Two memorable excerpts from a former SLAF commander’s memoir

These two excerpts from the forthcoming book, To Survive As One Nation, One People by Air Chief Marshal Oliver Ranasinghe. A Retired Commander of the Sri Lanka Airforce makes interesting reading. The first is of a sudden demand on the SLAF for emergency air support for the besieged Jaffna Fort when the only available helicopters were being prepared for a VVIP flight for UK PM Margaret Thatcher and her husband, Mark. The second deals with ferying PM Rajiv Gandhi and his wife Sonia to Katunayake after a naval rating had hit Gandhi with a rifle butt. In April 1985, the UK’s first female prime minister visited Sri Lanka to ceremonially declare open the Victoria Dam and Power Station built with aid under the patronage of Queen Elizabeth II. The completion of the project was a significant milestone for the Accelerated Mahaweli Development Programme, with the power station having an installed capacity of 210 MW. Two helicopters were stationed at Air Force Headquarters premises to fly the VVIPs at 6:30 a.m. on 12 April to Victoria Dam. I was Commanding Officer of the Helicopter Wing and assigned to fly Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and her husband. However, at around noon on the day before the flight, I got a desperate call from the Joint Operations Command (JOC) requesting that 250 troops be airlifted to the Jaffna Fort immediately, since “hot intelligence” had informed that the enemy had planned to attack the fort that night. I did not have any helis in the Wing as all had been deployed throughout the North and East. The only other two serviceable helis were in the VVIP security cordon, standing by to fly Prime Minister Thatcher and the other VVIPs the next morning. According to VVIP flying procedures, the helis are kept for 48 hours before the flight within a security cordon which is well-guarded by guards and air dogs. No one is allowed to go witin the security cordon without the Commanding Officer’s approval. I had to take a quick decision about whether to drop the troops using the two helis from the cordon and run the risk of having no heli to fly Prime Minister Thatcher the next morning. The alternative was to say “No,” to the Army and take the risk of losing hundreds of soldiers at the front, facing a humiliating defeat, loss of prestige, morale and losing the Jaffna Fort, which was the Army’s pride. If the latter happened, our conscience would be inconsolable even today. When we were fighting the battle, we were one unit: Army, Navy, Air Force and Police. The Air Force was always there. We never said no. So, I took the decision to fly immediately to Jaffna to carry out the task using the two VVIP helis. I was taking a huge risk, jeopardizing my career in the Air Force, by disregarding the standing orders and removing the two helis from the VVIP cordon. By 1:00 p.m., we took off from Katunayake for Jaffna, using the two VVIP helis without Air Force Headquarters approval. I was captaining one heli with Flight Lieutenant Lasantha Waidyaratne as my co-pilot. (He was the pilot who, a long time later on, landed a heli at Jaffna Fort in the impossible task code-named Operation Eagle.) Flight Lieutenant Tennyson Gunawardena was flying the other heli as captain. I had to fly as we did not have any pilots to spare. From the Palaly airport, we flew with twenty-two passengers without seats, keeping within the maximum all-up weight, and headed into the Jaffna Fort, approaching with the wind and not headwind as usual, avoiding enemy guns. By 5:30 p.m., Tennyson called me on the receiver transmitter unit and said, “Sir, it is raining heavily in Katunayake, and we have to go in bad weather in the night back to Katunayake. So can I leave now?” I said, “Okay,” and ensured the heli was made ready for the VVIP the next morning. In the meantime, I kept flying the balance troops. I did not get down at all from the heli and refuelling, too, was done whilst I was sitting in the pilot’s seat. The Brigadier-in-Charge in Jaffna came up to the heli very late in the evening and told me that, if I couldn’t drop all troops that night, to do the balance first thing in the morning. I said, “No, I will drop all tonight as I have to fly back to Katunayake for a very important task.” We dropped all 250 troops into the Jaffna Fort and, after refuelling at Palaly, left at around 10:00 p.m. to fly back to Katunayake. However, we got caught to heavy rain on the stretch from North of Mannar to Katunayake. The weather was so bad that we had to request radar assistance to steer to Katunayake. However, I decided to disregard radar advice and told my co-pilot to follow the coastline, just to be clear of obstacles such as high-tension wires. Helicopters do not fly in rainy weather, let alone bad weather, and definitely not at night, but we had no choice. Lasantha, my co-pilot, swears that he has not done a bad weather flight of that nature, either before or since, in his flying career. In fact, he says that he matured as a pilot during the last hours of that flight! At around midnight, we landed at Katunayake where the crew was ready to take the heli and clean it to VVIP standard, which they did throughout the night. I was relieved and happy that I could return to Katunayake the same night. The next morning, we positioned the two helis by 6:30 a.m. at Air Force Headquarters premises to fly the VVIP. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and her husband, Mr.Denis Thatcher, had a safe and comfortable flight to Victoria and back. In fact, Mrs.Thatcher was fast asleep when we touched down in Colombo! As the Commanding Officer of the No.4 Helicopter Squadron, I risked my life and career because I did not want the Jaffna Fort to fall into the enemy’s hands and lose Army lives. Also, I did not want to let down the VVIP and spoil the image of the Sri Lanka Air Force. If anything had gone wrong, obviously I would have been “thrown” in the sea. I believe such life and death situations reveal the inborn/emerging leadership potential of individuals. This excerpt deals with flying Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and his wife, Sonia, to Katunayake after a naval rating on ab honour guard struck Gandhi with rifle butt. In July 1987, I was out of the Helicopter Squadron and serving as Base Commander—Anuradhapura. The Commander of the Air Force called me one day and asked me whether I was still current on helis, and I said, “Yes.” He said, “I am sending a Bell 214 for you to do some flying training.” The next day, the heli arrived at Anuradhapura, and I got back into swing doing some flying training. After two days, I was told to come to Katunayake to do a flight. I was told that I had to fly the visiting Indian Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi, from the Bandaranaike International Airport (BIA) to Galle Face and back. He was coming to sign the much-talked about “peace accord.” The Indian Prime Minister arrived at the BIA, and he was ferried to the Galle Face green, from where he was taken in a motorcade to President’s House to sign the Indo-Lanka Peace Accord. Without taking much time, the motorcade returned to the Galle Face green. There was no panic. Rajiv Gandhi was smiling, but Sonia Gandhi helped Rajiv get in first, to the inner seat of the helicopter, and Sonia sat next to the window. If not for that, everything was normal. I started up, switched on the VHF radio and contacted the Air Force Operations Room for take-off clearance. They told me that at the Navy’s Guard of Honour parade, there had been an incident targeting Rajiv Gandhi. That played havoc in my mind. I had to think that whoever planned and failed would have a “plan B,” and that would be to target the helicopter. Then I realized that, if so, both Rajiv Gandhi’s life and mine would be destroyed by “plan B.” That was my thinking. I had to save this VVIP, our state visitor. To do that, I had to make decisions on my own. There was no one to tell me what to do. So, I took off in the most unexpected direction and avoided the usual route and followed a different route to BIA, whilst all the time being alert. Coming over BIA, I disregarded the usual approach procedure to the surprise of the Air Traffic Controllers and approached from the wrong direction and landed, but not in the designated landing place, to avoid a possible sniper or RPG attack. The VVIP got off and walked away to the awaiting Indian Air Force aircraft. That relieved me of the tension of delivering the “precious cargo” in one piece. (The book is distributed by the Vijitha Yapa Bookshop)