CHICAGO (JGL) – The Philippines along with Cuba and a group of Pacific Islands, including Puerto Rico and Guam, was bought by the United States at a discount for $20-M ($549-M in today’s currency) so that a bloody Spanish-American War would be averted in pursuit of America’s “Manifest Destiny” to spread freedom and democracy around the world.
Instead of the initial offer of $130-M ($3.5-B in today’s currency) that U.S. President Franklin Pierce agreed to buy Cuba alone from Spain, the offer was taken off the table as unnecessary after the Ostend Manifesto in 1854 suggested that the U.S. could obtain Cuba for free by use of force if the crumbling Spanish Empire “refused to sell” it.
As soon as U.S. obtained Cuba from Spain, U.S. granted Cuba outright independence. But in the case of the Philippines, which was part of the Cuban package out of the Treaty of Paris of 1898, Uncle Sam hesitated in granting outright similar independence for the Philippines.
As a result, Filipino rebels (Katipuneros), who had been waging war for decades against Spain, felt betrayed when American Admiral George Dewey did not support rebels’ suggestion that the Philippines be granted outright independence, too.
This is one of the original “sins” of Uncle Sam against the Filipino race that I think Philippine President Rody Duterte would like to be redeemed by the U.S. government and U.S. Congress as Mr. Duterte distances himself from the friendly, if not conspiratorial, foreign policy of his predecessors throughout the 20th century as he pursues a shift to an adversarial, if not businesslike, independent foreign policy.
By secretly agreeing with Spaniards to force their surrender “without use of arms” at the outbreak of Spanish-American War in the Philippines, Dewey stabbed Emilio Aguinaldo and Aguinaldo’s Katipunero rebels in their backs when Dewey agreed that the Spaniards surrender to American, not Katipunero, forces. Prior to the surrender and the Mock Battle in Manila Bay, the depleted and hobbled Spanish forces were holed up inside Intramuros (walled city), a Spanish fortress, waiting to give up.
If the Philippine-American War were a basketball game, the American players came to play in the dying seconds of the fourth quarter although the Filipino players had already routed the Spaniard players and the result of the game was no longer in doubt.
Filipino historian Teodoro Agoncillo called Dewey’s decision as “American Apostasy,” saying Americans “came to the Philippines not as a friend but as an enemy masking as a friend.”
DEATH OF 20K FILIPINOS
As a result, Katipuneros waged battle with Americans in what is now called Philippine-American War (1899-1902), which resulted in the death of 4,234 out of 126,248 American soldiers and 20,000 Filipino soldiers and 200,000 civilians, who died of disease and starvation. The Americans spent $16,000 during that war, which is now $430,320 in today’s currency.
In one of those skirmishes during the Philippine American War, Filipino freedom fighters dressed as women attacked an American garrison in Balangiga, Eastern Samar on Sept. 28, 1901, 115 years ago last Wednesday, killing 43 members of the US Army 9th Infantry and death of 27 Filipino guerillas. While the battle was U.S. Army’s worst defeat since the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876, Filipinos regard the attack as one of their bravest acts in the war.
In retaliation for the Massacre, U.S. Army General Jacob H. Smith instructed Major Littleton Waller, commanding officer of a battalion of 315 US Marines assigned to bolster his forces in Samar, regarding the conduct of pacification:
“I want no prisoners. I wish you to kill and burn; the more you kill and burn, the better it will please me… The interior of Samar must be made a howling wilderness.”
Littleton Waller, in a report, stated that over an eleven-day period his men burned 255 dwellings, shot 13 carabaos and killed 39 people. Some Filipino historians believe some 50,000 were killed.
The remaining U.S. Army soldiers, however, took with them three church bells, which U.S. Army soldiers believed were instruments used as signals for the attack.
Gen. Jacob H. Smith, who ordered the killing of every male over ten years old during the retaliatory campaign, was subjected to court-martial for “conduct to the prejudice of good order and military discipline”. Reprimanded but not formally punished, Smith was forced into retirement from the service because of his conduct.
While President Duterte may seek reparation for the Filipino deaths of “children under ten” after the Massacre, Mr. Duterte would certainly support the return of the bells not because they are government property but because they are church properties. Only the U.S. Congress can order the repatriations of the bells to Balangiga because the late Sen. Craig Thomas (R-Wyo) hosting two of these three bells in his state had barred its return by introducing language in the Defense Authorization Bill, S. 1055, that would prohibit “the return of veterans’ memorial objects to foreign nations without specific authorization law.” Although, no object or the country’s name was mentioned in the bill, this refers to the Bells of Balangiga.
