Posted on 03/17/2002 9:21:38 PM PST by altair
NO 'POLICY DECISION' YET: PALACE
US seeks to deploy more troops in RP
Posted: 0:01 AM (Manila Time) | Mar. 17, 2002
Inquirer News Service
THE UNITED States wants to bring in more troops for the controversial Balikatan 02-1 training exercise aimed at wiping out the Abu Sayyaf bandits in Basilan.
But presidential spokesperson Rigoberto Tiglao on Saturday said the Philippine government had not yet made any "policy decision" on the US proposal.
Tiglao said the proposal called for the deployment of more American "civic action personnel," not combat troops.
Under the Balikatan terms of reference, Manila and Washington have agreed to limit to 660 the number of US troops participating in the six-month exercise.
"The US proposal has yet to be discussed very seriously with President Macapagal-Arroyo and the President has not made a decision on that," Tiglao said.
According to him, the proposal was made "informally by those on the ground in Basilan."
About 160 US Special Forces soldiers have been deployed in Basilan where the Abu Sayyaf bandits are holding captive an American missionary couple and a Filipino nurse.
The US military last week began calling the war games "Operation Enduring Freedom-Philippines," giving credence to claims that the country has become, after Afghanistan, the second front of the US-led global war on terrorism. Both Washington and Manila have denied the claims.
Some nationalists and left-wing groups have also opposed the joint military exercise, saying it violates the constitutional ban on the presence of foreign troops on Philippine soil.
US soldiers are allowed to enter combat zones in Basilan to observe Filipino troops in action as part of the exercise.
But Ms Macapagal has said the US troops, although armed, are prohibited from engaging in combat. They are allowed to fire back though if attacked.
Shortly before Friday midnight, US military helicopters recovered the body of a Filipino soldier and evacuated three wounded soldiers after a clash with the bandits in Basilan.
It was the first known case that US military advisers had played a role, albeit indirect, in the war against the Abu Sayyaf bandits who have been linked to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network.
Because the Armed Forces of the Philippines lacks night flight capabilities, soldiers wounded in a firefight at night have often bled to death while waiting to be evacuated in the morning.
Maj. Noel Detoyato, a Philippine military spokesperson, said two US Pave Hawk helicopters flew to the war-torn island of Basilan late Friday after Abu Sayyaf bandits ambushed a Philippine Army patrol, killing one soldier and wounding three.
The Pave Hawks are a version of the popular Army Blackhawks.
The fighting subsided before the helicopters reached the site from their temporary base at the Edwin Andrews Air Base in Zamboanga City.
Detoyato said the clash broke out before midnight Friday in a jungle off Bolansa village in Lantawan town. The shooting lasted about 15 minutes.
Brig. Gen. Donald Wurster, commander of US troops training Filipinos, said a Pave Hawk and crew with night vision goggles, took the dead soldiers and his three wounded comrades to a military hospital in Zamboanga City.
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