As a retired Senior Superintendent of Police with decades of experience in intelligence, counter-terrorism, and strategic security coordination, I have repeatedly seen how short-sighted decisions undermine long-term national resilience. The adage “penny wise, pound foolish” perfectly encapsulates Sri Lanka’s vulnerabilities exposed during the 2022 economic collapse. Austerity measures, delayed reforms, and isolationist tendencies conserved minor resources in the moment but inflicted catastrophic costs in stability, public trust, and security capacity. Today, as we consolidate recovery under the National People’s Power government, embracing deeper maritime security cooperation with India stands as a wise counter to such false economies, investing prudently now to safeguard our sovereignty, economy, and peace for generations.

The 2002 Norway-brokered Ceasefire Agreement (CFA) with the LTTE is now a closed chapter in our history. Formally abrogated by the government in 2008, it paved the way for the decisive military victory in 2009 that ended three decades of separatist terrorism. Its present status is one of hard-earned reflection: a reminder of the perils of fragile truces without genuine political will, but also of the enduring success of intelligence-led, whole-of-government strategies that delivered a unified Sri Lanka.

Post-2009, with no active internal armed conflict, our security focus has evolved to hybrid and transnational threats, drug trafficking, IUU fishing, arms smuggling, terrorist financing, and great-power manoeuvring in the Indian Ocean. The 2022 crisis, however, tested this peace. Fuel shortages, power blackouts, and protest strains diverted naval and police resources, highlighting how economic fragility directly erodes maritime domain awareness and operational readiness.

India’s role as the indispensable first responder during that crisis, extending nearly USD 4 billion in credit lines, currency swaps, and essential supplies, prevented total collapse and laid the groundwork for today’s elevated partnership. What began as economic solidarity has matured into structured defence cooperation.

The landmark April 2025 MoU on Defence Cooperation, signed during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Colombo, represents a pivotal shift. This five-year framework, the first comprehensive bilateral defence pact in decades, building on the 1987 Indo-Sri Lanka Accord, institutionalizes training, equipment support, joint exercises, intelligence sharing, and maritime operations. It directly counters the “pound foolish” risks of under-investment that plagued our 2022 response.

Maritime security is the linchpin. Sri Lanka’s vast Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and position astride critical sea lanes make it a natural hub, and a potential chokepoint, for regional stability. Threats like narcotics smuggling through porous sea routes, illegal fishing by foreign vessels, and potential infiltration demand robust monitoring. India has stepped up decisively: operationalising the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (MRCC) for the Sri Lanka Navy in 2024, supporting Indian aircraft surveillance from Trincomalee, and facilitating regular hydrographic surveys and ship visits. Annual exercises like SLINEX-2025 have enhanced naval interoperability, with joint patrols and drills reinforcing rule-based maritime order. Participation in the Colombo Security Conclave (CSC), alongside Maldives, Mauritius, Bangladesh, Seychelles, and others, extends this into practical multilateralism focused on Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA), counter-terrorism, cyber security, and disaster response.

From an intelligence practitioner’s lens, honed at the State Intelligence Service Counter Terrorism Desk and during high-profile event security for CHOGM and World Cups this cooperation amplifies our HUMINT and technical capabilities without sacrificing autonomy. Shared information through platforms like the Information Fusion Centre-Indian Ocean Region (IFC-IOR) closes gaps that economic crises widen. It echoes our LTTE defeat: proactive, collaborative disruption of threats before they escalate. Post-Easter Sunday 2019 lessons on inter-agency coordination find new expression in these bilateral mechanisms, reducing vulnerabilities to hybrid warfare, disinformation, and economic espionage.

Critics may invoke sovereignty concerns or past sensitivities, but pragmatism demands we reject penny-wise isolation. The 2025 MoU includes termination clauses for flexibility, ensuring decisions remain Colombo-driven. Diversification is key: balancing ties with India alongside China (via BRI projects), Japan (drones and hydrography), the US, UK, and Gulf partners prevents over-dependence while maximizing gains. The CSC framework exemplifies inclusive, non-exclusionary regionalism, precisely the model needed to navigate Indo-Pacific dynamics.

Economically, maritime security underpins recovery. Secure sea lanes boost tourism, fisheries, and trade, sectors devastated in 2022. Joint capacity building (over 1,200 annual training slots for Sri Lankan forces) and blue economy initiatives create jobs and resilience, averting future “pound foolish” collapses. In a climate-vulnerable nation, cooperation on sustainable fisheries and disaster response further mitigates risks.