Perhaps, in one other massacre that happened after the Philippine American War, Mr. Duterte may also press for restitution from the U.S. for about a thousand Moro or Muslims, who were mowed down atop an extinct volcano called Bud Dajo in Jolo, Sulu in far-off Mindanao in March 1906.
“WOMEN AND CHILDREN KILLED IN MORO BATTLE”
In a privilege speech at the Philippine Senate floor during its centennial on March 7, 2006, Sen. Aquilino “Nene” Pimentel, Jr., the father of incumbent Senate President Koko Pimentel, jolted his fellow senators of a little known stand taken by about 1,000 Tausogs (Muslims), who, rather than surrender to the mighty American Army, decided to fight to the last man in an elevated encampment called Bud Dajo in Jolo.
Out of the estimated 800 to 1,000 Moros at Bud Dajo, only six survived. Corpses were piled five feet deep (1.5 meters), and many of the bodies were wounded multiple times.
U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt was quick to congratulate General Leonard Wood, who was the governor of the Moro Province at that time, for the “American victory.”
But thanks to the presence of the international media in Manila, and Mr. Duterte should also give credit to the media, they cabled the event to the outside world with a banner headline in the New York Times issue of March 11, 1906, screaming, “WOMEN AND CHILDREN KILLED IN MORO BATTLE; Mingled with Warriors and Fell in Hail of Shot. FOUR DAYS OF FIGHTING Nine Hundred Persons Killed or Wounded—President Wires Congratulations to the Troops.”
Under pressure from Congress, Secretary of War William Howard Taft cabled Wood for explanation of the “wanton slaughter” of women and children. Despite not being in command of the assault (although he was the senior officer present), Wood accepted full responsibility. By the time the scandal died down, Wood had assumed his post as Commander of the Philippine Division, and General Tasker H. Bliss had replaced him as governor of the Moro Province.
I’m sure another irritant in the relationship between the Philippines and the U.S. is the treatment of the Filipino World War II veterans by the U.S. Congress. Prior to the outbreak of WW II, there was a law providing standard pay for U.S. servicemen called into duty. It did not matter if the servicemen were U.S. citizens or not as did nationalities from 66 nations, including Filipinos, joined the U.S. Army Forces of the Far East during WW II.
When war was about to end, the U.S. Congress passed the Rescission Acts of 1946, in violation of ex post facto law, reducing the war pay of Filipino soldiers by half and depriving them from enjoying the G.I. Bill, granting scholarship benefits to the surviving war veterans.
Another irritant that must be investigated was the sugar subsidy of the Philippines that financed WW II. The Philippines, which was then a U.S. Commonwealth, was receiving a subsidy from the U.S. in exchange of raw sugar cane exported to the U.S. Some members of U.S. Congress in connivance with Philippine Sugar Regulatory Commissioner Elizalde agreed to use the sugar subsidy as expenses during the war effort. But to this day, there was no record showing that the Philippine government was ever reimbursed for the expenses from the sugar subsidy during the war. Mr. Duterte should urge an investigation into this mess.
Also, the Philippine government should be allowed to sue the U.S. Navy Captain of USS Guardian, who ignored warnings of Tubbataha marine park rangers, who radioed the USS Guardian to avoid Tubbataha Reef, when the Captain insisted the rangers “raise their complaint with the U.S. Embassy.” When BP spilled oil in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 in what is considered the worst environmental disaster in American history, President Obama ordered the filing of charges against BP. In July 2015, BP agreed to pay $18.7 billion in fines, the largest corporate settlement in U.S. history.
Why not let the Philippine government sue the U.S. Navy captain, who intentionally, knowingly and recklessly damaged the Tubbataha Reef, so he will be punished punitively to give him lesson not to repeat the same mistake?
In the case of the Sabah issue, Mr. Duterte can ask the United Kingdom, which is still part of the European Union as of press time, to show proof that it has basis to grant ownership rights of North Borneo to Malaysia, which to this date is still paying rent to the heirs of the Philippine Sultan of Sulu.
Suing another country is nothing new. Only last week, the U.S. Congress allowed victims of 9/11 attack to sue Saudi Arabia. In 1951, Germany paid more than 102 billion marks, about US$90-B in current amount, in federal government reparation payments to Israel and Third Reich victims. And Germany paid out billions more in private and other public funds, including 75 million marks (US$71-M) by German firms in compensation to wartime forced laborers.
I’m sure other issues would be raised that would lessen the irritants between the Philippines and other countries. But the Philippine Congress should protect the whistle blowers by strengthening the Whistle Blower Act to give incentives to these whistle blowers, who can come up with evidence that can put closure to these irritants. (Contact: columnist,jglariosa@hotmail.com)