ARMED CONFLICT
AFP-NPA Armed Clashes
Increased in 2004
The armed conflict
between Leftist guerrillas and government forces will likely increase next
year based on current trends and the reported expansion of the New
People’s Army’s (NPA) guerrillas fronts.
By Benjie
Oliveros
Bulatlat
The armed conflict
between Leftist guerrillas and government forces will likely increase next
year based on current trends and the reported expansion of the New
People’s Army’s (NPA) guerrillas fronts.
Defense and armed
forces officials have consistently downgraded the armed Left’s fighting
strength, with former AFP chief Gen. Antonio Abaya himself describing it
as an “ideological orphan” and a “spent force” engaged mainly in
extortion. Yet the same officials including Abaya agree that the Communist
Party of the Philippines (CPP) and its armed component, NPA, remain the
country’s No. 1 “security threat.”
Photo by Ace Alegre
In
a forum of the Manila
Overseas Press Club (MOPC) in
Makati
City last July, Abaya called the CPP/NPA “the main threat” to peace and
security because of “its nationwide presence and demonstrated capability
to launch armed rebellion and legal struggle in pursuit of its objective
of seizing political power.” The message suggests
that just the same government takes the armed Left seriously.
Who is then telling
the truth? As defense and military authorities belie or at least try to
tone down reports of an upsurge in the NPA’s offensives, claims by the
CPP-NPA in their various reports and publications – which are regularly
sent to the press by email or fax - say otherwise. Their claims can be
dismissed as a typical propaganda dish yet these may warrant a second look
after all based on reports by a number of independent sources which seem
to confirm what the armed Left has been saying.
Recently, the CPP-NPA
revealed that it has increased the number of its guerrilla fronts from 81
in 1999 to 128 last year. The fronts cover 8,000 barrios (or villages),
significant portions of 700-800 municipalities in 90 percent of provinces
all over the country.
The armed Left also
asserts that it has an ever widening and deepening mass base of millions
of people. These serve as basis for intensifying its guerrilla warfare
against the government and launching more and bigger tactical offensives.
Project
Ploughshares
However, data from an
independent source, the Project Ploughshares of the Canadian Council of
Churches, reveal a consistent increase in the number of casualties
resulting from the armed conflict up to 2004. Project Ploughshare’s “Armed
Conflicts Report” for 2003 and 2004, shows the following table:
Casualties
of the Armed Conflict
Based on the report,
armed clashes between the AFP and the CPP-NPA escalated in 1999 after the
breakdown of the peace negotiations between the government of the Republic
of the Philippines (GRP) and the National Democratic Front of the
Philippines (NDFP). As fighting escalated the number of casualties in the
following year also went up until it tapered in 2001. It rose again for
the next three years, 2002-2004, as shown in the table.
Intensification of
the armed conflict
The report by Project
Ploughshares appears to be consistent with the pronouncements of the
CPP-NPA-NDFP and the political events of the times. In previous years
particularly from 1992-1995, the statements of the AFP and the
CPP-NPA-NDFP about the significant decrease in NPA fighters and the
constriction of the latter’s mass base seemed to coincide. By end-1997,
the CPP in its Dec. 26 statement, reported an increase in its strength
although it also called for breaking the “inertia of conservatism” in
tactical offensives.
When peace talks
between the government and the NDFP broke down in May 1999, the AFP
stepped up its counter-insurgency operations. The operations coincided
with the calls of the CPP-NPA for an escalation of tactical offensives. In
the following year, the number of clashes between the AFP and NPA
increased with the CPP saying in March 2001 that the NPA was able to
launch 66 offensives in the second half of 2000 alone. During this time,
the move to oust former President Joseph Estrada from power was
accelerating.
In June 2001 – or six
months after Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo took over the presidency – the
government suspended peace talks with the NDFP and launched big military
operations, particularly in 12 of the NPA’s guerrilla fronts.
Project Ploughshares’
report for 2002-2004 showing a rise in armed encounters tends to bolster
Ang Bayan’s claim which shows that in Central Luzon alone in 2003,
the NPA seized 38 firearms and killed 48 government soldiers. Its Southern
Tagalog territorial region on the other hand reported it was able to
withstand the intensified operations of the AFP, which increased its
combat forces from 19 battalions in 1999 to 38 in 2003.
The Northeast Luzon
region claimed it launched successful tactical offensives that resulted in
the death of more than 50 AFP soldiers and five NPA guerrillas in the same
year.
Talking while
fighting
Meanwhile, peace
talks between the GRP and NDFP resumed in early 2004 resulting in the
formation of a Joint Monitoring Committee (JMC). The JMC was one step
forward in the implementation of the Comprehensive Agreement on Respect
for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law (CARHRIHL) that was
signed by both sides in 1998. The committee is to monitor the
implementation of the agreement and conduct separate or joint
investigations on reported violations to the CARHRIHL. The JMC was
launched last April with the joint secretariat being formed much earlier.
Peace talks remained
on hold during the May presidential elections. Eventually the talks were
stalled in August.
The year 2004 however
saw the highest number of reported casualties since 1999. In separate
reports, Ang Bayan reported this year about the NPA raid of a
detachment of the Philippine Air Force’s 704th Combat Support
Group in January, resulting in the death of four PAF soldiers, one Army
sergeant, and three NPA guerrillas; NPA attacks in Samar in June-August
that killed eight soldiers; eight soldiers killed in NPA tactical
offensives in Laguna, Quezon, and Palawan; NPA attacks in Davao Oriental,
Compostela Valley, Kalinga, and Abra resulting in the death of 10
soldiers; and how an NPA unit foiled a brigade-size AFP offensive in
Tarlac resulting in the death of 14 soldiers.
Aside from Project
Ploughshares, a confidential study of a foreign-based think tank also
pointed to an increase in armed clashes in 2004. Occasionally, major
Philippine dailies likewise published stories about ambushes and raids
staged by the NPA in recent months.
Relief operations?
The Philippine Daily
Inquirer reported about an NPA unit ambush of soldiers in Bulacan on Nov.
30 resulting in the death of 10 troops. Reacting to the incident, AFP
officials said that their soldiers were conducting relief operations. The
CPP, through its spokesperson Ka Roger Rosal, countered that the soldiers
were conducting combat operations.
The Nov. 30 ambush
was followed by two other tactical offensives from Dec. 11-15: on a
command post and on a detachment of the 609th IB, both in
Tarlac. The attacks were launched in response to the killing of a peasant
leader in the same province who was a key witness in the Nov. 16 Hacienda
Luisita massacre.
Project Ploughshares
described the armed clashes as sporadic comprised of a few major battles
and a series of minor clashes. The armed conflict has continued owing to
the failure of the GRP and the NDFP to reach a final peace agreement, the
group said.
But the AFP has a
different assessment of the armed conflict in 2004. General Abaya
said that although the AFP
had succeeded in "reducing the CPP-NPA capabilities and influence in
priority areas," the increase in armed clashes this year was due to the
NPA’s “extortion” activities targeting politicians and campaigners during
the May 2004 elections as well as “its stepped-up campaign of extorting
money from businesses in the countryside.”
On the
other hand, the CPP-NPA-NDFP attributes the increase in armed clashes to
its growing strength and to the response of its regional units and
guerrilla fronts to the general call to intensify its tactical offensives
and to raise the national democratic revolution to a higher level.
No
matter what perspective one takes, the fact is that armed clashes between
the AFP and the NPA are on the rise – and are expected to rise in 2005.
The armed conflict is still far from being resolved. Bulatlat
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