Sri Lanka must assertively embrace and lead multilateral Indo-Pacific cooperation as the indispensable driver of its long-term progress, security, and sovereignty. The hard lessons of the 2022 crisis leave no room for hesitation: penny-wise short-termism must give way to pound-wise strategic vision. We should fully operationalize the India defence MoU through sustained joint and intelligence fusion, while elevating the Colombo Security Conclave into a robust, action-oriented Indo-Pacific platform for maritime domain awareness, counter-trafficking, cyber resilience, and humanitarian response.

Sri Lanka is uniquely positioned to play a bridging leadership role, convening island nations, advancing inclusive initiatives under frameworks like the Indo-Pacific Oceans Initiative, and fostering minilateral and multilateral ties that include India, the Quad partners, ASEAN, and other responsible actors, without compromising our traditional non-alignment.

Bipartisan political consensus on these pillars, insulated from electoral politics, is urgent and non-negotiable. Isolationism invites exploitation and repeats past failures; assertive multilateral leadership in the Indo-Pacific secures our sea lanes, rebuilds economic vitality, strengthens interfaith harmony, and honours the sacrifices that delivered victory over terrorism in 2009. By championing such cooperative architectures, Sri Lanka transforms its strategic geography from vulnerability into enduring strength. The moment demands bold action, our nation’s destiny, regional stability, and future generations require nothing less.

( 34 sources )

Mahil Dole, SSP (Retired), is fthe former Head of the Counter-Terrorism Division of the State Intelligence Service of Sri Lanka, and has served as Head of the Sri Lankan Delegation at three BIMSTEC Security Conferences. With over 40 years of experience in policing and intelligence, he writes on regional security, interfaith relations, and geopolitical strategy.

This opinion draws on public records and professional experience. The views expressed are personal.

By Mahil Dole
Superintendent of Police (Retd.) and Former Member,
Sri Lanka Wakfs Board (Served Additional Terms)
Colombo, June 2026

When Dudley Senanayake died in 1973, nearly 1.8 million people lined the streets of Colombo to say goodbye to their much-loved leader. In a country of 12 million, that was one in every seven persons. It wasn’t a state-mobilised crowd or a political rally. They were mostly farmers from the Dry Zone who worked on the lands he had irrigated, teachers who benefitted from his school expansion scheme, civil servants, traders, students—ordinary people who walked for hours just to stand in silence as his cortege passed.

They came because they had never seen him act like a ruler. He lived like one of them: refusing special queues, apologising for accidental bumps, paying for things himself, treating political opponents with respect. For many, it was the first time they had grieved a leader they had never met personally, but whose decency they trusted. His funeral became less about death and more about a public reaffirmation that integrity in politics was possible, and that the people had noticed it.

The reluctant heir

Dudley was born under an auspicious sign. His father, D. S. Senanayake was at a temple ceremony in Bothale, Mirigama, when the news came. The temple astrologer predicted a great future for the child. History proved him right, though not in the way most expected. Dudley’s greatness lay not in how much power he wielded, but in how little he clung to it.

Dudley left S. Thomas’ College, Mount. Lavinia, as its best all-round student—equally at home in classrooms, on the cricket field, the football pitch, on the rugby grounds and the athletic track. At Cambridge, he won a Blue in cricket and earned degrees in Natural Sciences and Law. He returned to practise law, and entered politics only because his father persuaded him to do so. Public life was not his ambition; it became his duty.

As Prime Minister four times, twice in the 1950s and twice in the 1960s; his signature is on the irrigation schemes and agricultural programmes that fed the Dry Zone. But those who met him remember something more: his humanity.

The man without pretension

The following information was shared by Dr. Karunasena Kodithuwakku and the late Rukman Senanayake during informal conversations.

When the Queen of England, Queen Elizabeth II and the British Parliament decided to confer a Knighthood (the title ‘sir’) on Hon Dudley Senanayake in the 1950’s and informed him accordingly, Dudley declined the Honour graciously, declaring “I prefer to be known as plain Dudley Senanayake like now, rather than as ‘Sir Dudley Senanayake.”

Dudley with JRJ

In Kandy during his third term, Dudley accidentally bumped into a senior government valuer in the corridor of Queen’s Hotel. Before the man could speak, Dudley apologised. Later that day at the YMBA foundation stone laying ceremony, officials joked that they expected a larger donation from him. He opened his cheque book, looked at it, and said, “Give me the cheque I gave. Rs. 250? That’s my brother’s signature. I don’t have even that much.”

