Under the guise of “humanitarianism”, US marines land in Sri Lanka

Washington and Colombo both insist that the deployment is purely for humanitarian purposes. But the real motivation for the US military’s deployment in Sri Lanka, Indonesia and other affected countries is to further America’s economic and strategic interests.

The official US response to the December 26 disaster expresses the indifference and contempt felt within US ruling circles towards the victims. For three days, President Bush said nothing at all. When finally compelled to make a statement, he increased the initial US aid offer of $10 million to $35 million. Grudgingly, the overall figure was eventually lifted to $350 million.

The proposal to send the US military was made in a telephone conversation between US Secretary of State Colin Powell who telephoned Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar on January 1. On the same afternoon, the US ambassador to Sri Lanka, Jeffry Lunstead, announced that 1,500 US marines would be dispatched to carry out relief work in the country.

The decision, and the manner in which it was reached, provoked unease in Sri Lankan ruling circles. No cabinet meeting was held to discuss the issue and parliament was not convened to ratify the proposal. Yet for the first time since independence in 1948, a sizeable contingent of US troops was to arrive on Sri Lankan soil.

An editorial in the Daily Mirror on January 6 voiced some of the concerns. It cautioned against the tendency “to think more with the heart than with the head and look more to some short-term benefit instead of the long-term consequences in terms of global geopolitics and the agendas behind the agenda.”

The newspaper noted US ambitions to use Sri Lanka, and Trincomalee harbour in particular, as a base for its military operations in Central Asia and the Middle East. “Against this backdrop questions are being raised about the deployment of US troops with a warship on the basis of a telephone understanding between two ministers,” it commented.

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelem (LTTE) voiced its opposition to any US military involvement in relief work. An LTTE spokesman told the media that American and Indian troops, “based on their political and military interests” might spy and provide intelligence to the Colombo government to crush the LTTE. Both countries continue to list the LTTE as a terrorist organisation.

These objections reflected concerns that the US agenda would cut across the interests of different layers of the ruling elite in Sri Lanka. There was also the fear that an unabashed embrace of the US military could lead to opposition from working people, who have a long history of opposing the predatory actions of imperialism in the region.

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http://wsws.org/articles/2005/jan2005/sri-j12.shtml