was codenamed Operation Wedding. This entire undertaking proved crucial evidence for the Jain Commission of Investigation.

Therefore, it is evident that Prabhakaran killed Gandhi, pre-empting a threat he posed to the existence of the LTTE, fearing that if Gandhi returned to power, he might send the Indian troops again to Sri Lanka, as this is a credible hypothesis. Moreover, I know that Prabhakaran dreaded another Indian intervention because the IPKF crippled the LTTE and confined it to the jungles for more than two years and that the LTTE had lost 1,200 of its fighters in the battle with the IPKF. Then, it was a crippling blow to the LTTE. And that was the reason why the LTTE grabbed Sri Lankan President Ranasinghe Premadasa’s offer of talks.

Furthermore, Balasingham was not aware of the plot to kill Gandhi. Had he known about it, he would have strongly advised Prabhakaran against it, as Balasingham knew that the LTTE would be unable to sustain the struggle without Indian support. An Indian journalist asked Prabhakaran, when he called the international media in Killinochi in April 2002, how he expected India to have normal relations with his organization when he was wanted for the assassination of Gandhi. Not used to being questioned, he was flabbergasted by such a direct question and mumbled, “athu…athu…oru thunpamana sambavam.” Later, Balasingham elaborated on it as a Himalayan blunder. Hence, if LTTE had not attacked the IPKF and assassinated Gandhi, the Tamils in Sri Lanka by now would have established their independent homeland, Tamil Eelam.

Unlike such high-profile assassinations of Gandhi, the LTTE initially targeted only military personnel and installations and avoided civilian soft targets as much as possible. But it did not hesitate to strike at non-combatants when it suited its purpose. For example, the Anuradhapura massacre of 1985—the LTTE’s first such civilian mass killing—followed the collapse of the India-inspired Thimphu talks. The Batticaloa massacre after the Indian military intervention in August 1987 followed this. But the LTTE got away with it, even when it assassinated President Ranasinghe Premadasa during the May Day parade in 1993 because Western interests were not hurt until after the 9/11 attacks. Only after the al-Qaeda attack did the US and other Western powers wake up to terrorist threats and, following intensive lobbying by the then Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Laxman Kadirgamar, designated the LTTE as a terrorist organization. During the 2002–2005 ceasefire, the LTTE assassinated Laxman Kadirgamar, cocking a snook at Western powers.

The inhumanity of the conflict struck me. To this day, I still carry a deep sense of guilt and responsibility for the deaths of the numerous Sri Lankan military personnel and the Tamil Tiger cadres, who were killed using the intelligence I gathered. Now that my family and I are safely out of Sri Lanka, I still pray daily for God to forgive me for my involvement in these killings. Over 300,000 people died in this conflict as recently as 2019, when suicide bombers attacked various churches and hotels, killing 248 people. In this context, the fundamental rights of individuals have become irrelevant, and some of the civil liberties of societies have inevitably impinged.

When I was a child serving in the Hindu temple, I prayed that I would always be allowed to continue serving God as best as possible. Part of that service is telling this story, exposing the truths about the Tamil Tigers and the Sri Lankan government, and asking for forgiveness for my role in it all. I bow my head toward my chest and whisper, “Forgive me, Father.” And this time, I say it to any God listening.

Scenes from the past haunt me—a reel of death, genocide, and war claws at my heart and mind. After being kidnapped from school and forced to fight as a child soldier, I had to choose where I placed my loyalties. While my people were being torn away from everything dear to them during the bloodbath of Sri Lanka, I was abandoning my family amidst it all and fleeing to Canada. Not to betray them but to protect them. Yet, I was filled with remorse and shame. I pray God will forgive me and plan to redeem my sins.

Daily guilt, persistent nightmares resulting from my involvement in the civil war, and helplessness in faraway Canada, I slipped into depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, which gradually evolved into schizoaffective disorder in December 2004, soon after I arrived in Canada. Due to many years of prolonged treatment, the influence psychopharmacology has had on my life, and the effect that the drugs have had on my mind and behavior, I was ultimately changed into a different person. The antipsychotic drugs had a significant impact on my personality and outlook. As I internalized the treatment and conditioning, I came to believe psychologically and biologically that I had a severe mental disorder and that I could no longer live without the antipsychotic drugs.

Due to the antipsychotic drugs and chemical imbalance in my body, I suffer from many different side effects, such as obesity, hyper-cholesterol, hyper-thyroid, extreme fatigue, short-term memory loss, loss of focus, and loss of concentration. One thing led to another, and I find myself today, after more than twenty years of ongoing treatment, I have been conditioned and dependent on these drugs. If I ever stop taking the prescribed medications, I will relapse.

In annihilating the Tamil Tigers, many innocent people—youth, elderly, women, and children—had been killed as collateral. And some of those deaths happened because of my actions. But I know that doing the unthinkable was my only choice back then. My survival depended on it. Perhaps today, somehow, I might still amount to something greater than this wasted shell of a human who still lives with regrets and nightmares about those days. The survivor guilt I experience is all-consuming.

I have worn the face of a revolutionary, a soldier, and a schoolboy. I was an interrogator, a freedom fighter, and a captive traitor, all of which eventually led to a mentally ill. From here on out, how could I be forgiven for my sins?

Featured Image: Consult QD