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June 6, 2001, Inquirer, AFP, Ragtag band running circles around military,

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June 6, 2001, Inquirer, AFP,   Ragtag band running circles around military,
Posted: 11:30 PM (Manila Time) | June 05, 2001
Inquirer News Service

BOASTING a modern arsenal bought with ransom money, the ragtag bandit group Abu Sayyaf is running circles around the poorly equipped military as it tries to free American and Filipino hostages. 

The military has been on the receiving end of criticism from the public and media following a failed rescue attempt in Lamitan town on Basilan island, where the rebels broke through a siege with their captives. 

Hundreds of troops, backed by armor and air power, had ringed a hospital and church where the gunmen were holed up with nine captives they seized from the Dos Palmas Resort in Palawan on May 27. 

But the Abu Sayyaf sneaked through the cordon under the cover of darkness on Saturday. 

The military is also being criticized for failing to pounce on the Abu Sayyaf at sea when they were transporting the captives across a 500-kilometer expanse of water from Palawan to Basilan in the south. 

Armed Forces spokesperson Brig. Gen. Edilberto Adan said the military was being constrained not only by the presence of hostages being used as shields, but by the lack of logistics for rapid troop deployment. 

For 92 years, the external defense of the Philippines benefited from the presence of air and naval bases of its former colonizer, the United States. 

But US troops pulled out in 1992 after their lease was terminated, leaving a fleet of hand-me-down naval and air force equipment. 

A planned Armed Forces modernization, partly financed from the sale of the Army headquarters set on prime land near the Makati financial district, was scuppered by the Asian economic crisis in 1997. 

And with government facing a huge budget deficit, it looks like the military will have to defer its wish list for multi-role fighters, corvettes, attack helicopters, and surface to air missiles, among others.

“Rightly so, the public expects their Armed Forces to perform,” Adan said. “But then one reality which the public should also understand is that what they provide is what they get.” 

Because the Army's budget also depends on a country's economy, “we the soldiers who train for warfare will deliver our best based on the equipment, the resources provided to us.” 

“And when crises like this strike and the nation focuses on their Armed Forces to deliver, we will do with whatever tools we have in our hands,” he added. 

Soldiers faced bigger risks now because the Abu Sayyaf has updated its arsenal from millions of dollars in ransom payments for Europeans and Malaysians they seized from the Malaysian diving resort of Sipadan last year, Adan said. 

President Macapagal-Arroyo has rejected any demand for ransom this time. 

Hungering for modernization


With a coastline stretching 36,289 kilometers, the Armed Forces has only one frigate and 60 patrol and coastal combatant vessels, according to the Asia-Pacific Military Balance. 

The backbone of its Air Force is a squadron of fighter planes, the most sophisticated of which are 11 refurbished F-5 fighters. 

When the Abu Sayyaf raided the Palawan beach resort, the Navy mustered a fleet of only 10 ships from different parts of the country to track them down, Adan said. 

“But it's not the picture of a dragnet or a blockade. It's not a line of a hundred ships trying to put a screen,” he said. 

“We must understand that our ships are not that all modern. That’s why we have been hungering for the modernization of our Navy--we need better radars (sic), faster ships.” 

The 106,000-strong military is also inadequate in terms of personnel, with the country facing the Abu Sayyaf and two other key rebels groups--the bigger Muslim separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and communist guerrillas. 

Adan said military planners last year proposed beefing up troops in Mindanao with a 35,000-member militia force. But because of lack of funds, they settled for only 10,000. 

Three months into the training, the government said it had no money. “So we had to stop. The men we were training had to go back to their homes, their firearms had to be returned,” he said. --AFP

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