By CPP Information Bureau
The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) today lambasted as "shameless out-and-out puppetry" Gloria Arroyo's traitorous rationalization of the presence of US troops, who she said are helping the Armed Forces of the Philippines "in so many ways… without participating in direct combat."
"It is outright national treachery for Gloria Arroyo to defend the permanent stationing of American soldiers in Philippine territory, which is tantamount to defending the intervention of a hegemonic power in the country's military and other internal affairs," said the CPP. "It violates even the reactionary government's own constitution."
"Arroyo deceives the people when she glosses over the fact that American troops are engaged in combat operations in the Philippines," added the Party.
Citing statements by US Defense Secretary Robert Gates, the CPP said that the US has "decided to keep an elite 600-troop counterinsurgency operation deployed in the Philippines." Gates was referring to the Joint Special Operations Task Force-Philippines (JSOTF-P) "embedded" among local operating units engaged in "counter-insurgency" operations. He justified the participation of US troops as "instrumental in successes by the Filipino armed forces in killing and capturing leaders of the militant (sic) group Abu Sayaff and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front…."
"Clearly, this comprises US military intervention in violation of Philippine sovereignty," the CPP pointed out.
The CPP said that the claim that these operations are directed only against criminal bandits is a smokescreen to conceal their direct and indirect participation in combat operations against the New People's Army and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front."
According to the CPP, US troops have in various ways and degrees participated in combat operations in Central Luzon, Southern Tagalog, Bicol, Eastern Visayas, Panay, Southern Mindanao and elsewhere.
"The strategic aim is to suppress the anti-imperialist movement of the Filipino masses, especially the revolutionary armed resistance against US neocolonial rule in the country," added the CPP.
"Even the cosmetic 'humanitarian' operations of US interventionist troops, aimed to mask the brutality of US military interventionism, are being conducted within the framework of strategic 'counterrevolutionary' warfare."
