 Not yet, Filipino officials say
When the American military pulled out of the Philippines more than 15 years ago, it seemed that an ambivalent, emotionally charged political relationship with a former colonizer was coming to closure.
But the Philippines still has to acknowledge it needs help to maintain and modernize a military fighting one of the longest running insurgencies in Asia. US forces continue to provide that assistance despite growing calls by leftists in the Philippine Congress to end their participation.
It is Central Mindanao as much as anywhere in the region that jihadi groups from Indonesia and those with links to Al-Qaeda have used as training grounds to carry out terrorism in the troubled south and other parts of Southeast Asia. It is here that Noordin Mohamad Top, the Malaysian who emerged as one the of the region’s top terrorists, was trained, authorities say. Noodin, who appears to have been killed in a police raid in Indonesia Thursday, is believed to have been responsible for a long series of bombings in Indonesia, including the blasts at the JW Marriott and the Ritz-Carlton in Jakarta in July and earlier ones in Bali. It takes less than three hours by small boat to travel between the southernmost portion of Mindanao to the nearest Indonesian island.
Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro’s visit to the Pentagon last week highlighted how the United States remains very much an ally, announcing that his meeting with US defense chief Robert Gates would push to "higher gear" a strategy to counter threats of terrorism and Muslim separatism on the southern island of Mindanao as well as neighboring parts of Malaysia and Indonesia on Borneo.
As if on cue, this elicited leftover feelings of recriminations against American influence, fears that a Visiting Forces Agreement that has allowed joint special operations since 2002 might turn into another form of dependence and intervention. A legislative oversight committee is looking into whether the agreement should be reviewed or scrapped, although this is likely going to take some time and with lengthy debates.
For one, leftist coalitions in the congress are riding on to a call by the communist-led National Democratic Front (NDF) in Mindanao to push out the estimated 600-person Joint Special Operations Task Force Philippines under the US Pacific Command, presenting allegations by a female Filipino Navy officer that American soldiers were involved in combat with Filipino soldiers. Allegations of covert operations have been raised in the past yet none have borne fruit.
Urging that all revolutionary forces in Mindanao should "wage an all-out struggle against the deployment and intervention of America," the NDF has spoken somewhat out of turf since it has little or no common affinity with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) seeking to reclaim the Muslims’ ancestral domain. An MILF source privy to the peace negotiations said Muslims are seeking "accommodation" instead of an outright change in government, saying it is unlikely that it would align itself with the NDF.
Paulynn Sicam, former commissioner on human rights, said peace talks with the NDF are on hold for as long as demands by the communists to release their consultants facing charges of murder and the like remain an issue. The government, however, is open to formal talks again if this can be resolved, she aded.
"The New People's Army does not make idle threats," she said, "The NDF is upping the ante but this is trypical behavior. The history of the peace talks will show that every time the prospect of formal talks arises, even after they have agreed to talk, they tend to ask for more and more concessions before finally agreeing to meet."
Lt Col Rolando Baustita, spokesman for the 10th Army Division based in Davao – where the NDF is most active in Mindanao, said "enough forces are at hand" to repel any possible communist attacks expected in the northern and eastern part of Mindanao, largely populated by Christians and indigenous groups.
Communist influence in the region has largely diminished from its height in the 1980s, its strongholds limited to the eastern provinces, where rebels have resorted mostly to banditry and extortion, from full-scale attacks it had done in the past against the military.
A senior military staff officer of the Eastern Mindanao Command said the communists appear to be banking on propaganda, hoping that an anti-US sentiment would snowball, and that it would offer them some discussion leverage in a renewed peace talks offered recently by the government. The rebel strength of the New People’s Army has dwindled from 25,000 to 5,000, having lost its momentum after the fall of the Marcos dictatorship. Most of its remaining forces are concentrated in the southern Luzon region.
"They will blow out of proportion every incident involving the Americans," said the officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "If you talk about their military capability to do it, it’s zero."
The "high gear" that both defense chiefs have agreed upon in their talks in Washington is much of its continuing cooperation on two fronts: 1) upgrading the capability of the Philippine Armed Forces, whose modernization program bogged down from the start; and 2) providing support to a military doctrine in defeating Muslim rebels who have allowed Islamic groups from Indonesia and those with links to the Al-Qaeda to use their camps in central Mindanao as a training ground to carry out terrorism in the troubled south.
The military declared a suspension of operations two months ago in a effort to bring negotiations back on the agenda after peace talks broke down last year, trying to pursue a strategy that is geared instead towards conflict management and peace building – where they count on American financial support to undertake projects such as renovating schools, constructing farm-to-market roads, setting up livelihood markets, building wharfs and bridges in the impoverished conflict areas of Muslim Mindanao.
American forces, usually from the Navy or the Special Forces, form teams of 12 in tactical camps of the Philippine military based in critical provinces of Sulu, Basilan, Maguindanao, and Lanao. Many Filipino officers say this a partnership with the Americans, sharing intelligence and joining surveys of villages for their civil-military operations. There has yet been no case – at least not made public – of US soldiers participating in actual combat with Filipinos against the MILF.
A battalion commander in Mindanao said that from he has seen, the Americans are "bored to death" of their limited movements and that "even if I want them involved in our operations because they have the gadgets that we don’t have, they are too careful. Their careers as well as ours will be on the line."
In villages around Mindanao, there are no signs of open hostility towards American soldiers undertaking civil-military operations with Filipino troops; and in many areas dominated by Muslims there are signboards everywhere of US economic projects – referred to by the NDF as "so-called humanitarian operations … that aim to camouflage their (American) military intervention."
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