Navy bulwarks thwart LTTE assaults

By Dhaneshi YATAWARA

When Admiral Karannagoda took over as the Commander of the Navy in 2005 September the cessation of hostilities was in force under the Ceasefire Agreement signed in February 2002 . “During my command as the Eastern Naval Commander in 2003, I was convinced that the LTTE was preparing for a greater battle,” Admiral Karannagoda said explaining the modus oprendi of the LTTE.

The LTTE threw up a challenge to the Government, by closing the Mavil Aru anicut denying water to 15,000 villagers in the government controlled areas. By this time the LTTE had violated the Ceasefire Agreement on over 3,000 occasions since it was signed with the Government of Sri Lanka on February 22, 2002.

On August 1 around 2 p.m., the LTTE launched an unsuccessful attack from Sampur using suicide boats and other attack craft on the Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) passenger ferry, the ‘Jetliner’ off the Trincomalee harbour. The vessel was returning from Kankesanthurai harbour with over 1,200 Army troops on leave. An artillery attack was also launched by the LTTE from Sampur targeting the Naval base and the naval craft berthed in the harbour. The SLN who was ready to meet the enemy successfully repulsed the attack destroying number of LTTE craft including suicide boats during the confrontation. No SLN craft were damaged as a result of the artillery attack but 5 sailors were killed and 40 wounded in the Dockyard naval base in Trincomalee, the heart of the SLN. Over 40 rounds of artillery were fired at the Navy and a few of them hit the SLAF camp at China Bay. The Navy had realized that the LTTE had positioned their artillery guns at Sampur targeting the inner entrance of the harbour, to attack any Naval vessel leaving or entering the harbour. “The LTTE had drawn the battle plans to execute the grand strategy of recapturing the Jaffna Peninsula,” said Admiral Wasantha Karannagoda, the former Commander of the Sri Lanka Navy.

On the evening of August 11, 2006 the Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, the Navy Commander, the Air Force Commander and the Army Commander, were at the Operations Room of the Joint Operations Headquarters. The LTTE had launched attacks on Muhamalai Army Defence Line and the Naval detachments in Kayts. “We were awake the entire night directing the ground/battle commanders by getting the situation report of battle field then and there. We were in full control of the entire situation,” said Admiral Karannagoda, explaining the series of incidents in the historic battle against terrorism.

“Initially the LTTE made a few gains - they were able to breakthrough the Army defence line at Muhamalai making the Army to withdraw to the second defence line. Meanwhile the Kayts Island came under LTTE attack. But within 12 hours the Army and the Navy were able to regain their original positions,” Admiral Karannagoda said. The SLA artillery fire from the guns that were positioned in the Kayts Island provided very good support for the SLN troops to repulse the LTTE.

There were no dents in the security network of the northern island sector. Kayts, Punkuduthivu, Karaitivu, Nainathivu, Eluvathivu, Analathivu, Mandathivu and Delft which were under the defence of the Navy.

All these islands had a number of camps and we had deployed nearly 3000 troops in the island sector. In the 65 sq.km. Kayts island, we had over 1000 naval personnel at that time. At this time we were recruiting more youths to the Navy.

According to the Navy sources what facilitated the LTTE to land on the island was the support given by certain civilians living in the island. There were nearly 30,000 people living in this island. We had a strong radar network covering the entire island and at the time of the attack some of the radars were neutralized by those living in the island. In the attack three of the sailors were killed.

The LTTE could not stay in the beach front for more than 12 hours though they might have thought they would be lucky enough to win if they launched a surprise attack.

The Mavil Aru attack in June 2006 was the launch of the LTTE grand strategy of recapturing Jaffna. Else the, LTTE would not have achieved anything by closing an irrigation canal. Their intention was to drive away the Army troops from the camps located in area South of Trincomalee such as Muttur, Kattaparichchan, etc. so that they could continue their domination in the Southern rim of the Trincomalee harbour which enables them to bring their artillery guns to attack the Naval strategic locations in Trincomalee as attempted on August 1, 2006.

Greater battle

“I always believed we could defeat the LTTE militarily under correct political leadership,” Admiral Karannagoda added. “LTTE always pretended they were superior and many Governments also had to agree to their terms which I could never have done as a Naval Officer,” he said.

