Mother of All American WarsVIETNAM COMES TO MIND when one is asked about the ferocity of expletives-spitting American soldiers in fighting some brown-skinned guerrillas in a jungle set-up. After all, films like Platoon and Apocalypse Now do bring to our living rooms vivid scenes of such "heroism for democracy and freedom," and a string of sentences using as comma the four-letter "F-word" that has had to be censored out from the soundtrack. Add to this our familiarity with Miss Saigon, with a prominent Filipina playing the title role. Of course, American soldiers have also been seen in big-screen and television movies fighting German and Japanese villains, and, quite recently, shown in satellite-fed newscasts flying the UN flag and fighting Saddam Hussein.
The Philippine-American war is virtually-forgotten chapter of the Lifestory of our people.
Then, the American policymakers said the Filipinos were asking the United States for protection and guidance, probably using to the hilt that fly-in-the-ointment passage which turned General Aguinaldo's declaration of independence into a proclamation of a protectorate. (Aguinaldo declared "independence" in June 1898 but qualified this to be "under the protection ofthe Mighty and Humane North American Nation.") They added, too, that there was practically no resistance here, save for some small bands of bandits in the boondocks. All these, of course, were filthy lies. And the lies were coupled with silence about brutal atrocities being committed by the American troops against large sections of the population, leading up to a Filipino casualty figure of no less than 600,000. In January of 1899, the Filipinos established the very first republic in the Asian continent, and their forces had effective control over practically the entire archipelago, save for the wa]led capital city of Manila (Intramuros) then already in the hands of the Americans. Their control of Manila was not a mere contingency started with concern for the safety of their defeated fellow Caucasians, the Spaniards. The United States had her own designs on the Philippines as its first trophy to herald its late-day entry into the exclusive club of colonial powers.
The strength of the Philippine revolutionary armed forces was enough to defeat the Spaniards, but not enough for the sheer might of the reinforced American invasion and occupation forces. Apolinario Mabini deplored the Philippine side's lack of preparedness for the fierce battles that were to ensue. The Philippine-American War was, therefore, a war of aggression, on the one hand, and the continuation of a war of national liberation, on the other. Toward that war's end, no less than 600,000 Filipino lives had been snuffed. It was the forcible end, the crushing, ofthe Philippine Republic which was established after the Philippine Revolution of 1896 ended 333 years of Spanish rule.
This was a sad, even ironic, commentary coming as it does from an adviser as intimate as Mabini was to Aguinaldo, considering that the latter is widely regarded, perhaps overestimated, by present generations as an excellent military leader. On February 4, 1899, American reinforcements reached Manila, and non-American foreigners residing in Manila noticed the increased weaponry then in the hands of the forces of General Otis. Englishman Richard Brinsey Sheridan left us with the following narration: "The English residents at Sta Ana had the most trying time on the night of the 4th, and had it not been for the kindness and generosity of the Filipinos, many British subjects vould, no doubt, have been killed by the bullets of the Americans. "It was well known that General Otis had maps of Sta Ana, in which all the European houses were marked and their positions located, and it was therefore scandalous that shells should have been unnecessarily thrown into the houses of British residents." The Filipino troops were also there but without their high-ranking officers, as already pointed out in the above quote from Mabini. The officers were gathered around Aguinaldo in Malolos for a meeting and, hear this, a dance! The American troops suddenly shelled the Filipinos' positions in the town of Sta Ana and shot some Filipinos on the San Juan Bridge and nearby areas. Immediately, General Hughes, the American Provost Marshall for Manila, told his chief Gen. Otis: "The thing is on!" Otis replied with the indicative "Follow the prepared plan." The American assaults spread wider to cover the towns of Sta Mesa and Paranaque. Otis later recalled that his actions were aimed at swaying some of the wavering members of the US Senate into ratifying the Treaty of Paris. He got what he worked, or attacked the Filipinos for. Just two days later, the Senate did ratify that treacherous document by a vote of 61 for and 29 against. This, in turn, facilitated the sending of more and more troops and arms across the Pacific. That ocean, the world's biggest, had become an "American lake."
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How many Filipinos today know of the brutal war waged by the
American military for more than a decade at the last turn of the
century? How many, indeed, especially among our youth, our children
who idolize the "GI Joes" on television, know that a little less
than a hundred years ago, these American soldiers were finishing
off unarmed civilians and burning entire villages right here in the
Philippines?
When the Treaty of Paris was submitted to the US Senate for
ratification, that body was not at all eager to give the document
the needed majority approval. Something had to be done to sway
public opinion decisively in favor of annexation ofthe Philippines
in order to make good McKinley's crossed-fingers prediction: "While
the treaty has not yet been ratified, it is believed that it will
be by the time of the arrival at Manila of the commissioners."
Before the civilian commissioners, therefore, that would take care
of governance, they had to send over in droves the reinforcements
for their thinly-spread invasion forces.
In his work, The Philippine Revolution, Apolinario Mabini deplored
the lack of preparedness of the Filipino forces for the fierce
battles that were to ensue. He said: "The general staff of the
Philippine Army had neither studied nor devised the plan of the
movements of advance and retreat of the troops in case of a rupture
of hostilities; and Aguinaldo, hardly realizing the advantages of
the unity in command in the movements, had not prepared the
necessary means for the quick restoration of the communications
among the separate parts of the army, whenever a sudden retreat
gives place to the interruption of the telegraphic line. Aguinaldo
wanted to retain the personal command of the forces around Manila,
directing them from his residence in Malolos, although he could not
devote himself entirely to the performance of the obliga
tions of his office, owing to his attentions as the head of
government and to the whim of despatching (sic) himself many
businesses incumbent on the departments of the central
administration. Only after the rupture of hostilities, when the
telegraphic communication was already interrupted, he appointed
General (Antonio) Luna Commander-in-Chief of the forces around
Manila; but then the different parts of the army had already
withdrawn from their former positions and the communications among
them were difflcult and slow."
