Sri Lanka's giant neighbor to the north, India, will play a prominent role in the island's postwar environment. New Delhi long has been trying to figure out the most effective way to consolidate influence over Sri Lanka. New Delhi, which faces competition from other foreign suitors, understands Sri Lanka's geopolitical potential. The island is situated astride the world's most strategic sea-lanes, connecting resource-hungry East Asia with the Persian Gulf. Trincomalee, one of the deepest natural ports anywhere, has been eyed by many foreign navies -- including those of the United States and China. Now that Colombo has gotten a handle on its insurgency, the door is open for foreign competition. And India is aiming for first place in this contest.

With its ethnic and religious ties to Sri Lanka's Tamil minority, India began an aggressive push for influence in Sri Lanka by providing covert support for the Tigers during the 1970s, under Indira Gandhi's government. The foreign arm of India's intelligence apparatus, the Research and Analysis Wing (at that time in its infancy), trained Tamil separatist rebels at camps in Tamil Nadu state and Chakrata, in Uttarakhand state. It provided the Tamil cadres with many of the skills that later earned the group its formidable reputation. But in time -- realizing that the Tigers had become too powerful -- India (under Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi) made a 180-degree policy shift, ending support for the Tigers and sending peacekeeping forces to help Colombo put down the rebellion. This move sparked a fierce Tamil backlash that cost hundreds of Indian lives -- including Rajiv Gandhi's. The Indians took a much more measured approach toward Sri Lanka afterward: New Delhi sought to balance overt support for Colombo without completely alienating India's own Tamil minority.

The groundwork now has been laid for India to harness Sri Lanka's potential as a major transshipment point for Indian Ocean commerce. Still, much remains up in the air. Whether Colombo can follow up its military success with a meaningful political campaign geared toward the Tamil minority remains unknown. And while the Indians are well ahead of their rivals in the geopolitical competition over Sri Lanka, New Delhi has a number of other distractions -- from a spillover of jihadist violence in Pakistan to internal Indian economic affairs -- competing for its attention.

It took 25 years of bloodshed to end the Tigers' ability to wage conventional warfare. It will take even longer for the South Asian country to fully to realize its geopolitical potential.