By Our Defence Correspondent
United States government investigators are trying to find out if the LTTE was in any way connected with the suicide bombing of the US Navy destroyer USS Cole on October 12 in Aden, according to diplomatic sources.

The attack in the port of the Yemeni capital killed 17 US Navy sailors and wounded 33. It was one of the most devastating attacks ever against United States forces in the Middle East.

President Bill Clinton has vowed to avenge the deaths of the US Navy sailors, and one of the most massive detective operations in history is underway, with several dozen intelligence and investigative agencies from the US, NATO, and Middle Eastern countries participating.

The US government has not officially asked for Sri Lanka’s help in finding the attackers. However, the US military provides training for Sri Lanka’s aimed forces’ with teams of elite Green Berets frequently in Sri Lanka. The US embassy in Colombo also has a fullfledged military attache section, which could be used for discussions with Sri Lankan officials, without drawing public attention to the operations.

The ship, a state of the art guided missile destroyer with the most modern weapons to attack other warships, submarines, and aircraft, was severely damaged, with a 40 feet by 40 feet wide hole being blasted in its 1-inch armour-plated hull.

Only the Cole’s captain’s unusual order to close all watertight hatches in the ship, as it entered the port of Aden a few minutes before, saved the ship from sinking completely, with flooding being confined to the damaged area.

Investigators have found the attack to be the product of meticulous planning and intelligence on the part of the bombers, with prior knowledge of the arrival of the US warship and its exact berthing location in Aden, as well as all the details of the port’s security networks, and how to get through them. The Cole’s movements were not widely known. It was not on a long visit to Yemen, but was only stopping for a few hours to refuel, before continuing on to the Persian Gulf. It had arrived from the port of Newport News’ Virginia, on the East coast of the US, after crossing the Atlantic, the Mediterranean, and coming through the Suez Canal and the Red Sea.

What has struck investigators most is the extremely high level of planning and training of the two suicide bombers in the attack.

Although investigators believe that the bombers were members of a Middle Eastern terrorist group, and not the LTTE’ they suspect that the Tigers may have assisted in planning the attack or training the suicide bombers.

Few terrorist groups in the world would be so ambitious as to attack such a large American warship, and even less would have the expertise to plan it. Suspicions are centred on a few groups such as that of the notorious Ossama Bin Laden’ who carried out the bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Bin Laden is in hiding in Afghanistan and has repeatedly vowed to continue his attacks against the US.

Although there have been isolated suicide bombings in the Middle East in the past, notably by extremist Palestinian groups against the Israelis and US forces, none have been planned with such pinpoint accuracy. This was also the first seaborne suicide attack against US forces in the Middle East.

The LTTE has earned the dubious reputation of being the most effective terrorist group in the world. Its most famous and effective area of operations is by its Black Tiger suicide wing. To-date, more than 250 Black Tigers have carried out suicide bombings in and outside Sri Lanka.

The LTTE’s naval wing, the Sea Tigers, has its own suicide squadron of boats packed with explosives (some of the boats being armour plated), known as the Black Sea Tigers. They have carried out attacks as far as Colombo, which is some 150 kilometres away from the Northeast warzone.

Dozens of Sri Lanka Navy warships have been sunk over the past decade by suicide bombings and by Black Sea Tiger divers who attached explosives to the hulls of anchored warships But none was against a warship of the size of the USS Cole, since Sri Lanka’s warships are mostly gunboats and fast attack craft, with a few of the larger corvette-type warships which are all far smaller than a destroyer.

The fact that the bombers knew how much explosives were needed to sink the ship, and carefully brought their boat to the spot along the destroyer’s hull where the blast would create the maximum amount of damage, indicates an extremely high level of planning.

The calm and calculated manner in which the two bombers carried out their work to the letter before setting off the explosion, is remarkably similar to the manner in which Black Tigers are trained to operate. The LTTE trains Black Tigers for many years, to ensure that they will not get excited and arouse the suspicions of authorities, or panic and fail to achieve the maximum damage to the targets.

The LTTE leadership has been seething with anger after US President Bill Clinton named the LTTE as a terrorist organization three years ago along with 32 other organizations, and banned all of its activities in the United States. This act of the Clinton administration robbed the LTTE of all its international legitimacy and pretences to be an organization fighting for the freedom of an oppressed minority, and revealed it for what it is, a ruthless terrorist unit involved in destabilizing the South Asian region, money laundering and drug smuggling.

This act by the US was the most severe blow to the LTTE by a foreign government, surpassing a similar banning by the government of India in 1991 after the LTTE assassinated former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi.

The LTTE appealed the US government’s decision at the time, but US courts did not overturn the Clinton administration’s decision.

The LTTE has had very strong relations with a large number of other terrorist and drug running organizations worldwide, especially in South Asia, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. This includes warlords in Burma and the Khmer Rouge of Cambodia.