Gajalakshmi Paramasivam

24 April  2020

War & Coronavirus

Memorials confirm that some of us believe that those before us live through our bodies. It is part of our culture to remember and value the dead from whom we inherited our cultural values and therefore Commonness. Commonness confirms the realisation of soul-values. Once realised they lead us forever.

Tomorrow is ANZAC we remember the soldiers who fought to protect Sovereignty. Wikipedia presents Anzac Day as follows:

[Anzac Day  is a national day of remembrance in Australia and New Zealand that broadly commemorates all Australians and New Zealanders "who served and died in all wars, conflicts, and peacekeeping operations" and "the contribution and suffering of all those who have served"]

I join the Coogee group and feel for all those who died to protect Sovereignty. In terms of war I recall Sri Lankan Tamils – including civilians who died fighting for their own Sovereignty which is then shared by all those who include them a part of ourselves. I recall with deepest feeling my maternal uncle who was tortured to death :

[My Mum’s family got displaced out of Burma - first to Sri Lanka and then to India due to world-war II. During the war my mother’s brother – Uncle Ratnum Durai worked for  the Allied Forces and I learnt about this from my mother and her elder brother Uncle Lionel Durai of 27, 130^th Street (Ground Floor), Kandawglay – Yangon 1121, Myanmar. My uncle   updated me as follows from the records he had:

STATEMENT OF CAPTAIN RAYMOND A.MALONEY OF

THE US AIR CORPS TO THE U.S. O.S.S IN 1945

DEATH OF RATNUM DURAI. O.S.S. AGENT CODE NAMED REX

ON 22 JANUARY  1944 BY

JAPANESE KEMPEITAI’S DAILY TORTURE & BEATINGS

Q:        Do you have any information concerning the death of one RATNAM DURAI at the New Law Courts Building, Rangoon, Burma? If so, please state what you know of your own knowledge concerning the incident?

Capt. Maloney: When I was placed in the New Law Courts Building, RATNUM DURAI was already confined in a cell adjacent to the one to which I was assigned, and was moved to my cell in about 10 days. On nearly every day for several weeks after I arrived, one or more interrogators, usually the interpreters, would come to the cell and ask him questions. I understood from the questions that they were seeking information as to the radio frequencies and codes he used as an agent for the United States intelligence, where he was trained, and the names of other natives trained with him. The interrogators would frequently beat him with a heavy club or rubber hose while in the cell. At other times he would be taken from the cell and be gone for a period of from a few hours to 2 days. When he was returned to his cell his body would show evidence of very severe beating, and frequently he had been so badly mistreated that he could not walk. About half the time he was given nothing to eat and did not recover. He died in January 1944, about 6 weeks after I arrived. He had no diseases or injury, except from apparent beatings, when I first arrived.

Q: State what was told to you concerning this mistreatment and of the background of RATNUM DURAI?

Capt. Maloney: I was told that DURAI was a Hindu and a citizen of Burma, but had been trained by the United States Intelligence and dropped from a plane behind the Japanese lines in Burma as an agent; that he was captured during the latter part of November 1943 and immediately brought to the New Law Courts Building.

DURAI told me that he was always beaten when he was taken from his cell for interrogation and that on several occasions he was hung by his feet from the ceiling of the interrogation room, so that his head was barely above the floor, and that water was then poured in his nose.

Q: Can you give any information as to those responsible for the mistreatment resulting in the death of RATNUM DUARI?

Capt. Maloney: There was one Japanese interpreter who was on the case continuously and gave many of the beatings. He was about 25 years old, about 5’5” tall and could speak good English. He said he knew a little about boxing and that he was one of the few Japanese there who wore their hair long as in Western style.

Signed : RAYMOND A.MALONEY, Captain, AC. ASN 0-726056

To me our uncle died for Sovereignty of his family which then naturally becomes common at national and global levels. I believe I inherited that fighting spirit from my uncle also.

As per ABC news headed ‘South China Sea tensions rise as Australian frigate exercises with US warships’ there are concerns about more Australians getting ready to fight for Sovereignty, at a time we are going through the Coronavirus pandemic.  In 1918, our ancestors suffered not only from World War I but also from the Spanish flu which is reported to have infected 500 million and resulted in the deaths of 17 to 50 million people. Relatively speaking the Coronavirus cases are reported to be 2.7 million infections and .19 million deaths. But both have been reported to have blood related problems also.

One wonders whether these pandemics are associated with wars? – including secret wars? As per my experience with war victims in Sri Lanka – their feelings of Sovereignty were seriously affected after the 2009 battle. In 2009 we had the Swine flu. As per Wikipedia:

[It is estimated that in the 2009 flu pandemic 11–21% of the then global population (of about 6.8 billion), or around 700 million to 1.4 billion people, contracted the illness—more in absolute terms than the Spanish flu pandemic. Actual fatalities ranged between 12,000 and 18,000. However, in a 2012 study, the CDC (Centre for Disease Control)  estimated more than 284,000 possible fatalities worldwide, with range from 150,000 to 575,000.]

In 2009 when we did not have lockdowns in Australia. In Sri Lanka we were all almost totally fighting for Sovereignty (as we thought it was) on the basis of ethnicity and were not conscious of the Swine flu.

People are recruited for wars by Governments. These Governments may or may not be Independent of other influences when deciding to fight. But every death in war is taken to be for protection of our Sovereignty. A community / society that respects this confirms its own Sovereignty.

Our parents live through World wars. Wikipedia reports: ‘The total number of military and civilian casualties in World War I were about 40 million: estimates range from 15 to 19 million deaths and about 23 million wounded military personnel, ranking it among the deadliest conflicts in human history. The total number of deaths includes from 9 to 11 million military personnel.

Yet we participated in World War II also:

[World War II was the deadliest military conflict in history. An estimated total of 70–85 million people perished, which was about 3% of the 1940 world population (est. 2.3 billion).]

Those of us who feel war pain in the belief that we protected our Sovereignty – will not fear Coronavirus but know that everything has a deeper purpose.