At a function at the eastern Trincomalee naval base to celebrate last week’s attack on three LTTE's gun-running vessels by the Sri Lankan navy, Secretary to the Ministry of Defence Gothabaya Rajapaksa, expressed confidence that it “is militarily possible” for the Sri Lankan defence forces to  defeat the LTTE.
“The President is working towards finding a lasting political solution to the ongoing ethnic conflict, but no political solution will work without defeating the LTTE militarily,” Mr Gothabaya Rajapaksa stated categorically in the presence of his brother, President Mahinda Rajapaksa in Trincomalee on Monday.
“Sri Lankan army is capable of defeating the LTTE militarily,” the Defence Secretary said among hundreds of naval sailors in the heavily-guarded natural harbour of Trincomalee.
The naval ceremony came a week after Sri Lankan navy claimed that its off- shore patrol vessels have attacked and sunk three gun-running vessels of the LTTE in three different incidents on September 10 some 600 km southeast of Sri Lanka's Sri Lanka's southern tip of Dondra.
Credible info
Sri Lankan navy officials said that it carried out the “well-planned operation” after receiving “credible information” with regard to the LTTE arms supply vessels that were suspected to be “carrying three light wing aircraft, artillery guns and bombs to the north”. 
The Sri Lankan navy believed that in the three vessels that sank, the Tigers were transporting light aircraft, artillery and a bullet-proof vehicle for the use of the elusive LTTE chief. 
Describing the latest naval attack as a “massive blow to the LTTE” the navy claimed that it had "effectively  sealed off the entire coastal  line of  Sri  Lanka preventing the  LTTE cadre from continuing their arms smuggling activities”.
Notably, the LTTE has not made any remarks so far on the Sri Lankan navy's claim of sinking three of their arms vessels or loss of their weapons.