By Jose Maria Sison, NDFP Chief Political Consultant
August 6th 2002
Following the imperial visit of US state department secretary Colin Powell, the US-directed Macapagal-Arroyo regime has become more arrogant and more aggressive than ever before. It has ordered the redeployment of military contingents from the Moro areas in order to augment those previously deployed against the revolutionary people and forces of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), New People’s Army (NPA) and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP).
The regime has declared an all-out war. This means the escalation of the campaigns of suppression that have been going on since the Macapagal-Arroyo clique assumed power. The revolutionary people and forces of the CPP, NPA and NDFP are challenged to defend themselves and raise the level of their revolutionary armed struggle. We can expect a dialectical chain of events as follows:
1. The declaration of all-out war by the regime is leading to the termination of the GRP-NDFP peace negotiations. The ruling clique believes that it can gain politically in a big way by posing as strong and whipping up a policy of repression. But the NDFP is not at all intimidated. It has long been tested in revolutionary struggles, from the time of the Marcos fascist dictatorship to the present. It recognizes the worsening crisis engulfing the domestic ruling system and even the US and world capitalist system. It is eager to give full play to the advantages of the revolutionary people and forces in pursuing the armed revolution.
2. The military, police and paramilitary forces of the counterrevolutionary state are emboldened to commit grosser human rights violations on a wider scale than ever before. The escalating military campaigns of suppression increase the budgetary deficit, grab more and more resources from other departments of the reactionary government and worsen the economic crisis as in the few years of the all-out war policy of Estrada. The economic indicators that signaled the fall of Estrada are once again at work against Macapagal-Arroyo.
3. In response, the New People’s Army intensifies its tactical offensives, using as base of operations 128 guerrilla fronts all over the country. It increases both basic and special operations as the CPP has previously announced. It can also go into new kinds of special operations that involve negligible cost to itself and high cost to its enemy. For instance, it can destroy electrical towers and lines, like during the final years of the Marcos years, in order to compel the enemy troops to take the passive and futile position of guarding these installations and deliver telling blows to the regime in terms of calculated economic disruption and clear demonstration of the inability of the regime to provide a profitable environment to the imperialist corporate vultures.
4. In the face of the all-out war policy of the regime, the legal democratic movement can do its best to frustrate the draconian scheme of the regime through resolute and militant mass protests. At the same time, the revolutionary party of the proletariat acts accordingly to further develop the urban and rural underground for the purpose of facilitating the absorption of the legal forces of the national-democratic movement into the revolutionary underground. Current conditions are becoming similar to those in the years 1969-1972 when Marcos was preparing martial law. Upon the suppression of the legal democratic forces by the regime, armed city partisan warfare can flourish to make the business environment far worse than now for the big corporate masters of the regime.
5. The revolutionary forces of the Bangsamoro, like the MILF and the progressive section of the MNLF can consolidate their armies and choose the time for launching their own offensives, while the military, police and paramilitary forces of the Manila government are preoccupied with their campaigns of suppression against the revolutionary people and forces in most parts of the archipelago. In the future rounds of revolutionary armed struggle by the Moro people, the reactionary armed forces will fare worse than their continuing failure to destroy a small bandit gang called Abu Sayyaf in the tiny island of Basilan.
6. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has the illusion that, by running a “banana republic” for the US and a “strong republic” against the Filipino people, she can ensure her election in 2004. But her policy of repression can never solve but can only aggravate the ever worsening socioeconomic and political crisis and the ever rising criminality of her own military and police officers who run all sorts of criminal syndicates. Instead of being able to remain president beyond 2004, she is whipping up the demand and paving the way for a “strong man”. Generals Angelo Reyes and Panfilo Lacson are reported to be already angling for the role.
7. All types of alliances are being strengthened to isolate and remove the Macapagal-Arroyo ruling clique from power before 2004 or prevent it from winning the 2004 elections. They include the basic alliance of the toiling masses (workers and peasants), the alliance of progressive forces (toiling masses plus urban petty bourgeoisie), the alliance of patriotic forces (progressive forces plus middle bourgeoisie) and the broad united front (all the foregoing alliances plus the unstable and unreliable allies from the anti-Macapagal sections of the reactionary classes).
The intolerable and unrelieved suffering of the broad masses of the people under the US-directed Macapagal-Arroyo regime is generating social discontent and the rise of the revolutionary forces. All-out resistance of the Filipino people will defeat the all-out war of the enemy. The revolutionary movement will continue to gain strength by fighting the current regime and will be ready to face the next regime and deal with it according to circumstances.
By Jose Maria Sison, NDFP Chief Political Consultant
August 8th 2002
The 7-point press statement that I issued on August 6, 2002, with the title, The People’s All-out Resistance Will Defeat All-out War of the Enemy, is an analytical commentary as NDFP chief political consultant in order to show a dialectical chain of events that can ensue from the all-out war policy of the Macapagal-Arroyo regime.
To the careful reader, my press statement is clearly an analysis and is neither an order nor a call to action addressed to the New People’s Army or to other forces mentioned in all the seven points. Take note that I also cited the fact that the military and police of Ms. Macapagal are being emboldened to escalate human rights violations.
The NPA is bound by the decisions of a series of collective organs of leadership based in the Philippines. These include the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Philippines, its Military Commission and the levels of NPA command.
It is therefore inaccurate and erroneous for anyone to say that I have publicly issued an order or a call for the NPA to carry out certain tactical offensives, like hitting electrical transmission towers and lines. Those are well within the range of guerrilla tactics, whether I cite them or not.
It should be observed that long before the NPA can intensify the people’s war against the all-out war of Ms. Macapagal, her imperialist masters, the local exploiting classes, the military and police have already ruined the country and have inflicted incalculable suffering on the people.
In essence, what I have done in my previous statement is to call the attention of Ms Macapagal that she does not have a monopoly of actions in the ongoing civil war and that the CPP, NPA and NDFP and other forces can undertake actions to counter those of her military, police and paramilitary forces.
To make Ms Macapagal aware of the tactical offensives that the NPA is capable of carrying out nationwide, from a base of 128 guerrilla fronts, is to advise her to curb her appetite for all-out war against the revolutionary forces and the people.
The generals, like defense secretary Angelo Reyes, who are now prompting her to rave mad about all-out war, were the same ones who coached Estrada to grandstand about all-out war and to lay aside the GRP-NDFP peace negotiations. She should remember that they pushed him towards his perdition. Once more General Angelo Reyes is the albatross around the neck of Ms Macapagal,just like Mr. Estrada.
See also
Philippine perspectives Q&A Jose Maria Sison
Netavisen 10. august 2002
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