From Spy to Scribe: A Journey of Betrayal and Resilience
Photo courtesy of Jurist News
My life, as I have come to understand it, is a narrative woven from the threads of loyalty, betrayal and a relentless pursuit of truth. It’s a story that began in the war torn landscape of Sri Lanka and has, improbably, brought me here to a quiet corner of Canada where I now seek to find peace and purpose through the written word. This is not just my personal history; it’s a reflection on the nature of power, the complexities of human identity and the profound impact that a life of secrets can have on the human psyche.
I was born in Jaffna on August 23, 1973. My childhood was a mix of a moderate Tamil Hindu upbringing and a love for sports and learning. My dreams, like many young boys, were simple: to become a soccer player, a priest or an engineer. But the civil war that engulfed my homeland had a different plan for me. In 1991, at the age of 17, I was abducted from my high school and forced to join the LTTE as a child soldier. The Tigers had a ruthless policy of conscripting the eldest male child from each family and with three younger brothers I had no choice but to comply to protect them from a similar fate.
My time in the LTTE was a crucible of indoctrination and survival. I quickly realized that my intellectual abilities were more valuable to the organization than my physical strength. I learned military science, surveillance and the art of intelligence gathering. In 1993, at the age of 20, I was appointed as the Naval Intelligence Officer of the LTTE overseeing intelligence for the Sea Tigers and Air Tigers, the rudimentary naval and aerial divisions of the LTTE, respectively. My duties were to gather open source intelligence from magazines like Jane’s Naval Fighting Ships and Jane’s Fighter Aircrafts and create models of Navy vessels and Air Force fighter jets. The LTTE used this intelligence to plan, prepare and execute surprise raids and suicide missions and I was tasked with training the Black Tiger suicide cadres in technical intelligence.
My life as an LTTE operative took a dramatic turn when I fell in love with a female cadre named Nala. This relationship was a serious violation of the LTTE’s code of conduct and punishable by death. An Indian intelligence infiltrator, Srinivasan, discovered our affair and blackmailed me into working for India’s Research and Analysis Wing (RAW). I agreed, not out of political conviction but out of a desperate desire to protect Nala and myself. I provided RAW with vital intelligence, including a tape of the LTTE leader Prabhakaran discussing the assassination of former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. When the LTTE’s internal security division uncovered the RAW operation, I was terrified that my betrayal would be discovered. To save my life and protect my family, I confessed my involvement with RAW to my superior, Thinesh Master.
In a bizarre twist, Thinesh Master, on the LTTE leader Prabhakaran’s orders, gave me a new mission: to become a double agent for the LTTE within the military. I was to surrender to the army, gain their trust by providing them with all the information I had and eventually, one day, carry out a high value assassination. This was a punishment and a test of my loyalty. I was also asked to sign up for the Black Tigers, the LTTE’s secretive suicide squadron. I agreed, knowing this was my only chance to survive and secure my family’s future. My life’s new motto given to me by Thinesh Master was to trust no one, deceive everyone.
My journey as a spy began when I surrendered to the army in June 1995. I was code named 05 and immediately put to work in their Directorate of Military Intelligence (DMI). The army’s top commanders, including General Rohan Daluwatte, General Srilal Weerasooriya and military intelligence officers Colonel Rizvy Zacky and Colonel Mohammed Zaheer grilled me on the LTTE’s operations, bases and command structure. My knowledge was invaluable, especially during Operation Riviresa, a massive military offensive to recapture the Jaffna peninsula. I translated LTTE radio communications and provided tactical intelligence, which helped the army’s commanders plan their attacks and pre-empt Tiger counter offensives. My contributions were so significant that I was credited for the victory in Jaffna and was even present at the flag raising ceremony in the main square. But despite being treated as a hero by day, I was beaten and tortured by the military police at night, a constant reminder that I was a Tamil in a Sinhalese-dominated army.
