No tears for Fonseka

No tears for Fonseka
H. L. D. Mahindapala
Retired General Sarath Fonseka is one of those tragic Shakesperean heroes who is doomed to dig his own grave through a fatal flaw in his character. In short, he was virtually asking for what he got last night. He was challenging the government to arrest him if they have any charges against him and when the Military Police went to arrest him he resisted. He had to be dragged out initially though he walked the last steps to the van in which he was taken to quarters at Sri Lankan Navy.
The irony is that Fonseka who was challenging the government to arrest him was reluctant to walk out like a gentlemen and an officer to face his accusers. This is typical of Fonseka. He should have honoured his own words and, knowing the law, cooperated with the Military Police as there was no point in resisting arrest. He may have been putting up a show for Soma-hansa Amerasinghe, Rauf Hakeen, Mano Ganesan and a couple of retired officers but what good would that do to him?
The resistance he put up at his flat/office was unworthy of a man who holds the rank of a General. That is the behaviour of a kudu karaya. It is as if he was admitting guilt even before he is taken to trial. Besides, there was no bravery in resisting officers who are trained to carry out orders and he should know that because he was one of them. Fonseka is sinking deeper and deeper into his own mire.
The charges read to him include
1. Engaging in political activity targeting and undermining the state which he was sworn to serve whilst in uniform
2. Conspiring against his Commander-in-Chief whilst holding the highest rank in the Army
3. Creating a private army of more than 1,500 deserters whilst holding the office of the Army Commander in pursuit of his self-serving politics, and
4. Engaging in corrupt practices in procuring arms for the forces.
In this short list he has been let off lightly. Perhaps, there are more to come. But the most criminal charge that should be levelled against him is that of betraying his own comrades and expressing his willingness to name them in an international court, assuming that they had committed war crimes.
It is incredible that an Army Commander who earned his glory and spurs on the bravery and sacrifices of his forces should turn around now to blackmail his own rank file with threats of exposing them in an international court for carrying out his own orders. He talks now as if he was not a part and parcel of the Army that committed war crimes, according to him.
It is his state of mental balance that is in question here. How can an army commit war crimes without the knowledge of the Army Commander? If his rank and file committed war crimes without his knowledge then he was not fit to be the Army Commander. Besides, if he knows anything about the law of war crimes he should know that the ultimate responsibility lies with him. More so, because he claimed credit for all the successes in the battle field.
In his own words he has absolved all responsibility of any alleged crimes attributed to the Defence Secretary - his main target in his accusations -- when he declared that Defence Secretary was sitting in his air-conditioned room fiddling with his ties while he, as Army Commander, supervised and directed every move from Mavil
Aru to Vellamullivaikal. If the Defence Secretary was fiddling with his ties in the comfort of his air-conditioned room, without poking his fingers in the battlefield, how on earth could he have committed war crimes? If what Fonseka says is true - and we have to, for the sake argument, provisionally accept his word on claiming total responsibility for victory - then he is responsible not only for victory but also for the war crimes, which he says, that were committed on the way to the victory for which he claims sole responsibility. In claiming total responsibility for the victory, without the input of the Commander-in-Chief or the Defence Secretary he cannot point a finger at them, or for that matter any other authority or officer, for any alleged war crimes.
Sri Lankan soldiers who followed him loyally must be dying a thousand deaths now when they heard over the Sinhala Service of the BBC yesterday that "he (Fonseka) is prepared to give evidence in an international court on war crime charges against Sri Lanka."
"General Sarath Fonseka speaking to journalists in Colombo on Monday said, "I am not going to save anyone who has committed war crimes".
"I am definitely going to reveal what I know, what I was told and what I heard. Any one who has committed war crimes should definitely be brought into courts," Gen. Fonseka said.
"Those who reveal the truth are not traitors" he added, said the BBC report. .
These statements do not enhance his image as a hero of the nation which he claimed for himself to gain political mileage. In fact, with each statement he makes he goes down in the estimation of the public that hero-worshipped him. What he says is no doubt music to the NGOs, anti-Sri Lankan governments in the West and the defeated coalition of no-hopers who were gathered around him at the time of his arrest.
It is not surprising that Ranil Wickremesinghe was not there last night to hand him tissues for his tears. The move of the government to arrest Fonseka is a boon to Wickremesinghe though he will shed copious tears. Government has done what he could not do: removed Fonseka from the political scene which, Wickremesinghe hopes, would resolve his main problem of emerging as the sole rallying point for the opposition coalition now in total disarray.
The government move to try Fonseka in a military court is justified and valid. He is not tried for his politics as a presidential candidate but for engaging covertly and even overtly at times to undermine the authority of the democratically elected state whilst holding the highest office in the Army. As everyone knows, he was making overseas call from America to Tilvin Silva to get his advice on how to go ahead with his moves to put the Rajapakses in the dock with accusations of war crimes. .
It is the JVP that gave him this dead rope. The Soma-hansas who were just tall enough to lick the boots of the general, were leading him down the path of self-destruction. Their manipulations and promises of greatness to come fed the hate and ego of Fonseka who was trying to bring down the Rajapakses who gave him everything. Even now his statements are soaked in his bitter bile. That is not the stuff of democratic and humane politics.
As long as he is immersed in hate he will never redeem himself. It is difficult to shed tears for a man who hates so much and has no compunction in letting down his own forces for the sake of his petty self-interest.