MANILA, Philippines?The general who is steering the Armed Forces away from its long-held belief in a purely military solution to the insurgency problem to the new Bayanihan strategy that calls for ?winning the peace rather than just defeating the enemy? knows fully well the price of making peace.
?That served as my inspiration,? said Maj. Gen. Emmanuel Bautista, pointing to a special issue of a military magazine dated October 1977 that he keeps in his office at Camp Aguinaldo.
The calm mien of an Army officer at his prime has been immortalized in the cover photo, captioned ?Soldier of Peace.?
The photograph is that of Bautista?s father, Brig. Gen. Teodulfo Bautista, 49 years old at the time, just before the infamous Oct. 10, 1977, Sulu massacre, a flash point in the decades-long war with Muslim rebels.
The general and 34 of his officers and men had gone to a market in Danag, Patikul, to meet with a group of Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) rebels led by Usman Sali who had indicated a willingness to talk about a ceasefire.
According to the testimony of the lone survivor, the general, who had insisted on going unarmed for the peace mission, had just shaken hands with a smiling Usman Sali and some of his men when a shout was heard and scores of rebels materialized and ruthlessly cut down the soldiers with a volley of gunfire.
The national outrage at the treachery led the dictator Ferdinand Marcos to publicly question the wisdom of negotiating peace with the MNLF, the main Muslim insurgency which would continue to fight the government for the next 19 years until it signed a peace agreement in 1996.
Bautista was then 19 years old, and on his second year at the Philippine Military Academy (PMA).
?All I wanted was to graduate so I could join the Army. I just did my best,? he said.
He finished seventh in a field of 161 in the PMA Class 1981, receiving various awards, including the Distinguished Cadet Award.
Youngest AFP chief bet
At 52, Bautista was the youngest of the 10 generals that Mr. Aquino considered last month to succeed AFP Chief Gen. Ricardo David Jr. The President eventually chose Gen. Eduardo Oban Jr., the AFP deputy chief and a member of PMA Class 1979.
During the top-level reorganization in July 2010, Bautista was appointed to the crucial post of deputy chief of staff for operations (J3) who assists the chief of staff in formulating plans and policies on all matters concerning operations and organization.
The AFP had to come up with a new overall counterinsurgency plan to replace the previous Arroyo administration?s Oplan Bantay Laya that was linked to summary executions and human rights abuses.
According to Bautista?s military biodata, as J3, he led the formulation of the new Internal Peace and Security Plan Bayanihan.
?Since we?re going to make a new plan, let?s do it right,? he explained in an interview.
No sole credit
Stressing that no one can take sole credit for the new plan, Bautista said Bayanihan was the result of brainstorming among the military, government agencies and civil society groups that considered best practices from ground commanders to get the rebels to lay down their arms.
Right after graduation, Bautista volunteered to be assigned to Jolo, Sulu, with the 1st Infantry Division that his father had commanded before his death.
But the Army commanding general, Maj. Gen. Fortunato Abat, forbade it and told him to choose any assignment so long as it was not in Mindanao.
The young officer was not deterred and as a compromise, he was assigned to the 4th Infantry Division in Lanao del Norte.
His father?s legacy
In the course of his military career, Bautista was sent to various command posts as an infantry and Scout Ranger officer that saw him fighting against the communist New People?s Army (NPA) at the peak of the communist insurgents? strength in the 1980s.
But he was never assigned to Sulu where a military camp had been named after his father.
Bautista admits that in his youth, he had thought of avenging his father?s killing but realized its folly, as he knew it went against the legacy of his father.
?On the one hand, you want to take revenge, but the legacy of your father was as a soldier of peace. He treated them as brothers. He gave up his life for peace and reconciliation. I didn?t want to waste his life and sacrifice,? he said.
Bautista said he has accepted that dying in the line of duty is part of his chosen profession.
As fate would have it, Bautista found himself in a position to shape the direction of the military?s strategic security approach for the six years of President Aquino?s term until June 2016.
Shift in AFP strategy
As far as military operations go, Bayanihan marks a paradigm shift since it would focus on human security, or a ?people-centered approach,? and recognizes that counterinsurgency is not just the military?s concern but that of the whole nation.
