Having created a navy comprised of an estimated 5,000 to 6,000 rebel sailors, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) Sea Tigers of Sri Lanka are arguably the largest non-state maritime force in the world. With the LTTE’s development and deployment of its Black Sea Tiger squadron, the waters off the Tamil-controlled and contested coastlines of Sri Lanka have become a research and development testbed for water-borne suicide attacks. The May 11, 2006 LTTE naval attack on a Sri Lanka troop transport ship, carrying 710 soldiers and escort boats, included a suicide strike (Terrorist Incident forthcoming), which resulted in the loss of one Sri Lanka navy pilot boat and death of 17 sailors. The Tigers are believed to have lost at least five vessels and as many as 40 rebels.
The Sea Tigers have been considerably more active in 2006 than in years past, and last week’s attack resulted in the destruction of the third Sri Lanka Navy Israeli-built Dvora fast-attack boat this year. The lessons learned from such strikes are surely being compiled for use in future Black Sea Tiger attacks but may soon be read by militants elsewhere. Al-Qaeda , for instance, deployed suicide attacks against the USS Sullivans ineffectively at first, but later against the USS Cole and French oil tanker Limburg with increasing lethality in a modus operandi similar to that developed by the LTTE throughout the 1990s. Since al-Qaeda leadership has explicitly identified Israel as a prime target, the knowledge gained off the Sri Lanka coastline may be used by al-Qaeda cells, sympathizers, or allied Islamic militants and suicide attackers against a mainstay patrol boat of Israel’s Navy or adapted for use against other western fast-attack patrol boats worldwide. Reports continue to surface that like-minded militants of the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) in the Philippines and even al-Qaeda itself have explored other types of water-borne tactics such as SCUBA-fitted underwater demolition and suicide attacks.
International observers from the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) are loudly proclaiming that the LTTE and related Sea Tigers have no legitimate standing and no rights at sea because they are non-state actors and thus cannot legally claim ownership or possession of sea lanes or territorial/coastal waters. As such, captured Sea Tigers have even less standing than terrorist ‘detainees’ held by the US. In such remote geographical regions, the rule of international law is minimal. However, in this case, the international community is highlighting the LTTE’s abrogation of international law and its obligations to the current truce from 2002, still technically in force, as a means to apply pressure against the rebel leadership and dissuade foreign agents and the Diaspora from further supporting the Tigers. As such, the lessons learned from the current maritime conflict off the Sri Lankan coast extend well beyond just the tactical knowledge regarding sinking patrol boats, but expansively to include refining diplomatic maneuvers and strengthening the international maritime regime to protect foreign assets in waters off the coast of political conflicts.