Shock as Washington deploys its troops to Philippines
The Universe
(April 20, 2003)
THERE was real shock and awe in the Philippines a few weeks ago when Washington announced that US troops would join local forces in a new military campaign on the Southern Philippine island of Sulu.
Shock for Filipinos because it would put US troops into a predominantly Muslim territory in direct combat with Filipino citizens. Ostensibly it was to attack the base of the feared Muslim bandit group held responsible for the kidnapping and murder of dozens of people, including Awe at the audacity of the US Government that was then on about to launch its invasion of Iraq without a legitimising UN resolution. Now it was about to violate the Philippine constitution that forbids foreign troops to be based on its soil.
In 1991, the Philippine senate voted against allowing the US to continue to occupy its remaining military bases in the country. The biggest was that at Subic Bay, established when the US occupied the Philippines after a colonial war in 1899, its first with an Asian nation.
America was about to invade a sovereign combat – something never befire allowed – and it was met with loud protest from Muslims and Christians alike. The Philippines Government had to back away from this deployment of American troops.
The United States was able to get a signed Visiting Forces Agreement from the Philippines Government a few years ago to allow its warships and planes into the Philippines.
Many fear that these are stepping stones to getting a firmer foothold back in Philippine air and sea bases. These were very strategic in the containment of communism in China and North Korea during the Cold War. They could have been targets for retaliatory nuclear missile strikes in the event of any limited nuclear exchange which the US envisaged as a distinct possibility.
The bases were a forward deployment platform from which to launch any attack on mainland Asia. That cold war is now dangerously hotting up as Merica seeks to contain North Korea’s nuclear power weapons programme. With the US opportunity for North Korea to realize their nuvelar ambitions.
Finding diplomatic solutions is not America’s strong suit. It prefers a more robust sabre rattling. That make its allies and friends quake, in particular South Korea which has been trying to establish a ‘Sunshine’ policy of rapprochement with the North.
There is no doubt that the conquest of Iraq will give an ever more dangerous edge to the threat of George Bush’s threat when he told the media recently that “all options are on the table”. What many fear is more unilateral military action by the United States that would draw the Philippines into the fray as its ports and airfields become active under the ‘Visiting Forces Agreement.’
That would cause huge resentment and fear and a dangerous situation in the Philippines.
The government here is smarting from the sheer strength of public opposition to the deployment of US forces in Sulu US pressure is a powerful force on it’s one-time closest ally in Asia. That might be enough for it to bully its way back in as it prepares to surround and isolate North Korea.
