No doubt much will be written today about the air attack by the LTTE in Colombo early last week. There would have been time to gather more information, assess the damage done by the bombing and take a serious look at the larger picture.
The larger picture is one of security. How the LTTE’s rather primitive air wing was able to penetrate Colombo, the capital of the country, drop its payload however ineffective it might have been and get away to whence they came. While the Colombo media would have the advantage speaking to those in the know and piecing together what happened last Tuesday night those of us who live abroad must wait to get a clearer picture. What we know so far is what they have gleaned from diverse media reports.
If we are rather confused-and I am sure that those who looked at the various news reports as carefully as some of us, do - it is because there are even conflicting reports. It is in the nature of media that in the first flush of an incident the reports tend to be sketchy and vague. In an era of high speed communication and competing news services that is understandable though not necessarily acceptable.
But as time passes and fuller reports are filed, readers should be able to get more specific details that fill in the gaps left by the earlier brief reports. Unfortunately the earlier confusion tends to persist because some of the previous contradictions remain. Take one example. News sources reported that it was one aircraft that bombed the Kelanitissa power station. Reuter news agency, for instance, said that “The aircraft dropped bombs in Colombo near……..”. India Abroad News Service (IANS) reported the next morning that “After receiving reports of a suspected Tiger aircraft being spotted…..” Most reports indicated it was one aircraft.
But on Wednesday Defencewire which claims to be the hottest thing in defence news and analysis, said this: “It is now confirmed that two low flying Zlin 143 aircraft that bombed Thalladi camp last night had been proceeding towards the President’s House at Fort when they were diverted by heavy Anti-Aircraft gunfire.” Who confirmed this was not mentioned though a while later it refers to “informed sources.”
Unfortunately these well informed sources do not say whether “proceeding towards President’s House” meant the target was the President’s House or whether the planes were heading in that general direction. The implication seems to be that the target was President’s House for the sources added that heavy gunfire diverted the flights from its intended flight path. That also seemed to suggest that the informed sources were informed enough to know the pilot’s intention.
That however is not my main concern. Was it one or two aircraft that penetrated Colombo airspace? It is bad enough when one gets through but two are infinitely worse. Whether Defencewire is correct or the other news sources are correct is not the point, though certainly a clarification from official sources is welcome. It becomes quite a problem for those in our diplomatic missions who are often queried by the media in those capitals about details of such happenings, to provide definitive answers because of the lack of clarity. This is why I have maintained in these columns and elsewhere that government communications systems should be made more akin to active news media if those abroad who represent us are to be kept in the loop and abreast of the news. The bombing might have occurred at 11.30pm in Colombo. But for half the world or more, it was still very much a working day and even the print media had not gone to bed with their early editions. Apart from getting accurate news quickly to our missions and other interested parties abroad, there are still unanswered questions that relate to the larger picture mentioned earlier which surely need to be addressed.
One hopes that today’s newspapers will examine these issues and provide us with official answers and analyses based on them so as to give the public at home and abroad a better understanding of the situation. The situation is surely this. How is it that slow flying LTTE aircraft were able to penetrate Colombo and its environs for a second time since it bombed some oil facility last year and got away without being intercepted and destroyed? From what one could gather so far, the aircraft dropped a couple of bombs at Thalladi camp in Mannar, then went out to sea and came south to Colombo. If both aircraft flew to Colombo, as some claim, had one of them already dropped its payload and was coming here just for the ride or did it have another bomb or two in the undercarriage?
How many bomb pods do these aircraft have and how many bombs could they carry? Obviously the more bombs they have the slower the aircraft would be and the more fuel it would use, shortening the time they stay in the air. I may be wrong on this aspect of aerodynamics but this would be a common man’s understanding. Given the rather basic means of dropping the payload used by these aircraft, they would not only have to fly low but slow. I doubt they use electronic means of dropping bombs. These are by no means supersonic jets or unmanned vehicles that shoot missiles or drop bombs. These are closer to World War 1 technology.
The questions I hope today’s analyses and commentaries will answer are why with all the fire power from anti-aircraft guns and air defence systems said to be concentrated in and around Colombo, it was not possible to shoot down or damage the Tiger craft? How were the aircraft able to get up to Kelanitissa power station (or any other target) if it (they?) were spotted on radar at least 20 minutes before reaching Colombo? If the plane or planes were able to come to Colombo after being spotted on radar and Colombo had been alerted and then return with no apparent scratch on them, then should not serious thought be given to the defence system in place in the capital city?One would have thought that after last year’s bombing some lessons would have been learnt. After all, the aircraft- the ones that bombed Thalladi and Colombo- appear to have been able to return to their base, some report said to Iranamadu. I thought that this particular airstrip had been bombed and destroyed. Are the planes then operating from elsewhere? I believe there is a serious need for a thorough stocktaking. I hope that today’s commentaries will provide a lot of answers to a host of questions that arise but cannot be raised here for lack of space. | 
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