23 killed, 27 wounded in fighting in S. Philippines

Tuesday 12th August, 12:23 AM JST

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Latest 15 of 26 Total Comments Show All

Betzee at 01:10 PM JST - 12th August

Many Filipino Muslims do not bother with the 5 daily prayer calls, some drink alcohol, and they like to go out to the cinemas, bars and clubs for fun.

Someone I interviewed told me Jolo City, seat of the Sulu Sultanate, was the beer capital of the Philippines.
burikko at 01:30 PM JST - 12th August

WilliB:

What I would like to know is not historical or religious discussion but self-determination and free voting. We saw East Timor had gotten independence.
skipthesong at 01:40 PM JST - 12th August

betzee, I respect your views, but you are painting a picture here as though Islam had existed there since the dawn of time. But, in contrast, you basically opened a flow of criticism. For one, your point only proves that Islam is on and has always been on a conquering venture. How does a religion that originates so far away gets accepted in such a paradise place as the Philippines. So how, I can not see them opening up their hands wide to accept Islam. I would believe more of a forced conversion. Wanderlust does a good job in pointing out that Islamic banks are assisting as are other countries in getting the arms to these groups. Face it, no matter where these groups are, they are there doing their best to dismantle the fabric of modern society. I almost can compare this to the Queen of Mali, who gave all her subjects as slaves and all gold mined to the Sultans in order to become a Muslim herself. Many people lately seem to like the idea that Islam is growing and putting out the "Christian" menace but I on the other hand never believed anyone was so Christian enough to actually set forth a "Christian" country ruled by Christian beliefs with exception to basic and common sense laws. While Betzee seems to want to paint some US involvement picture as the root of the problem, I am sure there are quite a few happy that there was such a presence of outside influences that the Muslims of the south seem to have enjoyed.
SuperLib at 04:03 PM JST - 12th August

There are quite a few Muslim terrorist groups operating in the Philippines:

MILF (1969): Started after Muslim solders under Philippine command refused an order to attack an area controlled mostly by Indonesia and were shot. They're actually working with the government on a peace agreement and are trying to distance themselves from the other terrorist groups.

Abu Sayyaf (1990s): They were part of the MILF but broke away when the MILF started negotiations with the government. Their goal is to create an Islamic state in the southern Philippines, then expand that to Southern Asia. They have early ties to Al Queda but now the ties are weak at best.

Jemaah Islamiyah (1940s, Indonesia): Similar to the above in that they are trying to create an Islamic state throughout Southern Asia. These guys help plan the Bali bombings.

They have a few other smaller groups but they don't really have much power or influence. Of the two most active groups, JI has a front in the Philippines but is actually from Indonesia. Abu Sayyaf is based in the Philippines and wants to make the Philippines an Islamic state and then expand from there. It's a similar battle that's being fought on many fronts in the world.
SuperLib at 04:06 PM JST - 12th August

Betzee: In fact it was under US colonial rule that property rights was introduced in Mindanao as a means to "extract the natural wealth." Land plantations were offered to settlers, along with Dole, who then made use of the roads the US put in to get the goods, be it pinneaples or minerals, to market.

Wow. Apparently all of these groups can be traced back to an American company building roads to get pineapples. The need for canned fruit created groups of people who want to use violence as a way to spread hardline Islamic doctrine throughout the Philippines and into the rest of Asia.
skipthesong at 04:49 PM JST - 12th August

Abu Sayyaf is based in the Philippines and wants to make the Philippines an Islamic state and then expand from there. It's a similar battle that's being fought on many fronts in the world." Thats my whole point! Why is it when someone notices that or feels it, people here start blasting you as a racist? Hey, if people feel its not because of any racist attitudes, its more to do with those actions.
wanderlust at 06:16 PM JST - 12th August

The need for canned fruit created groups of people who want to use violence as a way to spread hardline Islamic doctrine throughout the Philippines and into the rest of Asia.

Interestingly, the plantations and land that families like Dole and Del Monte control in the Philippines, (and also in Saipan) was used by the CIA and US Military to train their own anti-communist insurgents, who were then sent to other parts of Asia to fight "communism". Religion has only recently entered into the fighting.