It demands from soldiers the utmost respect for human rights and international rules of war and a recognition of peace negotiations as the only way to end the armed conflict.
The 46-page open document admits to the AFP?s shortcomings in addressing ideology-based armed insurgency, and which has kept the military away from its original role as an external defense force.
?Owing to historical grievances, the greatest hindrance to stronger civilian-military cooperation is the continued perception of human rights violations allegedly committed by military personnel,? it said.
It said that because it has realized that a strategy that puts a premium on a military solution has been inadequate in addressing armed security threats, the AFP was embarking on a ?paradigm shift in the way it views its institutional mandate.?
No other way
Some sectors are skeptical that the separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), the other major Muslim insurgency, and the National Democratic Front, the political arm of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), would give up their leverage and abandon armed struggle now that the government has resumed peace negotiations.
?But there?s no other way. We have to continue trying to search for peace. It cannot be resolved by purely fighting,? Bautista insisted.
He showed how the Bayanihan concept could be successfully applied when he commanded the 702nd Infantry Brigade under the 7th Infantry Division in Aurora province.
?You have to show your sincerity. In Aurora we did two things in terms of military operations: there was both military pressure and social pressure,? Bautista said.
?The first thing I changed is their impression of the military. In my brigade I made sure there was discipline, that they were respectful and that they did not violate human rights,? he said.
According to Bautista, while combat operations against the armed rebels should show them the futility of armed struggle, the military should also work with community leaders to convince the rebels to abandon their armed struggle.
?Combat operations is just one part of the overall strategy. Without saying that we reduce it, we have to put it in perspective and introduce other ways to complement your efforts,? he said.
More than reporting the number of casualties, it is also important to take care of the surrenderees, he said.
?Once they surrender, show that you are really sincere to help them,? Bautista said.
Primacy of peace process
According to the Bayanihan strategy, the military wants to render ?irrelevant? the armed component of the CPP and ?convince them to abandon the armed struggle and instead engage in peace negotiations with the government.?
He likens the CPP to ?a political party that wants to rule by using a private armed group,? the NPA.
?In Europe there are many communist parties. If the people want them to win in elections, then let it be. But not through the force of arms,? he said.
The AFP?s desired end-state for the MILF is ?for the government to achieve a negotiated peace settlement and attain just and lasting peace in Mindanao.?
Why argue with Bayanihan?
?It?s simple. To our people, it?s saying no to violence, no to armed struggle and solving issues in a peaceful way,? he said.
He said the peace process should have primacy and the military is there to support this process.
?The role of the AFP is simply to force them to sit down at the negotiating table. As long as they?re doing that, then we?re doing good,? he said.
?Because a negotiated settlement is the only solution. We cannot hope to finish each other off. We cannot finish off all the enemies of the state. And do we really want that when our perspective is that they are Filipinos, they are [our] brothers?? Bautista said.
He admits that in the military it is a ?challenge? to get everyone on board all at once, to support the shift from a purely combat approach to a people-centered one.
?It remains a challenge. But we?ve planted the seed. It?s going to be debated continuously. But how can you argue with Bayanihan?? he said.
A fighting chance
As his father took the risk of meeting with rebels, unarmed, for the possibility of winning the peace, Bautista is convinced that the country has a fighting chance to end the insurgency problem and move forward with Bayanihan.
?We have been fighting for too long. Too many have died. The statistics include my father. How many more will suffer?? he said.
He has shown only a passing interest in Usman Sali, his father?s assailant. He said he had heard that Sali died upon his return from Malaysia where he fled after the massacre.
?Let it be?
?I don?t know. I have no exact information. I?ve let it be,? he said.
After nearly 10 months as J3, Bautista will get the chance to carry out the Bayanihan concepts in his next field command post.
?We have an obligation to really win the peace because we owe it to those who came before us, like my father. We owe it to our people, we owe it to ourselves,? he said.
?My own father was killed trying to reach out. If I am able to overcome it, who can contest me?? he asks.
