|
 |
 |
|
While US bombers hacked at the head of Osama Ben Ladin’s terrorist octopus in Afghanistan, Washington is already turning to chopping off El Qaeda tentacles across the world. Priorities are debated, with a spotlight on the intra-Administration controversy on Iraq. But less prominent areas of terrorist penetration across the vast Islamic world from Morocco to the Philippines are also coming under scrutiny and will be an important aspect of what is fashionably called asymmetrical warfare.
A U.S. military advisers team has arrived in Zamboanga in the southern Philippines as part of the worldwide effort. Their immediate object is helping the Filipino army rescue Martin and Gracia Burnham, a Kansas missionary couple snatched by Abu Sayyaf, a Philippines terrorists linked to El Qaeda. The organization killed an American, Guillermo Sobero from California, with more than a dozen Filipinos earlier this year. There are apparently some Moslem Filipinos among the “Afghan Arab” holdouts in Afghanistan. They were recruited through the same network that Ben Ladin built during the US and Pakistan-assisted war of the muhajeddin against Moscow during its attempt to establish a Soviet Afghan regime and some have returned to the Philippines where they are plotting local terrorism.
Some of the earlier plots by Abu Sayyad turn out to be significant in the U.S. “war on terrorism with a worldwide reach”. They demonstrate how Ben Ladin exploited local political and social issues in isolated corners of the Islamic world not only to recruit but also to test tactics. Philippines police believe they foiled a plot by Philippines terrorists to hijack a plane and use it as a weapon against a target in Manila, a forerunner to the 9/11 atroicities. Manila also believes it foiled a plot to assassinate Pope John Paul II during his visit in 1995, a constantly rumored target of Ben Ladin’s El Qaeda.
As in Afghanistan, a complicated political scenario has set the stage for these terrorist operations. The Moros is a catchall phrase for Philippine Moslems of different tribal and linguistic groups, often in conflict among themselves, named for Moslem enemies in Spain by the colonial conquerors of the islands 400 years ago. They constitute a distinct minority in the 7,000 islands that make up the republic with its largely Catholic population. During Spain’s rule, Madrid was constantly at war with them. And in the aftermath of the US takeover of the Philippines after the Spanish-American War, Washington squashed a short but bitter Moro insurgency in 1900-03.
Since Philippines independence after World War II, Manila has had a troubled history and unrewarding record of trying to satisfy Moro demands — independence by more radical groups. The fighting has resulted in thousands of casualties over the years. The issue is complicated by poverty, abject in the region even by Philippines standards, with an in-migration of non-Moslems from other islands seeking land. Some insurrectionists allied themselves with foreign Moslem regimes, including at one point Libya’s Muammar Qadaffi.
In 1996, supposedly with Libyan help, Manila made one more settlement, this time with the Moro National Liberation Front and its leader Nur Misuari who became governor of an autonomous Moslem area. But last month when Manila sought to replace him because of allegations he was allied to the terrorists, Misuari’s followers attacked government installations resulting in scores of dead and wounded. Misuari fled to Malaysia where Prime Minister Mahathir, courting Islamicist sentiment in the face of his own flagging popularity, has been dragging his heels on extradition.
Philippines President Gloria Arroyo, daughter of reformist President Macapagal whom the US backed strongly in the 1960s, came to Washington last month to demonstrate her support of the anti-terrorist campaign, to seek help — and to heal the last scars of the Filipinos’ expulsion of US military bases in the 1990s. President Bush promised weapons and training assistance to Philippines forces but Arroyo also has promised no direct participation by U.S. military in order to forestall criticism from nationalists in the Congress. This week the US formerly added Abu Sayyad to its list of terrorist organizations [as well as adding the continuing Philippines Communist insurgency in the north]. But Arroyo wants Misuari named as well.
The complicated political background, some of the worst tropical terrain in the world, and the extended call across the world on US resources, all will test the skills of the American advisers. It was in the earlier Moro insurgency that John J.“Blackjack” Pershing, commander of US expeditionary forces in World War I, first made his mark as a young officer. It was a bitter and bloody campaign — and some of the tactics would no longer be acceptable. But Pershing’s organizational skills, demonstrated then and later in France, are certainly on call today in the Philippines — and in Washington.
Sol W. Sanders, (solsanders@abac.com), is an Asian specialist with more than 25 years in the region, and a former correspondent for Business Week, U.S. News & World Report and United Press International.
He writes weekly for World Tribune.com.