Islam arrived in Mindanao via the Sulu Archipelago, Malaysia, Indonesia and Muslim India and developed in the Moros 200 years before the Spanish brought in Catholicism. The US inherited the long war between these two cultures when it took over the Philippines at the start of the 20th century, however the issue was sovereignity, not religion. Religion only started to become a factor following the Independence of the Philippines in 1946, and initially the conflict in the islands was between communists and the government. However, government policies and fighting alienated much of the population in the South, and religion started to become an issue. Edward Lansdale, was the US liaison officer who orchestrated many of their early counter-insurgency techniques, and he later went on to become an adviser in Vietnam, where the same mistakes were made.

The rise of both communism and islamic independence in the Philippines led to Marcos declaring martial law in 1972, though the cronyism and corruption that came with it further alienated and strengthened these groups. Many Filipinos liken their times under successive Spanish and US rule to 250 years in a convent, 50 years in a brothel.
Betzee at 08:52 PM JST - 12th August

This incident galvanized Muslim comsciousness in the Philippines:

Disputes with fellow ASEAN member Malaysia over Sabah in northeast Borneo, however, continued, and it was discovered, after an army mutiny and murder of Muslim troops in 1968 (the "Corregidor Incident"), that the Philippine army was training a special unit to infiltrate Sabah.

Wanderlust, The origins of the Philippines claim on Sabah is interesting; it was part of the Sultan of Sulu and never ruled from Manila. Yet Manila thought sovereignty should be restored to the Philippines (dropped from their constitution only in 1987).

Superlib you left this one off your laundry list: The Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) was in fact the first organization representing Muslim interests in Mindanao. It had a more resdistributive social justice agenda than an Islamic one. Land reform, etc., essentially the same agenda pushed during the Marcos era elsewhere in the Philippines by communist outlaw groups. One only need do a little research to appreciate just what a brutal system of cash crop agriculture was introduced to the Philippines by Spanish colonial rule: http://www.fieldmuseum.org/VanishingTreasures/Deforestation2.htm I suppose, on balance, it was better than the other method, slavery which was used on sugar plantations in the new world.

Mindanao was largely sparred that because the Spanish could not provide enough security to foster plantation-style development. Under American colonial rule, Mindanao was integrated into the Philippines. As a frontier, migration from the crowded Visayas, in particular, where the sugar plantations were located was encouraged. Prior to that, the Muslims and the Christians in the Philippines had enjoyed very limited contact.
Betzee at 09:02 PM JST - 12th August

For one, your point only proves that Islam is on and has always been on a conquering venture. How does a religion that originates so far away gets accepted in such a paradise place as the Philippines

Skip, Couldn't you say the same thing about Catholicism?

Islam was introduced to the Philippines by Muslim traders from neighboring Malaysia and Indonesia. It probably would have spread up the archipelago had the Spanish not appeared on the scene and introduced Catholicism.

The plight of the Philippine Muslims did attract the attention of the Islamic world in the 1970s, in particular Moammar Khaddafy, who brokered the first agreement between the MNLF and the Marcos government.
Betzee at 09:40 PM JST - 12th August

This is one of the best pieces I've read on Abu Sayyaf (Bearer of the Sword) and the ways to undercut it:

This Is the War on Terror. Wish You Were Here! Welcome to the tropical Philippine island of Jolo, where life is like a Corona ad—coconut trees, white-sand beaches, bathtub-warm seas. Except those guys in the water are U.S. Green Berets, and those kids on dirt bikes are jihadists known for kidnapping Western tourists. Even stranger? On this front, at least, America seems to be winning.

http://outside.away.com/outside/destinations/200702/jolo-philippines-1.html
Betzee at 11:06 PM JST - 12th August

The Pentagon takes the opposing point of view. Before they dispatched assistance to Jolo (described in the article linked above) they wanted a detailed history of the region. One of the things which residents of Jolo remember is the Battle of Bud Bagsak in which the US took the island, which had been the capital of one of the most powerful sultanates in Southeast Asia. Few Americans are familiar with it, I certainly never heard of it. Yet an awareness of our shared history helped those in country win over the confidence of the locals.

