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US Special Operations Forces

As stated earlier, next to Afghanistan, the Philippines has become the second front in the war against international terrorism, including the deployment of the elite U.S. Special Operations Forces which is a composite force and command by itself. The SOF of the U.S. armed forces consists of the Green Beret, Rangers, Special Operations Aviation, SEALS, Delta Force, etc. They are elite in the sense that there are only 47,000 members of such forces worldwide, including in the U.S. mainland. They are part of the Central Command (formerly the Rapid Deployment Force) with headquarters in Tampa, Florida, and are directly supervised by the US Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low-Intensity Conflict (SO/LIC).

Under Section 167 of Title 10 of the US Code which created the Special Operations Command, SOF operations are described as "direct action" (small-scale strikes), unconventional or irregular warfare, civil affairs and psychological operations (psy-ops to influence public opinion), foreign internal defense (arming and training paramilitary forces), and counter-terrorism training. SOFs, together with CIA special hit teams, have also been known to specialize in political assassinations.

The deployment of SOFs in the Philippines shows that in recent Pentagon strategy, the Philippines serves not only as the second front in the war against international terrorism, it also serves as a springboard for renewed U.S. drive for geopolitical hegemony in Southeast Asia, against Philippine home-grown guerrillas (NPA, MNLF, MILF) and other Asian people's mass movements.

MLSA

The Mutual Logistics and Support Agreement (MLSA) is the Pentagon's logical follow-up to the 1999 Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA). The MLSA is not just about logistics and other military hardware that the US wants to stockpile in the Philippines for use by American forces. It is also about the setting up of facilities, structures and infrastructure to "house" U.S. war materiel in the Philippines. For the Philippine government, this is a necessary document to enable it to comply with the constitutional provision requiring an agreement to allow foreign military "facilities."

The VFA had already given the go-signal for the entry of "foreign military troops" under the guise of joint military exercises. All these point to the full restoration of US military presence in the Philippines, but this time using the entire country as one big military base! Under the former Philippine-US Military Bases Agreement (MBA), U.S. troops and facilities could only be stationed or installed inside the bases which were limited in scope and area, all in Luzon island.

Now the VFA and the proposed MLSA would cover the ENTIRE Philippines, including southern Mindanao, noted for its close proximity to Indonesia and Malaysia. While it is true that the MLSA does not specifically designate certain basing areas for use by U.S. forces, it offers, like the VFA, the entire Philippines, all its islands, air space and territorial land and water to the U.S. Armed Forces for use in the same functions as bases, namely: training, refueling, replenishment, resupply and possibly even the repair of US naval vessels.

But more important is the use of the Philippines once again as a staging area for U.S. interventionist actions in Asia and other parts of the world, as springboard for unilateral actions of a superpower that is behaving like a mad dog after Sept. 11. All our ports and airfields nationwide in all the islands can now be used by the U.S. armed forces. And if the Philippines and the U.S. have stretched the interpretation of the 1999 VFA to include all kinds of military activities on Philippine territory, including actual counter-insurgency missions for U.S. forces, you can imagine what they would do with a document like the MLSA in place.

Dilemmas in Philippine national interest

In the U.S. preparations to strike at Iraq, the Philippines is faced with a serious dilemma. It has diplomatic ties with Iraq as well as with the two other nations demonized by Bush's reference to the "axis of evil" which also include Iran and North Korea. If the Philippines allows the active use of Philippine territory by U.S. military forces against these countries, can we ask them not to take this against us or the Filipino contract workers on their soil?

On the local scene, the Philippine government is also faced with the prospect of completely scuttling the ongoing peace talks with the National Democratic Front after the US included this organization, as well as the Communist Party of the Philippines and the New People's Army in its "Foreign Terrorist List."

Closing ranks against the borderless U.S. military

The past victories of Asian anti-colonial struggles, including those for self-determination in Vietnam and elsewhere, the democratic movements against pro-US dictatorships, as in the anti-Marcos dictatorship struggle and the dismantling of the formidable U.S. bases in 1991 in the Philippines, demonstrate the desire of the people of Asia to live in freedom, to run their country their own way, without foreign dictation. At the same time, a strong movement for a nuclear weapons-free and foreign bases-free world has taken shape in Asia and the Pacific in recent years. Many countries now advocate nuclear disarmament and the establishment of nuclear-free zones of peace, as well as demilitarizing and denuclearizing the seas and oceans of the region, such as the Southeast Asia Nuclear Weapons-Free Zone Treaty signed on Dec. 15, 1995.

The Southeast Asian Nuclear Weapons Free Zone Treaty signed by members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) should be given substance. The treaty has expressed the organization's determination "to protect the region from environmental pollution and hazards posed by radioactive wastes and other radioactive materials," and "to take concrete action which will contribute to the process towards general and complete disarmament of nuclear weapons."

In the Philippines, even after the dismantling of the U.S. bases in 1991, we continue to block any attempt to re-establish US military presence through the proposed MLSA. This is being done by defending and giving substance to the anti-militarist, pro-peace and anti-nuclear provisions of the 1987 Philippine Constitution. We are also seeking the abrogation of the Cold War relics - the 1951 Mutual Defense Treaty and the 1947 Military Assistance Agreement, as well as the 1999 Visiting Forces Agreement. Our experience in people's struggles against foreign aggressors and dictatorships shows us that only by closing ranks and forging a broad united front can we defeat our militarist adversaries both in the Philippines and Asia.

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