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Bases Are Obsolete Like A Withered Flower
First Published: Reflections - Philippine Daily InquirerTBA Publication Date: 30th November 1991 Author's Name: Father Shay Cullen SSC Col. Harry G. Summers is a retired US military officer who is a well known syndicated columnist and a former professor of the US Army War College. He is known as a conservative voice on military matters in the United States but is a man of independent and innovative views that can differ with the conventional US military strategic thinking. That is why his recent column comparing the US Military bases in the Philippines to a withered flower guarded by a lone sentry raised a lot of eyebrows. Col. Summers said that the bases have not only outlived their original purpose but the presuppositions on which they were built were erroneous and seriously flawed in the first place. The North Korean invasion he says was misinterpreted by President Truman as an invasion planned by "Monolithic World Communism". Many were led to believe that the invasion was planned and directed by the Soviets to spread communist ideology. This simplistic and flawed analysis led to a massive US mobilization against largely imagined threats to its own newly established post WW II dominance in Asia. The US Navy was sent to the Formosa straits to meet a supposed invasion threat from communist China, troops were committed to Korea and Europe, advisers, money and the CIA were sent to the Philippines, and later advisors and then troops to Vietnam, beginning that nightmare of 25 long years. Summers implies that the US exaggerated local conflicts and presented them as threats to the entire world. This was the beginning of the cold war that the Soviet President just pronounced over. During the 1950's the Soviet Union was surrounded by military bases in a policy of containment that was to meet a threat more imagined than real, Summers says. This sparked a Soviet military build-up that was to lead to its economic ruin. In the 1960's the belief that "Red" China posed a threat to world peace was spread around to justify continued military spending in the United States despite the fact that China was going through a long internal upheaval and was a threat to no one. The so called Chinese threat to the Philippines was scoffed at by Chinese nationalist officers as being absurd according to Summers. To-day the Chinese are quasi-allies of the United States, the Soviets are signing economic and arms treaties with the United States, ending their breach with South Korea, dismantling part of their nuclear stockpile, phasing out their chemical weapons and withdrawing troops from Europe and the Far East. Perhaps they feel less threatened or realize that they cannot continue the massive spending that is crippling their economy and likewise is plunging the United States closer to a massive economic recession as it continues huge defense spending and and runs a billion dollar deficit. In the light of these realities there is no reason for the continued existence for these massive bases of the cold war other than to serve as a bottomless pit for taxpayers money that would be better spent on eliminating world hunger. Philippines military analysts and CIA intelligence agents try very hard to convince public opinion and the US Congress that the Philippine communist movement is not a home grown insurgency against landlordism and oppression but portray that it is supported by either the Soviets or the Chinese. Few are buying that story nowadays but it shows how desperate the US department of defense is to find enemies to justify the continuation of the cold war, its colonial presence and the obsolete bases in the Philippines. Defense contractors and Pentagon generals are going through a cold-war withdrawal as US politicians,who hope to cash in on the "peace dividend", are calling for massive cuts in defense spending . There is a story going around Washington that the psychiatric couches are full of generals on the edge of nervous breakdowns because peace is breaking out. They need an enemy to justify their jobs of planning the nuclear destruction of the planet or inane invasions of sovereign nations like Panama. But of even greater importance is the unprecedented resentment against the continuation of the US bases in the Philippines. Like a jogger disabled by a thorn the Philippines will never run to freedom and prosperity until the bases go. More Filipinos are coming to realize this as never before. Last 23 May 1990 the Association of Major Religious Superiors in the Philippines both men and women which represents almost all of the religious sisters, brothers and priests in the country issued a statement in response to the serving of the termination letter on the bases. ...."We would like to congratulate and applaud and strongly support the move of President Aquino and Secretary Raul Manglapus to present the US with the termination notice of the RP-US Military bases agreement. We believe that with this notice of termination President Cory has indeed registered clearly the mind of the Filipino people." The Association can claim with some justification to understand the "mind" of the Filipino people considering between all members represent thousands of years of pastoral service and accumulated wisdom. This statement should not be taken lightly and is the closest to a reading of the stand of the Catholic Church on the bases to date. But not all agree that the serving of the notice of termination is an act of much significance. Last May 25 ABKADA, a group critical of the bases said that the talks were a...." mere propaganda ploy designed to deceive the Filipino people and co-opt the raging nationalist sentiment against the bases........The termination notice served by the Philippine government was merely proforma - meant only to convey the formal expiration of the MBA on Sept.16 ,1991 ......Abakada therefore calls on the Philippine Government not to enter into any negotiations that would result in in a new treaty extending the US bases stay in the country...." Abkada also called on the Senate to reject any such treaty and for all Filipinos to campaign against the bases. On May 25 there was a pro-base rally organized by the business and political leaders of Angeles and Olongapo cities. They demanded that the Senate should ratify a new treaty to extend the bases. But appalling failures of security in Olongapo has left both Americans and business leaders bitter. The killings and stabbings of Americans led by what police say is a criminal gang supplied by other police and a military soldier stationed at San Miguel communications base, in Zambales have closed the gates much of the time paralyzing the flesh trade making it an increasingly obsolete business. Politicians here no longer boast about the tight security and elaborate network of neighborhood spies set up to protect American customers. Critics say it is counter productive and totalitarian. When families are encouraged to spy on each other in the name of security they are led to to make false reports to get revenge for a family feud. Christian life is destroyed by such a network that is built on suspicion and fear. The recent spat of daylight killings show how ineffective it is. The killing of an American officer Lt. Richard Brown, 33, last June 3 by robbers in Olongapo, a stones throw from the police headquarters has angered and dismayed American officials. Frantic phone calls to the Olongapo police were met with inaction according to the house maids of Brown who then had to tricycle to the Marmont hotel to phone the American base police for help while the young officer bled to death. More than ever do we come to realize that the bases are obsolete as Col. Summers says, both to the Philippines and the United States. But the elites who control the defense spending there and the US connected trading here together with the local vice-lords of the sex trade will not admit the truth because their own dwindling interests are at stake.
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