War of Suppression

Since President Ferdinand Marcos imposed martial law last September, the Philippine armed forces have used their new powers in a struggle to suppress two guerrilla rebellions at opposite ends of the country. One has been organized by the Maoist New People's Army, with perhaps 1,500 combat cadres, operating In Isabela province on Luzon Island in the far north of the country. The other is a resistance movement among Moslems in the southern island of Mindanao and on the jewel-like tropical islands of the Sulu Archipelago. While the Maoists have been thrown on the defensive, martial law seems only to have added fuel to the resentments of the Moslems. TIME Correspondent David Aikman visited both fronts, and sent this report:

I boarded a chopper with a Northeast Command colonel for a lightning supply and inspection visit to a forward company command post in a remote foothills barrio in Isabela province. As the scenery below us quickly changed from the lush lowland rice fields to the forbidding forests and gullies of the Sierra Madre highlands, the pilot climbed to 2,000 feet, respectfully out of range of Thompson submachine guns and AK-47s. Suddenly, when he spotted the tiny H-shaped landing pad, he put the chopper into a tight sinking spiral and landed in the barrio. The supplies were unloaded and the colonel, accompanied by two wary troopers, climbed quickly out and up the slope to greet the company commander.

The villagers gawked and giggled at the activity, assembled en masse before the thatched huts. At first there seemed to be no sign of the troops holding the barrio. Only after spotting the floppy jungle hats, ubiquitous badge of counterinsurgency, could one distinguish them from the villagers. They were stripped to the waist, dangling their M-16s with that insouciance which seems universally to characterize men in jungle combat. With the chopper unloaded and the formalities exchanged, we took off again. The whole visit, one small episode in the campaign, had lasted less than three minutes.

Before martial law, the New People's Army controlled 33 of the 37 municipalities of Isabela province. Since the midnight-to-4 a.m. curfew was imposed last September, the army, which has about 3,000 troops in the area, estimates that the guerrillas' strength has been whittled down by more than one-third to an operational base of only 7,000.

As a brigade commander says, "We are not tied down by such niceties as habeas corpus." Perhaps the most effective measure has been forced resettlement. Within just one week of the proclamation, 53,000 peasants were simply ordered down from the Sierra Madre into the lowlands. An officer explained how the move had been accomplished. "Evacuation started immediately after martial law. We gave them a warning; just lighting a cigarette for a guerrilla is a crime. They are either for us or against us. Actually, they did not want to get caught in the crossfire." One could not help wondering what story might be told by villagers who had been ordered out of their homes by the armed forces without notice.

On Jolo Island in the Sulu Archipelago, 800 miles to the south, our Huey raced in from the sea at treetop level. The waist gunner crouched in deadly earnest over his gunsights; his helmet decal read "Sacred Heart of Jesus, Bless Our Ways." The fierce Moslem Tausogs, who control two-thirds of Jolo Island, often have snipers in the coconut palms, and they are unerringly accurate at 200 yds. At Jolo airport, a Jeep sits at the runway edge as each plane takes off, watching for snipers. Despite such precautions, the rebels in Sulu shot down three government planes in the past three months.

As in the north, the 4,000 or so government troops in Mindanao and Sulu do not hesitate to treat areas of suspected enemy concentrations as free-fire zones, whether or not civilians are around. I was told by sympathizers of the Moslem rebels that 200 civilians had been killed by army and navy shelling in Jolo. Not surprisingly, there are some 40,000 evacuees in the Mindanao-Sulu area; 14,000 of them are packed into 17 refugee centers on Basilan Island.

Under an amnesty issued by Marcos on Jan. 10, any guerrilla who surrenders his arms by Feb. 28 will receive safe conduct and a pardon. There is an old saying in Mindanao that a Moslem would rather part with his wife than his gun, and so far, as the army admits, not a single Moslem has taken up Marcos' offer. Meanwhile, until the amnesty on firearms expires, the army cannot conduct any offensive operations. The troops sit tight much of the day in their foxholes, rising at 4 a.m. to prepare for the dawn fusillade by Moslem snipers.

The rebels, especially the Tausogs, are fearless and skillful fighters, better armed than the Maoists, with no shortage of machine guns. They dart through the coconut groves in twos and threes, always covering each other and ready to pick up the body and weapon of a fallen comrade. Amazingly, no prisoner has been taken on either side, and not a single enemy body found on the battlefield. Casualties, however, have been heavy in the fighting. The army admits that close to 50 soldiers have been killed (the Moslems claim the figure is much higher) and estimates enemy dead to be around 200.

For all its fierceness, the conflict seems to be governed by an almost anachronistic chivalry on both sides. Says Ground Force Commander Colonel Alfonso Alcoseba, a veteran of 13 months in Viet Nam: "These people are gentlemen on the battlefield. They don't mutilate or desecrate the dead."

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