Missing the moderates
Murphy, Denis
Report from the PiailippineS THE MISSING MODERATES IT'S MARCOS VS. THE HARD LEFT O F ALL THE Asian countries the Philippines should be the easiest for a Western reader to understand. It is...
...Now Marcos is back, apparently as strong as ever, redivivus as only a dictator can be (Think of the stories of Stalin on his deathbed opening his eyes while his henchmen toasted his departure...
...The radical left also discouraged their growth, because rightly or wrongly it has seen them as threats to its own organizational efforts, The harm done by the Communist party in this way has probably been greater than the Marcos government's...
...We sat under a thin _9 new moon listening to the speakers, though what is said at these rallies matters very little -- most often in fact the public address system hardly works at all...
...He has lived in the Philippines for twenty-four years...
...George Kennan used the pages of Foreign Affairs to lay out the doctrine of dontainment which became the guiding creed of the nation's foreign policy establishment...
...Yet the two seem to be the only long-range alr available for the country, especially since the recent collapse of the united moderate opposition in its first real test, over whether or not to participate in May's parliamentary elections...
...It will be made up mostly of the poor with some sympathizers from the upper classes and the church, and it will depend for its organization and 8lan on the leftists...
...The bishops' contradictory statements on the coming elections are signs of the basic weaknesses of their conference...
...Further there are deep personal and political differences among them...
...Perhaps one young girl spoke for them when she told me she came because she wants freedom _9 and democracy...
...Several "traditional old politicians," as they are called here (almost as if they were a type of tribal group themselves with their own strange ways and customs) also spoke, including Diosdado Macapagal, former president of the country, although they, too, are far from being leftists...
...Why the United States chose not to do this remains a mystery to me and to most Filipinos...
...Once the Americans made their choice, / Commonweal: 262 Filipino businessmen followed...
...They are simply amateurs abroad in this modern society, easily rounded up as allies by the most respectable group, the businessmen...
...This seems to be the situation in the Philippines today although here the unexpected is the norm and anything may happen at any time...
...Marcos has been the uncontested strong man of the country since 1965...
...It could have brought the Philippine army, shorn of its top Marcos men, to back such an arrangement...
...Till now leftist leaders have failed to build a real united front or popular organizations...
...The United States could have forced Marcos and his immediate followers to resign -- the same role it played in the end with the Shah and Somoza -- and arranged a free election to choose successors...
...A member of the Mangyan tribe of Mindoro Island was given a chance to speak, for example...
...This they must do because people are still far from ready for overt Communist direction...
...Most Filipinos, given a choice, would choose neither Marcos nor the NPA, but the moderate alternatives that culturally would seem more attuned to the prevailing outlook lack the fierce determination and the international support needed to come to power...
...Embassy and the Filipino elite, on the one hand, and the Communist party, on the other...
...The rich were mostly gone...
...The NPA, or New People's Army, is the armed wing of the Communist party of the Philippines...
...Unfortunately, the alternatives have one by one been removed by the fight and left, like chess players moving quickly through the opening moves of a match to get to the essential struggle -- as they perceive it...
...They have no professional staff to prepare position papers for the meetings or to follow up on decisions made, no secretariat that can deal with day-to-day problems...
...They are singleminded, ruthless, unsentimental, patient, tireless, and filled with a sense of their own importance...
...blessing, is contesting the election...
...acquiescence has systematically worked for years to suppress such groups...
...If they are, they will have their way in the end...
...This would have undercut the radical left or channeled its forces into a more democratic process, and, even if the new government could not have worked miracles to solve the country's problems, it would have had popular support and breathing room for some years to try in a democratic way...
...Marcos is accepted again at the heart of the country' s political life by the U.S...
...Over the last seven months, the United States, through its influence on the World Bank and other foreign funding bodies, had the power to dictate to the Philippines the conditions it wanted, up to and including Marcos's resignation, in return for a resumption of international funding and a rescheduling of the country's debt...
...Seven months ago President Marcos was a sick man at the head of a government reeling from the Aquino assassination and the economic crisis that followed...
...It is Catholic and highly Americanized, at least superficially...
...The success of this opposition will depend on the wisdom of the left...
...has settled instead for an election contested by a sector of the opposition, to elect a parliament that is powerless...
...The NPA has suffered hundreds of casualties in its long armed struggle in the mountains and backwaters of the country, but it has now about 8,000-10,000 armed men and women and, spokesmen say, three people trained to use every additional gun they get...
...DENIS MURPHY (Denis Murphy is the Assistant Executive Secretary of the Office for Human Development of the Federation of Asian Bishops' Conference...
...Foreign Policy devoted itself to the "lessons of Vietnam...
...Former Senator Jose Diokno once said with grudging admiration" "Filipinos...
...it published some of the increasingly dovish members of the old foreign policy 4 May 1984: 263...
...Perhaps the leadership will become less dogmatic and more patient...
...The Catholic bishops are also split, though not as publicly, in November the bishops' administrative council took a neutral position on the elections, but recently Cardinal Jaime Sin has urged people to participate...
...Leftist underground groups were more prominent in the rally's organization than they had been in the past...
...If the poor were organized into effective democratic labor unions and peasant organizations, some moderate solution might still be possible...
...These days it is even easier to understand, for more and more only two strong personalities separate themselves from the indecision and compromise that mark the country's political life -- President Ferdinand Marcos and the NPA rifleman...
...There were no church groups among the coalition members and very few sisters or priests at the rally...
...When containment was discredited by Vietnam, liberal critics of the war found an outlet for their ideas in a new magazine, Foreign Policy, launched in 1970 and now published by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace...
...However, it seems to be true: the United States and the young Filipino radicals started years ago oversimplifying the situation into black-and-white terms, and by their actions they have succeeded in fact in creating the world they imagined...
...The U.S...
...T HIS MAY SOUND like activist rhetoric and I would not have written so a few years ago...
...F"'" ""' " 'lt ' ti " orelgn p o l i c y a erna v e s NEW WORLD ORDER II BUT WHAT ABOUT THE RUSSIANS...
...The wider tragedy is that third-world choices have inexorably been narrowed down by circumstances to strong man or guerrilla...
...It is also very similar politically and economically to the Latin American countries that are now in the headlines...
...Ultimately it will follow the road down which the leftists point, though the huge crowd in the moonlight was gentle and showed absolutely no desire for violent solutions...
...The Marcos government with U.S...
...We're fifty million sheep and one S.O.B...
...His own ministers were silent in his defense, and President Reagan called off a state visit...
...There are exceptions, but those have never thought of organizing to influence the larger body of bishops and presenting a common and consistent position based on the Gospel and the church's social teaching...
...Most people were ordinary men and women whom no one organized...
...interests here (the military bases especially), would have been elected...
...The underground showed much more sophistication than ever before in allowing member groups of the organizing coalition, most of whom are far from leftist, equal time at the microphone and equal space for their banners...
...Most anthropologists would say Filipinos are just the opposite...
...W HAT THEN do the millions of poor and lower-middle-class Filipinos do ? They do the best they can within the narrow limits laid down for them by the U.S...
...So they meet twice a year but there is no consolidation of points of view, continuity, or thrust...
...He was ridiculed by politicians and businessmen who for ten years had been quiet as altar boys...
...They are after all supreme realists...
...Most of the marchers were farmers, sunburned and exhausted after their journeys...
...It is left, then, to the poor people to work for basic reforms in the country, with whatever allies they can gather...
...I saw some hints of what the future may hold at a recent rally supporting the election boycott in Manila's Luneta Park...
...It has a near monopoly on young, dedicated Filipinos...
...ironically both Marcos and the NPA soldier are as unFilipino as it is possible to be...
...The scenario that was only imagined by these two antagonists some years ago is now reality...
...government, the business community, and many bishops, including Cardinal Sin...
...Such an outcome is not what most Filipinos would choose now if they had other real alternatives at hand...
...This crowd around me, l thought, is probably the basic opposition force of_9 future...
...A labor leader spoke though he had recently edged out the left's own candidate for control of the Kilusang Mayo Uno (May 1 Movement), the most radical of labor federations...
...One sizable group, with apparent U.S...
...At this time in Filipino history, moderate democratic leaders more or less nationalist, more or less friendly to the United States, but all rational and open to compromise with U.S...
...Some 150,000-200,000 people gathered to meet groups of boycott marchers from North and South Luzon...
...T HE JOURNAL Foreign Affairs was, until the late 1960s, virtually synonymous with postwar American foreign policy...
...Another has mounted a boycott...
...the party has controlled _9 supply of dedicated social action workers who are the lifeblood of people's groups, especially in the early stages...
...But they are not so organized...
Vol. 111 • May 1984 • No. 9
