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| India-Pakistan |
| Security Forces use Bangalore Torpedoes to blast through Tiger defense line |
| 2007-11-09 |
| Reckie teams have already assessed the situation in the first bunker line of the LTTE, which was originally the second line maintained by the LTTE prior to the capture of the LTTE first line by the troops in September 9, 2006. Therefore, troops were well aware of the ground which has been transformed into a death trap with trenches dug into a depth of eight feet and mine fields and improvised explosive devices to foil a Security Forces advance into their defences. Troops were prepared to face these barriers in their bid to take the Tiger bunker lines at first light on Wednesday. They were equipped with Bangalore Torpedoes to make inroads to the Tiger territory clearing mine fields. The Bangalore torpedoes, explosive filled pipes, were used to clear the mine fields by the engineering troops of the Engineering regiment. At 5.30 am the troops of the Air Mobile Brigade broke into the Tiger defences surprisingly taking their bunker lines on the two sides of the Jaffna - Kandy highway around Muhamalai. A gripping, 2,000 word story about an infantry assault on a fixed position. The whole thing just happened yesterday. If you've got time I highly recommend reading the whole thing, and there are a few pictures too. |
| Posted by:gromky |
| #2 Since noone else answered, I'll take a civilian stab at it tw. IIUC, the Tigers had artillery &/or mortar cover of the bunker areas. Had the reconnaisance teams tried to hold the bunkers they would have been in an extremely exposed position -- and they are a light force themselves. So what they did was to deny the use of the bunkers to the Tigers and then move back to rejoin the larger force, which will no doubt proceed against the bunker area as part of a larger attack. |
| Posted by: lotp 2007-11-09 13:30 |
| #1 According to Security Forces there was no intention by the troops to hold the ground. “Our intention was to destroy their bunkers and return to our defences,” a senior Army official told this columnist The first part of the article made sense to me, but then I hit the bit above. If someone would be kind enough to explain why the Sri Lankan army chose to retreat rather than dig in, I'd be grateful. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2007-11-09 10:57 |