The turning point in my relationship with the military came during the second phase of Operation Riviresa in 1996. While my intelligence work continued to be successful, I began to witness the brutal war crimes being committed by the army against Tamil civilians. The military intelligence officials, the same ones who were interrogating me, were abducting, torturing and murdering innocent Tamils. When I confronted Colonel Zacky and Colonel Zaheer about these atrocities, they dismissed them saying that such acts were common in armies worldwide. This was a lie I could not accept. My belief in a peaceful, federal solution was shattered. I realized that the military was using me as a propaganda tool against my own people and my cooperation was only perpetuating the cycle of violence. I knew I had to leave.
I confessed to Colonel Zacky and Colonel Zaheer that I had been a double agent for Indian intelligence, a confession I had kept hidden until then. I gave them a package of documents I had buried, including a tape of Prabhakaran’s speech. This was my trump card, my ticket out. The army could not trust a mole for a foreign intelligence agency. They had no choice but to let me go. The DMI thus arranged for me to leave Sri Lanka, providing me with a passport, identity card and birth certificate, which was covertly facilitated by Bahukutumbi Raman, also referred to as B. Raman, the former Additional Secretary of the Cabinet Secretariat of the Government of India and head of the counterterrorism department of the RAW. In September 1997, I left my homeland for the first time, a broken man carrying the heavy burden of my past.
My new life as a refugee in Canada was supposed to be a fresh start but my past followed me. In the summer of 2000, I was approached by a Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) agent codenamed Leema Kilo. She blackmailed me into becoming an informant for CSIS, threatening to deport me if I did not cooperate. For the next nine years, I worked for CSIS without pay, gathering intelligence on the LTTE front, cover and sympathetic organizations among the Tamil diaspora as well as the Sri Lankan government operatives in Canada, providing the Canadian secret service with information from my time as a spy. I was constantly being manipulated by CSIS, who used my vulnerable status and my family’s safety as leverage. They promised me a job and Canadian citizenship but these promises never materialized until after the LTTE was militarily defeated in 2009.
The trauma of my past and the stress of my new life as a spy in Canada took a heavy toll on my mental health. I was misdiagnosed with bipolar disorder and paranoid schizophrenia and was forcibly confined and medicated with antipsychotic drugs. These medications had severe side effects, causing me to suffer from obesity, memory loss and a fractured sense of self. My mind, once a weapon in a deadly game, was now a source of constant torment. I was haunted by my past and tormented by my present.
In the end, my journey has been one of survival against insurmountable odds. I was a pawn in a larger game, used by the LTTE, Indian, Sri Lankan and the Canadian governments for their own political ends. My intelligence was a commodity to be bought, sold and stolen. But through it all, I never lost my humanity. I always tried to do what I believed was right even when the choices were limited and the consequences were dire. I am now a Canadian citizen, a father and a man who has found a new purpose: to share my story with the world, to be a voice for the voiceless and to advocate for a peaceful, federal solution for the Tamil people in Sri Lanka. My pen has become my sword and my words are my shield.
A Spy Tiger’s education
The LTTE’s intelligence wing, the Tiger Organization Security Intelligence Service (TOSIS), was a formidable and sophisticated organization that I had the unique opportunity to learn from. It was structured into two sub units: the National Intelligence Service and the Military Intelligence Service. The National Intelligence Service was responsible for assassinations, sabotage and psychological warfare, while the Military Intelligence Service, which I was a part of focused exclusively on gathering intelligence on Sri Lankan security forces.
My training with the LTTE was comprehensive, drawing on tactics and tradecraft from some of the world’s most renowned intelligence agencies, including India’s RAW, Israel’s Mossad and Pakistan’s ISI. We were taught how to recruit informants, conduct surveillance and analyze intelligence. The training program was rigorous, covering everything from weaponry and explosives to political theory and asymmetric warfare. I learned that an army without intelligence is like a man without eyes or ears and that intelligence is the most basic and essential asset in warfare. The LTTE’s emphasis on intelligence dominance allowed them to compensate for their numerical inferiority and challenge a much larger, conventional army.
One of the most innovative and terrifying tactics of the LTTE was the use of Black Tigers, a highly secretive suicide squadron. I was responsible for training these cadres, who were often disabled and indoctrinated to believe that a glorious death was better than a life of suffering. I had to teach them how to use explosives and how to inflict maximum damage on military targets. The Tigers’ use of suicide bombers became a template for other terrorist organizations such as Al-Qaeda and the Taliban and their tactics were meticulously planned and professionally executed.
