Philippines can’t beat the communists—US cable

Despite the huge allocation of funds and massive deployment of troops, the Philippine government is not in a position to break the back of the long-running communist insurgency, the US Embassy in Manila said in an assessment in 2006.

Then US Ambassador Kristie Kenney said in two cables to the US state department that Manila’s campaign against the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and its military arm, the New People’s Army (NPA), was “apt to remain deadly and long,” and that “total victory over the insurgents in the foreseeable future remains unlikely.”

The cables were released by WikiLeaks, the online whistle-blower.

Kenney reported in an unclassified memo dated July 17, 2006, that “nothing dramatic has changed in the status quo in the long-running saga of the CPP-NPA despite the Philippine government’s announced goal of defeating the NPA within two years and its allocation of additional resources.”

In another unclassified cable dated June 30, 2006, Kenney said then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo had approved “a new strategy for defeating Asia’s longest-running communist insurgency.”

Kenney said that according to the plan, the Philippine military, assisted by the national police, would “launch multiple offensives to eliminate the NPA in critical areas, including Central Luzon, southern Luzon, parts of northern Luzon, and the Bicol region.”

“The new campaign will simultaneously seek socioeconomic development, lack of which has fueled the communist insurgency over almost 40 years,” she said.

She added, however, that “apart from the announced [military] troop redeployment from Central Mindanao, other elements of the new strategy remain vague, with no clearer prospect for success than earlier campaigns.”

Kenney’s memos were also addressed to the Pentagon, Central Intelligence Agency, National Security Council, US Pacific Command in Honolulu, and US diplomatic missions in Southeast Asia.

Asked to comment, US Ambassador to Manila Harry Thomas Jr. responded predictably.

“[We] do not comment on WikiLeaks,” Thomas said. “Our comments on this are the same as they always have been, as the president’s and the secretary of state’s are.”

‘Deadly threat’

Kenney, now the US ambassador to Thailand, said that the NPA “remains a deadly threat throughout the Philippines,” and that “its elimination would tangibly improve the prospects for peace and development nationwide.”

She said the NPA “suffered significant losses” during the government’s Lambat-Bitag campaign in 1989-1993, and had employed “traditional guerrilla tactics since its reemergence in 1996 as a serious threat.”

“With an estimated strength of 7,400 members and 130 guerrilla fronts, [the NPA] continues to threaten the Philippines’ internal security and impede economic development,” the envoy said.

Kenney reported that during a Cabinet meeting in Isabela on June 16, 2006, Arroyo found the 10-year timetable of the Department of National Defense to defeat the communist insurgency as “too long,” and set a target of two years instead.

She said that under the Internal Security Operations’ Oplan Bantay Laya, Arroyo announced a special new budget allocation of P1 billion “effective immediately.”

Fund breakdown

Citing media reports, Kenney said the fund would be distributed thus:

P400 million for the military, “primarily to purchase attack helicopters but also to fund overall anti-NPA military operations.”

P300 million for the police, “reportedly mostly to beef up protection of and capabilities of police outposts in remote areas, but also to resume the counterinsurgency role in Metro Manila of its elite Special Action Force.”

P300 million as part of a military-led “hearts and minds” campaign, “to wean away remote and underserved parts of the Philippines from CPP and NPA control or influence.”

Kenney said the then yet unpassed 2006 budget included special funding for a “500 barangays project” by the military with the same goal.

“President Arroyo has also announced a plan to commit an additional P75 billion over the next three years to generate investment and development in northern Luzon in particular,” she said.

Kenney also reported that the 3rd, 4th and 9th Infantry Battalions comprising some 1,500 soldiers had been redeployed from Mindanao to reinforce military operations against the NPA in Central Luzon and parts of northern Luzon; Tanay, Rizal province, in southern Luzon; and the Bicol region.

She quoted the military as saying that 3,000 more troops primarily serving as security details of VIPs and other civilians would be reassigned to help in the new campaigns.

Revolutionary taxes

Kenney said Philippine government officials had “indicated a new effort to target CPP-NPA ‘sympathizers and financiers,’ stating publicly that anyone who provides comfort or aid to the insurgents will be subject to counterinsurgency operations.”

She said “leftists” had expressed concern that the military and police “could go after local farmers already squeezed by the NPA’s revolutionary taxes, possibly leading to an increase in extrajudicial killings allegedly involving security forces.”

But she also quoted government officials as saying that business firms paying such “revolutionary taxes” would be investigated, “with the objective of restricting the flow of funds to the communist insurgents although they have not publicly targeted the largest suspected victims—cellular phone companies whose remote relay stations are often at risk if they do not pay up.”

In the July 17, 2006, cable, Kenney said the NPA had responded to the government campaign by continuing “its low-intensity attacks” nationwide.

“At the same time,” she noted, the CPP’s political arm, the National Democratic Front (NDF), was “pushing for renewed peace talks” with the Philippine government.

She mentioned then opposition Sen. Jamby Madrigal’s meeting on June 26 and 27, 2006, with NDF officials in the Netherlands, where the lawmaker signed a joint communique that “criticized the military campaign against the NPA and urged the government to resume peace talks with the communist insurgents.”

LGUs harnessed

Kenney also said Arroyo had mandated local government units (LGUs) nationwide to “devote resources to the fight against the NPA.”

She mentioned an executive order allowing LGUs to “draw additional funds from the central government to support security efforts, such as surveillance and intelligence gathering.”

Kenney quoted then Interior Secretary Ronaldo Puno as saying that the fight against the communist insurgency was “a continuing and sustained struggle,” and that it required the help of LGUs and institutions “down to the barangay level.”