Tamil Tigers

[spartan]

What is your opinion of the Tamil Tigers?

Are they an organisation you support or oppose?

Please give your reasons as to why you support or oppose them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tamil_Tigers

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sri_Lankan_civil_war

[Revolutiondownunder]

They are marxist inspired but I feel that at heart they are more ethnic seperatists.

They are anti-imperialist, but since their people being in Sri-Lanka is the result of imperialism Im not so sure how far that goes.

[Saorsa]

They are a national liberation movement struggling against the oppression of their people. Of course I support them.

[Anarch_Mesa]

The Tamil Tigers Aren't what Sri Lankan needs, if that is what you are looking for. They are a violent revolutionary group, but at times they seem to lean torward a thuglike appearance, I'm just unsure what to think about them.

[Black Sheep]

It would be great if the original poster posted a link or two,providing basic information about what he/she is talking about.. :sneaky:

[Vendetta]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tamil_Tigers

There you go, mauroprovatos.

[Black Sheep]

Yeah, yeah i already did that, but it would be good,since this is the learning section, to include such info on the 1st post.:)

[spartan]

Yeah, yeah i already did that, but it would be good,since this is the learning section, to include such info on the 1st post.:)
Just edited in two links.

[Yehuda Stern]

The LTTE is very similar to other nationalist groups - it arose in opposition to oppression and ended up having to make deals with imperialism because it did not have a revolutionary perspective. It is pretty similar to what happened to Fatah in Palestine.

[JimmyJazz]

Of course I support them.

I cringe when I see this.

[Saorsa]

Originally Posted by JimmyJazz

I cringe when I see this.

[JimmyJazz]

http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc101/vtm20002000/whyyou.gif

[Ramachandra]

The LTTE was born through the sufferings of the common tamil people in sri lanka(Which was a result of imperialist capitalism).In the begining there were severel tamil armed groups.But later LTTE became the superior tamil armed group completely and brutally demolishing the other groups.Actually now the LTTE is kind of a semi facist group and also an ultra chauvinist group which is based on an ethnic basis.From the point of view of a sri lankan revolution the LTTE's demand of dividing the country through ethnic borders is completely reactionery as it devides the sri lankan proleteriate through ethnic lines.It is a well known thing that western super powers directly or indirectly back the LTTE.The Royal Norwegian government openly gave their aid to this group during the last few years.No leftist can support the political actions taken by the LTTE which includes mass murdering,ethnic cleansing etc.Thousends of muslims were banished from their homelands by the LTTE and this action was clearly made on a basis of chauvinism.And through out it's history they violently attacked innocent sinhalese civilians,murdered them and it also shows the racist element of this group.And if some one says that It's an "anti imperialist" group well that's a total myth.answering a question asked by a journalist in 2002 LTTE's cheif ideologue Anton Balasingham ( he passed away couple of years back) clearly stated that their economic policy is "free market economy".The fact is each and every opressed in the island suffers because of this "free market economy"carried through by the pro-imperialist regimes in the past few decades.So what liberty can the LTTE give to the common tamil if they are commited to the same reactionery policy?They are not anti imperialists.They are also pro-imperialists as same as the colombo government.We as a section of the sri lankan left don't recognise the LTTE as a progressive group and they are not worth to support,and in addition i must mention that the LTTE gets a massive support from the tamilnadu bourgeise politicians(in india) and all these leads to an end which cannot be defined "progressive".Actually the LTTE is more similar to a group like Al queda Yes they were born through oppresed masses but their political charachter,goal and motion leads nowhere but to maintain the system of oppression.These kind of terrorist/racist groups cannot even give the slightest support to solve the national question in sri lanka.It only confuses such an effect.Only an socialist revolution can demolish every kind of sufferings of the country!The true responsibility of a revolutionery is to gather each and every tamil,muslim,sinhalese under the red banner of the revolution and unite the proletariate!deviding the country leads to more and more destruction and that is not a solution at all.

[FreeFocus]

They've engaged in terrorist attacks, killing hundreds, maybe thousands of civilians. That's indefensible, no matter which way you put it. And it's not like these were accidental murders, where they attack a military outpost and civilians get caught up in the crossfire, but they've specifically targeted civilians and high-density locations. The Sri Lankan government is obviously no saint and is just as bad, if not worse.

[dez]

ramachandra, i've heard two things about the tamil tigers.

One is that they invented suicide bombing, and the other is that they promote forced recruitement.

Are they true?


(just out of curiosity. Not joining any propaganda wave)

[Vargha Poralli]

One is that they invented suicide bombing,

May or may not be true but certainly they perfected it and have used it most effectively. Take a look at assasinations of Rajiv Gandhi,Premadasa and many other prominent Srilankan hardline politicians and also their attack and neutralising of Srilankan Airforce periodically.



and the other is that they promote forced recruitement.

They do just like every other rebel groups and government do. There is nothing outrageous about it.

I greatly agree with an analysis about them in another website. They are like puss coming out of the wound that have been inlicted on the Srilankan Tamil $people. Clening the puss is not going to heal the wound which is what Srilankan government is trying to do.

They are th biggeset obstcle to a solution to the Srilankan Crisis just the Sinhalese Chauvinist government is but without them there is no solution to the crisis.

[Ramachandra]

One is that they invented suicide bombing, and the other is that they promote forced recruitement.