When Admiral Karannagoda took over as the Commander of the Navy in 2005 September the cessation of hostilities was in force under the Ceasefire Agreement signed in 2002 February.

“During my command as the Eastern Naval Commander in 2003, I was convinced that the LTTE was preparing for a greater battle,” Admiral Karannagoda said explaining the modus oprendi of the LTTE.

In the East the Tamil Rehabilitation Organization (TRO) started constructing new housing scheme in a selected site and we found almost all the families who were given these houses were the so-called LTTE ‘Mahaveera’ families,” he said. It was identified that the settlements were built particularly to secure the LTTE supply lines leading to areas south of Trincomalee. This was the time the LTTE established 13 new camps South of the Trincomalee harbour including the infamous “Manirasakulam camp”.

As this war veteran explained, the LTTE launched its offensives prematurely during the peace process fearing that the Government under President Rajapaksa would further strengthen the forces and gear up for an attack.

This is the fundamental reason for the LTTE to pre-empt the attack. “They realized that the more the time spent in the peace process, stronger the Security forces would be because President Mahinda Rajapaksa was determined to eradicate terrorism from the country. Yet he gave the peace process a chance,” he said.

Our Naval deployment off the Eastern shores, previous to my command, concentrated on Mullaitivu since it was a key base of the Sea Tigers. But when I took over the command, we found the LTTE had active supply lines in the Mannar South on the Western coast, Admiral Karannagoda added.

Thus we had to strengthen the patrols in Mannar South as well. We intensified the surveillance over the multiday fishing trawlers secretly transporting weapons and improved our Intelligence network. On a daily basis, we adjusted our deployments on the intelligence information we received.

We had larger ships patrolling 150-160 miles in the deep sea to detect any LTTE ships entering into or wander near our waters. The Fast Attack Craft (Dvoras) were patrolling 15-30 miles in the sea to detect the multiday fishing trawlers that were transporting weapons and goods for the LTTE.

We destroyed nine multiday fishing trawlers bringing in arms and ammunition to LTTE during the year 2006 and captured two. By this time Silavaturai was a key logistic base of the Sea Tigers in the Western coast. In the East coast, from Point Pedro to Trincomalee we had six Dvora craft at any given time patrolling. The LTTE had a number of Sea Tiger camps along the Eastern sea board from North of Trincomalee upto Point Pedro. These camps have been set up to launch ‘wolf pack’ type attacks on supply vessels and SLN vessels plying between Northern Peninsula from Trincomalee.

We always deploy Fast Attack Craft in pairs in the Eastern seas and South of Mannar. Since we had to concentrate on both the Western coast and the Eastern coast the number of craft available were not adequate. So it was then that we thought of our own small boat concept. It was a good answer to the suicide boat menace of the LTTE and also supplemented the Dvoras. The Sea Tigers came in 20-25 boat clusters consisting of 5-6 suicide craft in it to attack a pair of Fast Attack Craft. These Dvoras patrolling in adjacent areas had to fight the LTTE’s 25 boats until the reinforcements reach the location either from KKS or Trincomalee. Thus the small boat, called “Arrow” became a necessity. It became very effective in shallow water encounters where Dvoras could not operate. In 2007 we were able to launch a flotilla of Arrow boats, so when the LTTE launch 20 boats for an attack we could launch 40. Outnumbering them we made our attacks a success and that’s how we were able to secure the sea lines of communication countering the LTTE suicide boat threat. The small boat concept really helped defeat the LTTE at sea.

Encounters

The Navy manufactured more than 150 “small boats” in three varieties including “Arrow” and “Wave Rider” that were capable of operating in different sea conditions. Built with fibreglass, it just took eight days for the naval technicians to build and equip a single “Arrow boat” with the installation of its weapon outfit including Automatic Grenade Launcher, 14.5mm and 23mm guns.

These “small boats” were manned by highly trained sailors from elite units, such as the Special Boat Squadron (SBS) and the Rapid Action Boat Squadron (RABS).

“We manufactured these boats throughout day and night because we needed them quickly and this is how we were able to tame the Tigers at sea,” Admiral Karannagoda added.

The Sea Tiger’s capabilities declined dramatically with the Navy destroying a large number of LTTE boats in many encounters at sea. In 2006 the Navy encountered 21 sea battles with the LTTE - these were battles that lasted for more than 12 hours in the seas and there were number of other battles that lasted for shorter periods.

