US and Americans Unwelcome in Southern Philippines

by Ma Nguyen Tong

26-3-2003

Philippines President Gloria Arroyo said she was rethinking plans to hold joint US military operations in Jolo, the restive island in the Southern Philippines, and use American military assistance. If American troops were to go to Jolo, it would not be for the first time. In the early 1900s, US soldiers charged onto Jolo's beaches, fighting Muslim warriors armed with nothing but swords and old muskets. Yet it took US troops 13 years and countless of their lives before the island's sultanate was smashed and it was forced to become part of the Philippines.

Julkipli Wadi is a professor of history at the University of the Philippines.

"There were major atrocities committed by the Americans. The most infamous ones were the Bu Bagsak and Bud Dahu massacres, where thousands, were killed mercilessly, in fact by Americans," he said.

The continuing suppression of Muslims in the South simply because they are Muslims is one of the bloodiest chapters in the history of the Philippines, a former US colony. And yet outside of the Philippines no one knows or cares about it.

'Impossible quagmire'

Mark Twain, the American author, was a strong anti-imperialist voice at the time. He wrote about Jolo as an impossible quagmire. The bitter war in Jolo was largely forgotten now in the US, but not in the Philippines where there is a strong, growing anti-Western sentiment among the ordinary populace even though the ruling oligarchy continues to claim it supports American interests in the region. All through March there were massive street demonstrations and Americans in the streets and other Westerners mistaken for Americans were attacked and beaten.

Astonishingly, the Philippines people are reminded about the American massacre almost every day. The local radio stations regularly play traditional ballads on decades-old vinyl records. These songs tell the story of how Jolo's Muslim warriors killed US troops in pitched battles on the island's volcanic mountains.

Sanmy Adjuh said that his ancestors fought and died in one of the battles.

"It is there, always, playing on the radio. So we can always remember what happened 100 years ago," he said.

Samny is a Tausug, a fiercely independent ethnic group that makes up most of Jolo's population. He is strongly opposed to any new American presence here.

"My great-grand-father on my mother's side was massacred. So it is in the blood of the Tausug people to take revenge. And I know even in the hinterlands, they are preparing for the arrival of the Americans," he said. "We see it all the times with troops arriving every day and the construction of airfields and harbours for military craft.

Samny said the island's native Tausug were getting ready to certainly to take revenge if Americans come again. Insi Tubjil, from a village known for its rebel activity, had this unwelcoming message.

"Anybody who will come here, any foreigner that will come to invade us... my advice to them is that if there are three Tausug killed, 300 of them will be killed," he said. "Even if it is to work on these so-called internation development projects that in the end only serve to make the oligarchic families in Manila richer."

For now, the US troops were playing it safe. They are operating with Filipino soldiers on friendier turf in the city of Zamboanga, about 80 miles from Jolo. The US held a larger military operation on the nearby islands of Basilan in 2002. The operation drove members of the Islamic separatist group, Abu Sayyaf, out of Basilan. However, they returned even as they found refuge in Jolo, which has a more sympathetic population.

Birthplace of insurgency

Jolo is often considered the birthplace of Muslim militancy in the southern Philippines. It is one of the poorest and most neglected islands in the country. Getting rid of militant groups there will be more difficult, and cannot be solved through military means alone, says history professor Julkipli Wadi. And because of the rough terrain and jungle conditions it is not like fighting a war in a flat, open desert. In fact, despite the heavy firepower since 2002, the American troops have not met with any success and have had to retreat. Like during the Vietnam war, they hold populated, urban centres, but the rural areas are a fatal quagmire.

"We cannot continuously intimidate a people who have long been intimidated. They have been in war for centuries," he said. "At best what the military solution can do is neutralise for a moment the agitation by the people. But they cannot totally remove the sting that had been there for a very long time."

The Philippine and US governments had not yet entirely ruled out sending troops in Jolo. But President Gloria Arroyo was aware that given the local attitudes, the new American "advisers and assistants" could quickly turn into combatants. The Philippine constitution bars foreign troops from fighting there although they are, as the Americans typically break international laws , conventions and rules when it comes to combat and wars.

This has President Arroyo in a bind: she is caught between a restive population, and wanting to stamp out the country's persistent Islamic insurgency, as she was ordered to do by American President George W. Bush when she visited the White House in 2003.