Red October yarn and when it is time to re-read History

It is not the fault of the new generation of Filipinos why they have this romanticized view of the period from 1970-1986. I realized while reading Agoncillo's HIstory of the Filipino People, which is the required reading for college students here, that this entire period was never discussed at length by Agoncillo. It was as we lost ten years and relegated these years to the dustbin of memory. I don't fault Agoncillo-- his book came out during those tumultuous times and he died a year before EDSA revolution. How can he write about the entire martial law period when it was still barely alive when he died?

Another required reading--Renato Constantino's history book--is also an inadequate account of the period. Filipinos need a new history book that would show what really happened after 1966--- the last year in Agoncillo's book.

This, however, is not my topic for tonight. My topic for tonight is about historical dementia--our tendency to forget events of the past and remember only those who would fit our frame of understanding.

I write this because we are living in a time when several leaders of ours want to risk our very futures to experiment on some idea which they know, and several others too, would surely further worsen our condition.

Several friends are in a quandary why the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) is propagating this yarn called Red October. Is it to save the hide of their Commander in Chief who first spewed this poison into the public sphere?

No one--except Duterte fanatics-- believe this Red October yarn simply because the Communist Party of the Philippines, even they know that the situation is definitely not ripe for a true socialist revolution. This will eventually come about yes, but the Philippine situation requires not a Socialist upheaval but a National democratic revolution and establish first a government that will truly give the people a better standard of living.

In a budget hearing, the AFP already corrected Duterte's assertions that an ouster plot is in the offing being budgeted and supported not just by the CPP but by the Liberal Party and the Magdalos of Trillanes. The AFP just did a 180 and exonerated or "cleared" the Magdalos and the Liberals and kept a consistent line of blaming the Communists for plotting Duterte's downfall.

Sincerely, every single Filipino knows that there is simply no need to act against Duterte or cause his downfall. His continued mismanagement of the economy, his adamance to really fire and prosecute erring members of his official family and his propensity for quick fixes are sure-fire ways of really causing this administration serious harm.

What baffles some is the AFP's willingness to still issue statements about this so-called plot. Is it just a face saving way for them and for Duterte? Or something really big is about to happen by October 17 or media says, October 31st?

The Presidential spokesperson already denied that the government is planning to prop a revolutionary government or extend martial rule. So, if there is no plan whatsover to do this, why create such a baloney of a story which is causing several jitters from foreign and local investors? Many are feeling that they are somewhat living in "suspended animation." More and more people are putting their future plans off simply on the basis of this yarn.

Which is worse--being arrested or dying due to the worsening economy? High prices of basic commodities are causing not just discomfiture for most but utter suffering. If these things continue, the CPP does not need to recruit additional manpower--it would be the people themselves who would fill the streets with their anger.

You can feel it in the air--people are silently suffering from economic deprivation and if this economic crisis lingers--this surely could lead to a somewhat "Manila Spring" similar to that which happened in Arab countries several years ago. Our condition is worse compared with that of the seventies because people are really suffering and they are exhibiting this deprivation thru other means.

What is more disconcerting is seeing the AFP succumb to the very same wrongs and faulty analyses and assumptions as those taken by Marcos prior to the declaration of martial law. Martial law or any form of dictatorship or autocratic tendencies destroyed the military institution before and it took the AFP and the DND three decades to recover.

While several hawks are desirous to test their new guns and ammo and now being egged on by this president, these people within the establishment must consider those historical lessons which the institution so painfully realized after 1980.

Mr. Duterte just told the AFP that it is time to neutralize the enemy as if war is the only option to erase every Communist out there. Time and time again, and many studies and researches later show that war is never really the final nail that sealed an insurgency's death. The employment of state violence upon its citizens is never really an effective counter-insurgency strategy. The fact is--the more the state uses violence to stop or kill dissent, the more the movement of dissent grows.

The AFP of today and the AFP of the 70's may actually be substantially different but the terrain and the strategies employed by revolutionaries remain potently the same. Even if they level the mountains, cut off all the trees and level every city in this archipelago, the embers of dissent and the longing for change will remain as sure as the sun rises in the East and sets in the West.  For you are not defeating the idea--you are adding the fodder that justifies the very act of your enemy.

And every one knows that war destroys armies and militaries. War leads to an exhaustion of state resources and fuels destabilization. Worse, war changes men. When the evil effects of war enters the souls and minds of every soldier, these cause  more abuses; and the more repressive a state becomes. The very same repression employed by the state to defend itself against its enemies is the very same one which will utterly destroy it later.

It already happened in the history of the AFP. Those in the leadership posts of the AFP and the PNP know this because they were the PO1's and the lieutenants who staked their lives hunting down Marcos' enemies and running after the rebels during those tumultuous seventies. While the AFP may actually be more equipped now and empowered by technologies, the effects of using wars as tools for solving the problems of the state remain practically the same. Why risk when there is simply no need to?