In 2007 the Navy was able to reduce the number of encounters which lasted for more than 12 hours to 11 with the full exploitation of their unique small boat concept. And in 2008 there were only three such encounters.

The main reason for the defeat of the LTTE was cutting off their supply lines. The LTTE possessed several large merchant ships that were used to keep a steady supply of military hardware so that the LTTE could continue their offensive against the Security Forces. According to naval intelligence the LTTE had eight such vessels in the high seas about 1500 - 3500 kilometres away from Sri Lanka using them as floating warehouses, carrying mortar shells, artillery shells, torpedoes, aircraft parts, missiles, under water craft, diving equipment, Radar, electro-optical devices and night vision equipment.

These ships would sail 300-400 km close to the coast and transfer the ‘cargo to multiday fishing trawlers owned by the LTTE and transport them to the land. Therefore in order to cut off the supply lines, it was of paramount importance to locate these floating warehouses.

“We improved our intelligence network and its links, both local and international, and with the help of the information we gathered during interrogations of those onboard the captured trawlers, we were able to get a clear picture of the whereabouts of those ships,” Admiral Karannagoda explained.

The first ship was destroyed on September 17, 2006 about 120 nautical miles away from the Sri Lankan coast. “Sri Lanka Navy was not a blue-water navy comprising the state-of-the-art warships such as frigates, destroyers, corvettes or battleships which could patrol in the high seas for longer periods.

But we always found innovative methods to mobilise our old patrol vessels. The Navy had to develop the ocean-going capability in order to destroy the other floating warehouses which were located about 1800 nautical miles away from the Sri Lankan coast, closer to the Australia’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). It is the strategy we adopted that mattered most”, he said.

As a result of Sri Lanka Navy’s dedication to duty under the Command of Admiral Wasantha Karannagoda, by end 2007 the LTTE totally lost the supply lines, a major turning point in the history of our war against terrorism.

Time tested strategy

Explaining further on the strategy Admiral Karannagoda added that starving the enemy of their supplies is a time tested strategy in warfare.

“In the Second World War the Germen troops were compelled to withdraw from their offensive to capture Leningrad in Russia as a result of their supply lines getting cut off due to severe winter. World renowned Chinese philosopher Tsun Tzu elaborated this very clearly in his book the ‘Art of War’,” Admiral Karannagoda explained.

We monitored and analysed the enemy use of artillery and mortar rounds from the daily reports received from the Joint Operations Headquarters (JOH). The graph shows how the enemy were firing their heavy weapons at will when they had uninterrupted supplies in 2006 and early parts of 2007 and how slow the Army was progressing due to heavy enemy fire. It also shows how the enemy fire reduced dramatically once the Navy destroyed their floating warehouses, particularly the last four ships during the latter part of 2007 and how the Army advanced rapidly with the drastic reduction in mortar and artillery fire from the LTTE as shown in the graph. Sinking ‘floating warehouses’ compelled them to start manufacturing mortar and artillery locally.

The manufacturing plants were captured by the Army later. The LTTE knew that for every bullet they fired there was no replenishment. Therefore they were compelled to withdraw from a larger area they were holding earlier and to concentrate on defending a smaller area.

The Sri Lanka Navy played its silent role keeping the naval budget to a minimum. Admiral Karannagoda believes that the Sri Lanka Navy has much more to offer to other navies in terms of recent fighting experience, particularly the development of strategies and tactics for defeating a ruthless notorious terrorist group at a time when maritime terrorism has become new threat in and around the Indian Ocean.

Although the Navy was working hard to defeat the LTTE Sea Tigers and to cut off their supply lines, certain elements were trying to make these successes of our sailors less public, especially blocking it being reported in the media or undermining the efforts of the Navy. What really helped the navy to maintain its high morale was the unwavering leadership of President Rajapaksa ruling together with the country,” Admiral Karannagoda added. “President Mahinda Rajapaksa with the Defence Secretary, Gotabhaya Rajapaksa kept the armed forces together galvanizing the support of the people behind them. Their resolve never shook and that was one of the most crucial factors,” behind the victory over terrorism,” Admiral Karannagoda said.
 

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