US Senator in Colombo

Saw your report on the visit to Sri Lanka by a liberal Democratic Senator from Maryland.

 It brought back a memory from my childhood.  His Father was Ambassador to Sri Lanka in the 1970s. I remember meeting his father and the Senator who was a kid like me back then if my memory serves me right.  That was at the President’s house in Kandy when the Ambassador dropped in for lunch on  a trip he was doing as a guest of my late uncle Clifford Ratwatte, who had invited him to Pallakelle. My grandfather, as Head of State, had invited them to lunch.

What struck me was how tall his father and he were. To me they were like characters out of a story book with a green giant.

Of course, back then, Sri Lanka wasn’t strategically important to the US as it is now. It was during the cold war.  Sri Lanka had prided itself as a left leaning neutral/non aligned nation officially.  But in reality it was more in the pro socialist camp while maintaining good relationships with all major powers. Remember at that time, there were even Two Germanies: the Federal Republic and the communist repressive GDR.

Little did I dream of migrating to the US back then.  Sri Lanka is now being wooed by the US for obvious reasons: the China factor.

World Bank and IMF policies towards Sri Lanka are very much controlled by the US. Therefore, in a post cold war realigned global realities, Sri Lanka is now quite firmly in the grip of one or two nations more than others. We should recall the adage “beware of those who come bearing gifts”. The US will be very pleased with its efforts in encouraging regime change. Now that Indian and US interests are coalescing, Sri Lanka will be under more pressure than ever to even maintain a modicum of neutrality and non-alignment.

Mano Ratwatte