Background

Sri Lanka’s Liberation Army of Tamil Eelam, or Tamil Tigers, are one of the most capable non-state armed groups. They aren’t state-supported, their main funding comes from Tamils in southern India and the Tamil diaspora around the world (including New Zealand). They have been fighting since 1976, succeeding in maintaining autonomy for the rural parts of the northeast.

India sent a peacekeeping force which withdrew after three years. It had initial military success – being the most powerful state in the region, and with extensive counter-insurgency experience – but the Tamils had more and more success, and India’s political will could not deal with the casualties. 1166 Indian jawans died on Sri Lanka.

Tamil involvement in black globalization includes drug trafficking, arms smuggling and piracy. They formerly were known to operate a fleet of ten freighters which shipped cargo worldwide. One of the frieghters shipped 60 tons of explosive from Ukraine to Sri Lanka in 1994 in a single trip. Piracy included a 1997 seizure of a ship carrying over $3 million worth of mortar rounds.

Airport attack

The 2001 Bandaranaike airport attack demonstrates the devastating effect of attacking an island’s connections with the world.

Sri Lanka made an insurance claim of US$500 million. 26 aircraft were destroyed including most of the Sri Lankan air force and several airliners. Nearly half of the 1500 employees of the airline were made redundant following the attack. Travel advisory warnings by Western governments and sharply increased insurance premiums for airlines were a huge setback to the Sri Lankan tourism industry.

How did they do it? Just 14 heavily armed and highly trained suicide bombers entered the airport, in three waves. They had night vision goggles, anti-tank missiles, RPGs, a grenade launcher, three machine guns and nine assault rifles. Taking advantage of a scheduled evening power cut (due to an electricity shortage), they cut fences and travelled through stormwater drains. Early in the morning, the first two groups emerged on the runway and destroyed eight aircraft on the flightline with missiles, before firing at the hangars. After an hour of combat, they were dead.

The third group targeted the international airport. They machine-gunned a fuel tank beside an airliner before igniting it with a grenade – the explosion destroyed the airliner. Some of them planted bombs which destroyed airliners, others infiltrated the air conditioning, climbed to the roof of the terminal and fired rockets at more aircraft. It took five hours before all of them were killed.

Implications

This attack was well-planned and well-executed. The fighters were obviously fully committed to their cause, and willing to accept certain death. In an instant, one of Sri Lanka’s main advantages – the ability to use aerial bombing – was wiped out.

The choice of target is interesting. More air force jets could have been destroyed, but the attackers chose to cause maximum disruption and damage to the civilian airport as well, affecting tourism and travel. The attack was designed to be spectacular, increasing the worldwide perception of Sri Lanka as a dangerous warzone, rather than an exotic tourist destination. In effect, they struck at the heart of Sri Lanka’s economy and image. This demonstrates the vulnerability of critical infrastructure and the wide-ranging effects of striking it.

Attacks of this sort are likely to happen in other conflicts, too. The Basque destruction of an airport parking building a few weeks ago was an example, and so was the IRA attempted mortar attacks at Heathrow in the 1990s. Plots to attack airports have also been uncovered in Thailand.

Posted by Phil on Wednesday, January 31st, 2007 at 1:55 pm.