39 Years of Revolutionary Struggle

Tomorrow, December 26, the Communist Party of the Philippines will be celebrating its 39th anniversary. CPP Chairman Armando Liwanag said that the revolutionary movement, the longest insurgency in the world, next to the Shining Path, continues to gain strength. The AFP issued a statement which said that the CPP-NPA-NDF has lost considerable troop strength from a high of 7,000 to a little above the 6,000. This, the AFP says, owes to the current administration's continued armed campaign to decimate the CPP-NPA-NDF by 2010.

Bold words, bad actions.

Obviously, the AFP cannot really kill the CPP-NPA-NDF. First, the AFP continues to have a very low trust rating with the people due to allegations of human rights violations. Second, the AFP is suffering setbacks after setbacks in the battlefield. The Marines, the creme de la creme of the armed establishment suffers from low morale. The corps suffers from battle fatigue and morale due to continued defeats against the Muslim mujaheddins in Sulu, Basilan and some parts of Mindanao. And third, in other theaters of war in the Philippine archipelago, the Army has suffered numerous deaths due to ambuscades and attacks on its camps.

The Reality

The reality is, the CPP-NPA-NDF will continue to exist even beyond Arroyo. For as long as the AFP remains under the weak leadership of an illegitimate leader, there will be major defeats in the field. Soldiers will die by the hundreds and more by the wayside. This is because the CPP-NPA-NDF and other insurgent groups continue to innovate. Note the message by Joma:

Sison said the New People’s Army, the armed wing of the CPP, is "gaining strength and advancing."

"It is increasing its platoon-size and company-size offensives and is looking forward to the building of mobile and more effective regional centers of gravity and to the development of relatively stable base areas on the basis of the guerrilla fronts," Sison said in a statement. (Philippine Daily Inquirer, 25 December 2007)

Note this statement--the CPP-NPA-NDF is building mobile and more effective regional centers of gravity--meaning it is shifting from a regularized, standardized army setup to a more attuned guerilla setup. What it means is that the CPP-NPA-NDF will try to do some insurrectionary activities which punctuate its actions during the Marcos dictatorship. Expect more assassinations, bombings and other urban insurrectionary actions against the Establishment. This is indicative or an indirect admission that the revolutionary struggle should involve more urban attacks than being concentrated in the countrysides.

More about security issues for 2008 for the Philippines in my next blog.