My work in military intelligence was a constant learning experience. I learned to identify military ranks, memorized the names and addresses of high ranking officers, and studied the administrative structure of the Sri Lankan military. I built models of military complexes and naval vessels and learned to decipher coded communications. I was a teacher and a student, a creator and a destroyer. I was an irreplaceable intelligence asset to the LTTE, a role that brought me immense power but also immense guilt. The experience taught me that in the world of espionage, information is currency and the truth is a weapon to be wielded with caution.
The tsunami and the truth
In late 2004, while working for CSIS in Canada, I uncovered a major LTTE plan to launch a multi-pronged attack on the Trincomalee Naval Base. My analysis of open source intelligence and communications led me to believe that the Tigers were going to use suicide bombers, mini-submarines and Czech-built aircraft to destroy the base and cut off the supply route to the Jaffna peninsula. I immediately alerted CSIS but my warnings were met with skepticism. Desperate, I traveled to Singapore to brief Professor Rohan Gunaratna, Sri Lanka’s national security advisor and Singaporean academic who had close ties to the DMI.
On December 26, 2004 a massive tsunami struck the Indian Ocean, killing 80,000 people in Sri Lanka. The tsunami wiped out the Trincomalee naval base and killed an estimated 6,000 Sea Tigers. The attack I had predicted was averted by a force of nature. I was in Singapore when the tsunami hit and the news left me a broken man. My mind, body and soul were as ravaged as my native land. The trauma I had suppressed for so long resurfaced, leading to a mental breakdown that landed me in a psychiatric hospital in Montreal where I was misdiagnosed with chronic paranoid schizophrenia.
The tsunami was a turning point in the civil war but for me it was a personal catastrophe. It validated my intelligence but also highlighted the futility of my struggle. I had fought a war for over a decade and in an instant a natural disaster had done what I and the military could not. My life had been a series of deceptions but the tsunami was a truth that I could not deny. It was a brutal reminder that some forces are beyond human control and that in the end we are all just pawns in a much larger game.
The final stand
In the years that followed, I continued to work with CSIS but my faith in them was shattered. They had used me and then discarded me when I was no longer useful. They had misdiagnosed me and their actions led to my forcible confinement in psychiatric hospitals and medications. When I tried to find a legitimate job they interfered, providing false information about my mental health to potential employers. They kept me in a state of vulnerability, a puppet on a string, all for their own political ends.
But I refused to be a victim. In 2009, I became a Canadian citizen, a symbol of my new identity and my new purpose. I decided to use my knowledge and my pen to fight for justice not with guns and bombs but with words and truth. I filed a complaint with the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal, alleging that CSIS had discriminated against me on the basis of my race, national origin and perceived mental disability. My goal was not just to seek compensation but to hold the Canadian government accountable for its systemic racism and its exploitation of a vulnerable former child soldier.
My journey is not over. I am still fighting for justice but I am no longer a pawn. I am a voice, a witness and a survivor. The ink of my pen is mightier than the sword of a king and my story, once a secret, is now a testament to the resilience of the human spirit. The road ahead is long and arduous but I walk it with the knowledge that I am finally free.
Author’s Bio:
Kagusthan Ariaratnam is a defence analyst with over two decades of firsthand experience in the Sri Lankan civil conflict. His journey began at 17 when he was forcibly recruited by the LTTE as a child soldier. His aptitude for analysis moved him away from the front lines and into the organization’s intelligence wing. In 1993, he was appointed a naval intelligence officer involved in the LTTE’s tactical operations. This was followed by a complex period as a double agent, working with India’s Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) before defecting to the Sri Lankan government. As an operative for the Directorate of Military Intelligence, he played a significant role in government counterinsurgency efforts. Now a Canadian citizen, Ariaratnam has dedicated himself to promoting peace and reconciliation. Kagusthan’s new memoir can be found at Amazon: https://a.co/d/5AKdv1q
The post From Spy to Scribe: A Journey of Betrayal and Resilience first appeared on Groundviews.
