Shouldn't there have been a mini dog fight?

To learn that the LTTE is in possession of air-crafts and that they are able to fly over the suburbs of Colombo and drop bombs on the main air force base changes everything. It is one thing to live with the risk of a bomb going off at a busy train station in Colombo or hear about the attacks on army bases in the North and the East but quite another to think the next attack in Colombo could come from the skies. I think it will take the general public a weeks to fathom the significance of the new threat that has befallen on our country. Fortunately for the general public, the most at risk from the risk of air attacks are the army top brass and the politicos. So there is little doubt that they are right now scratching there heads with the aim to neutralize this newly discovered threat.

Meanwhile, I keep wondering how the two planes were able to return to "base" without attracting response from the air force. true the air force probably is ill-equipped to handle a threat of this kind and probably lack the ability to engage in air-to-air combat. I am no military expert, but why didn't any of the air force plane take off - either with the aim to shoot the LTTE air-crafts down or at the very least find out where they land? The LTTE air-crafts are thought to be Czech made Z-142s able to only attain a top speed of 236km/h. The MI-24 helicopters alone, operated by the air force, can cruise to speeds of upto 335km/h and is equipped with a 12.7 mm four barrel YakB machine gun 2 anti-armor missiles and rockets according to someone who knows a little bit more about the military hardware than I do. If true, then it baffles me why no one bothered to chase the little home-made, DIY bombers and blast it out of the skies? Imagine what the pictures of burning wreckage of LTTE planes would have done to the LTTE ego. Instead, the LTTE got the satisfaction to announce that they have carried out an air raid in Colombo and flashed pictures of the LTTE airmen clad in light blue uniforms giving the 'V' sign. And I am left here - feeling violated.