Yeah, you can go the brute force way like the Japanese. But look where it got 'em, they still can't set foot in Nanjing....
WilliB at 02:56 AM JST - 13th August

Betzee:

" Even stranger? On this front, at least, America seems to be winning. "

Winning what? Winning military skirmishes? Sure, the Americans and other kuffars can do that. But "win" in the sense of stopping the islamic separatism in the Philippines or anywhere else? No way, as long as we refuse to address the ideology of islam and pretend it is just another "religion" that can coexist with others. In fact, there is no provision for such a thing anywhere in islamic teaching. Islam demands that muslims live according to Shariah and fight the kuffars until they either convert to islam or submit to dhimmi status under Sharia.

The situation in Mindanao is thus not different in any way from the situation in Uigur, South Thailand, Kashmir, Northern Nigeria, Chechnia, the Middle East, or anywhere else where islam meets non-islam.

Why do people refuse to see the bigger picture?
Betzee at 04:00 AM JST - 13th August

WilliB,

From me the crucial chapter in the history of Mindanao where all the problems started was the first half of the twentieth century:

[T]his was a frontier zone, legal property rights to the income its natural resources had the potential to generate had not been established. This was remedied by enticing inhabitants of the populous northern islands to settle in Mindanao. They were offered timber and mining concessions as well as land grants for plantations, where cash crop agriculture would capture economies in production scale, and cattle ranches. Vast tracts of land occupied by the Moro and Lumads, tribal peoples who practiced animism, were deeded over to settlers and transnational firms such as the Del Monte Corporation, which set up a pineapple plantation in the 1920s. Between 1903 and 1939 the population of Mindanao, estimated at half a million at the end of the 19th century, had expanded by 1.4 million. Lured by material incentives, these Christian settlers came to disproportionately control the market economy whose growth was in turn facilitated by the infrastructure built under American colonial rule.

The Commonwealth of the Philippines was established in 1935. This presented the Moros with the prospect of domination by the majority Christian population. To avoid such a fate, they lobbied to have Sulu and Mindanao receive independence or remain under U.S. colonial administration. "Our public land must not be given to people other than the Moros," they implored. "[I]f we are deprived of our land, how can we then earn our own living? A statute should be enacted to forbid others from taking over our land, a safe and reliable way to forestall a tragedy." Their request was rejected....

This is exactly what's happening in Tibet today which has provoked a violent backlash. It's a sadly familiar story in much of the world. What's different about the southern Philippines is how little ethnic cleansing has in fact occurred. The Lumads, for example, never converted to Islam. Nor has their been any pressure on the Christian settlers to convert either. I really don't see the scenario you outlined in play here.
SuperLib at 10:44 PM JST - 13th August

Betzee, you're giving mostly technically accurate information, but what you're doing is assigning the incorrect weight to your arguments. The original poster asked, "What do the Muslims of the Philippines want that would cause this action?"

US imperialism in the Philippines can be linked to terrorism today if one wants to see the link, but the link doesn't come naturally. I asked a Filipino friend today about this issue and she said that your arguments mostly lacked substance; there are much more compelling reasons for the existence of terrorism in the Philippines today. She said that that was actually the first time she had heard about the link and had to pause before answering because she had to actually check in her mind to see if a link could be made.

If skip had asked for a complete list of all possible causes for terrorism in the Philippines today, no matter how small, then American imperialism would probably make the list. But giving it as your first answer (ie root cause) would be a misrepresentation.
Betzee at 10:24 AM JST - 15th August

Betzee, you're giving mostly technically accurate information, but what you're doing is assigning the incorrect weight to your arguments. The original poster asked, "What do the Muslims of the Philippines want that would cause this action?"

This is one short snippet from a 50-page document. So judging my conclusions from that is a little like your sample of one, "the Filipino I know..." speaking for all Filipinos writ large. Anyone trained in research methods would recognize the pitfalls of such an approach.

People in the field found it helpful and that's the only opinion I care about.