He had his hair cut at a salon in Colpetty. When the head barber tried to move him ahead of the queue, Dudley said, “No, no, I will wait for my turn.”

A senior politician from Kegalle visited him urgently in 1965. The secretary told him to be at Woodlands before 7 a.m. When Dudley saw him, he invited him to breakfast. The man was overwhelmed. “I can’t believe how I am welcomed here,” he said. “At my former leader’s house, I’m not even allowed to sit on a low bench.”

Dudley was however careful to protect the dignity of the country that he represented. As Prime Minister, he received an invitation to the Royal Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953. After accepting the invitation with due honour, Dudley went to England and was staying in a hotel when a high official of the British government paid him an unexpected visit. This was to appraise him of a change in plans.

“Hon. Prime Minister, I’m sorry to inform you that a difficulty has arisen regarding providing you with a separate horse carriage as informed earlier. Would you please share a carriage with Hon. (so and so) of Africa and grace the occasion?” Dudley was very annoyed, and told the official “Please inform your government that I expect a separate horse carriage to be provided for me too, just like for all the other Leaders as promised. Otherwise, I would consider it an insult to my country and will return to my country immediately without attending the Royal event.” It is reported that the British government promptly complied with Dudley’s request.

Simplicity that disarmed everyone

Even as Prime Minister, Dudley refused the trappings of office. One day in 1965-70 he told his security not to follow him and drove his Triumph Coupe alone to Mirissa. He spent the day photographing the beach and drove back safely. The police kept watch from a distance. Another morning he set off for Nuwara Eliya for a round of golf, again asking his security officers to stay back. A few hours later they found him at Ramboda Pass, sitting on a culvert smoking his pipe, the radiator of his car boiling over. He was relieved to see them and asked them to take him for his game—in their vehicle.

Traffic police once chased a speeding car only to find the PM at the wheel, pipe in hand. On Galle Road, he spotted an old friend at a bus stop, stopped the official car, and said, “Hey, what are you doing here? Jump in!” He took the man to Woodlands for tea and snacks, then drove him to Fort Railway Station himself. The friend was a Tamil gentleman who had captained Royal when Dudley captained S. Thomas’. Titles meant nothing to him.

Dudley

His humour was self-deprecating. At an All Ceylon Agricultural Officers Association AGM, the president pleaded with him and Minister M.D. Banda to “breed and recruit” more officers for the five-year plan. Dudley replied, “You all know I am not capable of breeding humans. You’ll have to ask the Honourable Minister—he’s already produced seven children!” The hall erupted in laughter.

A leader remembered

The day after the 1970 election defeat, party members went to see him in their numbers. Our family too was amongst them. He came up to our mother and said softly, “I’m very sorry, Mrs. Banda.” Even in defeat, his first thought was for others, especially for people like M.D. Banda, who had never lost an election before.

Dudley drew crowds not with slogans, but with sincerity. He never asked people to lower themselves to meet him. He met them where they were. In an age of political theatre, he was simply, stubbornly, decent.

During the period 1965-1970, when Dudley was Prime Minister, the Opposition led by Madam Sirima Bandaranayake, made allegations against Robert Senanayake (Dudley’s brother) regarding certain Foreign Exchange issues in Parliament. Dudley got up and urged the Speaker to

a. Appoint a Parliamentary select committee to investigate the allegations against his brother.

b. Appoint a Member of Parliament from the Opposition as its Chairman

c. Appoint the majority of the Select Committee members also from the Opposition.

According to the findings of the Select Committee and as reported to Parliament later, Robert Senanayake was completely exonerated. The entire leadership of the Opposition apologised profusely to Dudley.

An important point about this episode is a statement made by Dudley himself in Parliament prior to appointing the Select Committee. He declared that if his brother was found guilty of having indulged in any malpractice by word or deed, he (Dudley) would forthwith resign as PM.

That is why Sri Lanka remembers him not as a politician, but as “the gentleman Prime Minister.”

On 19 June, the day of his birthday, it is heartening to remember that such leadership once walked amongst us.

(The writer is the late Minister M.D. Banda’s eldest son.)

By Gamini Leeniyagolla

It is obviously too early for an outpouring of joy over the seeming cessation of hostilities between the main antagonists in West Asia. While the prospect of there being a measure of calm in the region is being welcomed by considerable sections of the international community, what is ‘on the table’ currently is only a Memorandum of Understanding between the US and Iran to give peace a chance. The hard part in the peace effort remains to be achieved.