I'm not sure whether they invented suicide bombing but they used it in a massive way.
Vargha poralli the thing is it's true that they killed Gandhi and premadasa but if you count hundreds of innocents they killed using the above tactic well you will sure think twice.The assanistion of gandhi doesn't sound heroic to me.It is the Indian goverment (mainly indira gandhi)adopted the tigers and other tamil militant groups in the early 80s.The RAW provided arms,armed training to the tigers in camps of tamilnadu.They used tigers as a tool of their expanding desire.Pirabhakaran killed Gandhi not because the LTTE is anti imperialist or something, that happened because Gandhi later suppoted the EPRLF-another tamil group and the growth of that group challanged the autocracy of pirabakaran.The thing is you cannot support the colombo government by the same way LTTE is not worth of supporting too.If you oppose the colombo government on principle matters(anti chauvinism,anti capitalism etc) the same principles apply to the tigers too.They are no better.At least let me say this.The SL government accepts the minimum degree of bourgeise democracy.We the leftists can critisize the government while living in the area controlled by them.But imagine what will happen if you go and critisize the LTTE in a leftist perspective.No alternative idea is ignored there.Thats why we argue that the LTTE's nature includes features of facism.

[Ramachandra]

In addition the LTTE uses/used child soldiers in their troops.I know this fact clearly there are many young tamils - they have immigrated to the southern cities leaving their northern homelands because of the threat to be taken in to the LTTE squads.People who can afford go abroad many others come to southern areas.Do you know that the majority of the tamil population in sri lanka lives outside the north and east areas?In colombo there are certain areas which the majority cleary consist from tamils-many of them have escaped from the "liberated'zones of the LTTE.:)Jeyapalan-a distinguished tamil poet(He now lives in norway or canada.i'm not sure)is a classic example for the brutality of the LTTE.The poet was a political conciouss leftist artist but he had to flee the country-He was critical both on the SL government and the tigers.

[Sam_b]

they are a national liberation movement struggling against the oppression of their people. Of course i support them.

this.

[Revolutiondownunder]

So what liberty can the LTTE give to the common tamil if they are commited to the same reactionery policy?


There are quite a few Singalese and Tamil left wingers in my city. They often spout similar sentiments.

[spartan]

Why are the Tamil Tigers being supported by western governments like Norway?

Is it because Sri Lanka is too close to China and the west is trying to redress the balance by weakening Sri Lanka via the Tamil Tigers?

[Kal98]

It would be a shameful exercise in Sri-Lankan chauvinism indeed to say that the Tamil people do not constitute an independent culture and people. I mean we are talking about the Sri-Lankan government here, the same government who used the Tsunami as an excuse to displace coastal fishing people in order to make way for slick housing development.

In either respect; the struggle for Tamil national liberation will have to happen before the struggle for socialism, because even if Sri Lanka was to become socialist it would still have to deal with the issue of Tamil people in a non-chauvanist way.

The attempts to skip over or deny the anti-imperialist and democratic nature of the liberation struggles in the developing world are simply denying reality. The Tamils must have a secure State before they can have socialism.

[Ramachandra]

In either respect; the struggle for Tamil national liberation will have to happen before the struggle for socialism, because even if Sri Lanka was to become socialist it would still have to deal with the issue of Tamil people in a non-chauvanist way.

The national question in sri lanka(The term tamil issue indicates a narrow view point)can be handled in a non chauvinist way only within socialist conditions because in this era you cannot expect bourgeise factions -either tamil or sinhalese to be non chauvinist as they are corrupted from all kind of reactionery trends from their roots.If the bourgeise has failed in each and every social issue how can you expect a non chauvinist proper solution only for the ethnic issue from them?

The Tamils must have a secure State before they can have socialism. http://www.revleft.com/vb/../revleft/buttons/quote.gif (http://www.revleft.com/vb/../newreply.php?do=newreply&p=1240731)
You cannot take the "tamil struggle" out from the context.Talking about an abstract national opression without considering the internal class relations is wrong.accepting a seperate state means deviding the country on ethnic lines.We thoroughly emphasize that under srii lankan conditions it is really dangerous.Actually SL is a country which have a mixed population.As i have mentioned before there are thousends of tamils who live in southern areas.The structure of many districts population is kind of a multi ethnic one.What happened in India/pakistan when it was devided?How many millions were killed?We strongly oppose such a step because it will lead to countless disasters/ethnic cleansing and it won't be a help in it's least sense to solve the problem .And please focus on the imperialist interfierences happening on this problem.Just because a group is armed that won't make it progressive.Can we just ignore the norwegian backing of the LTTE?

The attempts to skip over or deny the anti-imperialist and democratic nature of the liberation struggles in the developing world
As i have mentioned before LTTE has nothing to do with anti imperialism.The LTTE is really different from many fantasies which some have about them.Please try to go through a deep study on their nature.Then you will realise their political motion is quite the opposite from which you fantasize.
"democratic nature" of the LTTE?I suggest you should try to study on other expressions of the non tiger tamil politicians.From appapllai amirthalingham to nilan thiruchelvam hundreds of tamil politicians were murdered brutally by the LTTE.Uma maheshwaran,the leader of another tamil armed organization(actually in the 80s this organisation held somekind of a leftist approach.) was also assasinated.All these happened because they didn't kneel in front of the LTTE's autocracy.And you speak about democracy:tt2: