As the Filipino people commemorate the historic Senate vote rejecting the renewal of the US military bases agreement thirty-three years ago, we emphasize that the US government’s intervention in our affairs continues not only through the US-RP Mutual Defense Treaty and military agreements secured with succeeding regimes, but more stealthily through the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP).
The AFP likes to trace its history back to the Philippine revolutionary army of Aguinaldo. But it actually has its origins in the counterrevolutionary Philippine Scouts, a part of the US military based in the Philippines and led by American officers but composed mainly of Filipinos and Filipino-Americans whose primary task was to crush Philippine resistance to US imperialist rule.
From the onset, the AFP has been an entity focused on fighting and killing fellow Filipinos. Given its fascist and counterrevolutionary roots, it should come as no surprise that the AFP continues to commit grave human rights violations and violations of international humanitarian law.
To this day, it is the US that provides the doctrinal framework, training and funding for the counter-insurgency war led by the AFP.
The Philippines is currently the biggest recipient of US military aid in Southeast Asia. It will also be receiving US$500 million in additional military assistance over the next five years, no doubt to enhance the AFP’s capacity to conduct intelligence, psywar and combat operations and terrorize the people in the course of the Marcos Jr. regime’s stepped-up counter-insurgency drive.
In addition to providing monies and war materiel, the US provides advanced military training to elite AFP officers, who later take the reins of command in the AFP as US-trained Amboys.
Marcos Jr., as the current chief lackey of the US, has enabled US imperialism’s mounting intervention in the country by affirming and enhancing all treaties and agreements that define the US’ master-puppet relationship with the Philippines.
Karapatan calls on all freedom-loving Filipinos to expose, resist and hold accountable US imperialism for its sinister role in propping up Marcos Jr.’s fascist military. For directing the AFP’s brutal counter-insurgency war, US imperialism shares the blame and must be held to account for the worsening human rights violations and violations of international humanitarian law that this war has engendered.