In the Middle East of today we have one of the most complex conflicts to break out in modern international politics and the observer would be naive in the extreme to expect a facile and early closure to the tangle. Yet, for the sake of the world’s publics who have been hurting badly in the prolonged hostilities one could only hope that the US-Iran MoU that is expected to be signed by the sides on Friday would lead eventually to a substantive peace. The world’s thanks are due to Pakistan in this connection for its sustained support in the peace drive.

While the sides have agreed to a ceasing of hostilities in the most general terms and have reached accord on the facilitation of uninterrupted oil and gas supplies to the rest of the world, for instance, the ‘devil will prove to be in the details’ in an envisaged comprehensive peace settlement. It is these details that would make or break peace if the negotiations go on in earnest.

Nevertheless, the details would need to be worked out consensually in a spirit of compromise with an eye to the greater good of the world community. Realpolitik or a narrow focus on solely the national interest among the protagonists, for example, would need to give way to a measure of humanity that would encompass within it a consideration of the overall well being of the world. In other words, it is statesmanship that would crucially matter.

The next few weeks would establish whether humanists are ‘asking for far too much’ when they broach the questions at issue in these terms. Yet it is essentially self interest and national security considerations of the first importance that drove the conflict from even prior to February this year and these questions would need to be taken up and resolved to the satisfaction of the US and Iran in the main if some headway is to be made towards a durable settlement.

The nuclear issue would prove to be the proverbial Gordian Knot. From a realistic viewpoint, Iran could not be expected to be without a potential nuclear deterrent in the face of perceived nuclear threats emanating for it from the West and Israel. In the short term, Iran would need to possess this deterrent to a measure, within a mutually agreed international legal framework maybe, until wide agreement is reached on the nuclear tangle. Specifically, Iran’s immediate threat perceptions with regard to her nuclear-powered rivals would need to be defused during initial negotiations.

Ideally it is a world free of nuclear weapons that must be aimed at but since this goal cannot be achieved in the near or medium terms, unfolding negotiations would need to ensure Iran’s absolute security in a world of powers that continue to swear by the nuclear deterrent, if it is to give up the suspected latter capability.

However, it is to the degree to which the present nuclear powers divest themselves of this capability that Iran could be put at ease on this score. Accordingly, it is nothing short of a complete elimination of nuclear weapons from the world that could dissuade keenly security conscious states from developing nuclear weapons of their own with a mass destruction capability.

This is the number one dilemma the international community needs to grapple with going forward and it is to the extent to which it resolves it that a nuclear weapons free world could be envisaged. No doubt, an uphill challenge.

Compelling Israel to support the present negotiatory process constitutes another grueling challenge for the US. Currently the Iranian position essentially is that a Middle East peace is inseparable from a normalization of the security situation in Lebanon. That is, the present Israeli attacks on the Hezbollah presence in Lebanon must cease if a comprehensive peace is to be realized in West Asia.

However, Israel is showing no signs of drawing back from its attacks on Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon since the security of the Israeli state is being seen as threatened by the militant group. Co-opting Israel into the negotiatory effort therefore would turn out to be a matter of paramount concern for the US.

Moreover, elements in the rightist administration in Israel are seeing the current peace efforts as a ‘sell out’ to the enemies of Israel. They would have none of it. It is left to be seen how the US would be managing these virtual storm centres in the diplomatic process that could very well bring down the overall purported peace drive.

A recent pronouncement by US Vice President J.D. Vance points to yet another problem area in the US’ current peace overtures. He said that, ‘Regional peace and stability includes stopping the funding of terrorist organizations.’ He was obviously referring to the support extended by Iran to Hezbollah when he mentioned ‘terrorist organizations’ but he has given fresh life to the age-old conundrum of ‘Who is a terrorist?’ by these words.

To the Netanyahu government the Hezbollah and other militant organizations fighting Israel are ‘terrorists’ but from the viewpoint of the Iranian regime they are ‘freedom fighters’. This seemingly insurmountable definitional issue would not only stubbornly bedevil the peace effort but could even figure in bringing about its collapse, unless judiciously handled.

Thus, it’s the thorny details that need to be watched to keep the West Asian peace process afloat, once it gets going in earnest. There is no doubt that US President Trump would be receiving a considerable amount of support from the G7 in this historic peace undertaking and his personal appeals to the grouping currently meeting in France for continuous support are likely to elicit a positive response from it.

Likewise, Trump would need to appeal to also the BRICS countries if almost total global support is to be garnered for the peace drive in West Asia. BRICS’ solidarity with the US and the West is likely to carry considerable weight with Iran and other Eastern actors who are key to a sustained peace drive in the Middle East.