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Home | From the Soldiers | The Struggle for Change | Withdrawal of Support | The Armed Forces | The Nation | Issues and Concerns -------------------------------------------------- From the People | Soldiers of the People | About Us | Links --------------------------------------------------
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Scout Rangers, Marines and Special Action Forces Officers under Investigation and Custody, in Detention, and/or Changed ================= ================= ================= ================= ================= ================= ================= ================= ================= ================= Sen. & Lt. Col. Gregorio Honasan ================= ================= ================= |
We Belong Criselda Yabes, Boy from the Barracks, 1990
In those day, General Fabian Ver, at the helm of the Armed Forces, carved out his own mafia of sycophants, warped the promotion system in favor of those whom he selected by merely pointing his finger, built a web of intrigue to separate his friends and foes and vulgarly enriched himself and his allies, ultimately corrupting the military organization. In those days, the “principle of proximity” and the “principle of visibility” applied: all an officer had to do in order to be in the good graces of Ver was to stay close to him at all times, delight him with flattery and favors. To disobey was perilous. As discontent among officers outside Ver’s clique simmered, the “griping” sessions began. That was how three young officers got together to re-think their military lives, holding informal discourse on reforms that drew the sympathies of their peers and many older officers who felt as they did. Those informal sessions rapidly gave birth to a movement that flowered at EDSA.
Captain Rosendo Ferrer. Lieutenant Noel de los Reyes. Lieutenant Diosdado Valeroso. Their common denominator: they were young and idealistic and they also happened to be intelligence officers. Ferrer of Class ’76 was an intelligence officer of the Special Action Force and formerly a security officer to Ramos. De los Reyes and Valeroso of Class ’82 were Col. Victor Batac’s junior officer in the PC’s production branch. De los Reyes was class president and the first to be company commander of his class. Valeroso was elected class president later in 1988. A middle-level officer, Lieutenant Colonel Alejandro Flores of Class ’72, was also part of RAM’s first meeting, which took place one late afternoon of February 6, 1985.
Demoralized by Ver’s leadership, these officers found a haven for themselves in the office of the production branch of the Philippine Constabulary’s intelligence unit (C2). “It was very informal,” one of the officers recalled. “Nagtawagan kami. ‘O pwede ba tayong mag-usap-usap.” Their discussion centered on “Techniques in Organizing,” according to Valeroso. “Why do we have to organize? Because we do not want others to organize for us.” It was the beginning of conceptualizing the formation of a reform movement. By their fourth meeting and subsequent sessions, Batac and another junior officer, Lieutenant Washington Javier of Class ’80, began to mingle with them. A few senior officers in the Constabulary intelligence community followed; among them were the late and then-Colonel Eugene Ocampo and Alexander Aguirre.
The officers developed a self-examination test that was uncannily similar to the communists’ method of building cells for revolutionary cadres. An officer described it this way: “I criticize myself before you, and then I make a commitment that from now on I will not be a misfit. Then we go out and propagate, each of us recruiting two more officers.” Out of their idealism grew a commitment to institute “internal reforms” within the Armed Forces. They were also careful not to step within the bounds of politics. Foremost in their agenda was to put the military house in order. With access to intelligence reports, they were aware of the military’s losses in the long-running insurgency war. The Communist Party of the Philippines, once a rag-tag army, had grown into a serious threat to the country’s long-term stability. The officers’ primary targets were corrupt military commanders, especially the generals, whom they saw as too incompetent to run the war. “We got our information from various units,” Batac explained. “People go there to get research materials and inquired about certain things. People would confide. What I would do, especially with the unit commander, is to sit with them and talk with them because, more often than not, a lot of unit commanders were simply lazy to write (their reports), so they just talk. From them, I obtained situationers in different areas. Most of the time our talks turn to gripe sessions. I used to be a heavy drinker. By 5 o’clock in the afternoon we talk over bottles of beer and that was how we get a very broad view of things happening. We get the inside story.”
The griping sessions were happening so frequently that their boss, C2 chief Colonel Jesus Altuna, became suspicious. One time he unexpectedly barged into the production office while a session was on hand. Caught by surprise, the officers abruptly burst into singing “Happy Birthday.” The beer bottles were perfect props to disguise their secret meeting.
But while they tried to concentrate on military reforms only, it was impossible to turn a blind eye to a deteriorating political situation.
There were important factors that had led to the idea of organizing a reform movement. One of them was Marcos’s failing health, which fed rumors of a power struggle between the first lady and Ver, on one hand, and Enrile, on the other. Marcos’s kidney transplant operation was kept secret from a nervous public. Then, on August 21, 1983, Marcos’s archrival, Benigno Aquino, was assassinated as he stepped out of a plane on his return from three years of exile in Boston. The assassination threw the Philippines into a whirlwind of political uncertainties. Filipinos saw military conspiracy in Aquino’s death and marched out into the streets in an unprecedented show of outrage. The young officers in C2 saw what was coming. “It was already after the assassination … frustration na lang talaga sa mga younger officers,” Batac said, “and we can’t do anything about the situation. They wee everything happened and nobody is moving. Our superiors were supposed to lead us, but they won’t.”
And like a runaway train that no one could stop, the politicization among young officers sped off on a fast track. At a reunion of PMA graduated in March 1985, RAM made itself known to the officer corps, distributing leaflets, statements and manifestoes originally drafted by Batac, Flores and Valeroso. The reformists brought their message to the heart of the soldiers:
We are still a small group of young PMA graduates and it is precisely Our youth and idealism that drive us now to see reforms in the AFP … For me know fully well that the AFP that is being molded today shall be The AFP we will inherit tomorrow.
We have searched for leaders from along our seniors but then most, If not all, are too high to be non-partisan, too comfortable to be interested, or too wealthy to care. Or perhaps, it is their way of admitting that they no longer have the moral right to lead us to reform.
Reform or Coup?
Batac knew that other things were brewing in the Armed Forces. Across the street from his office in Camp Crame, another group of officers were hatching preparations for a “defensive action” to protect their boss, the minister of national defense, in an ugly power play with Mrs. Marcos and Ver. The officers were led by Colonel Gregorio Honasan. With Enrile’s blessing, the MND boys started building up their armory as early as 1982, a year after Ver was appointed chief of staff, and slowly expanded their base. Honasan was the first to invite Batac to join them. “I think Greg introduced this idea to JPE,” Batac recounted in July 1990, in an interview in his hideout. In between spoonfuls of rice and longanisa served by a maid in the home of a civilian supporter, Batac candidly talked about the early alliances that made RAM possible. “He (Enrile) gave the clearance to start the training and procurement of equipment, and Greg, I think, started recruiting others and I was one of them. At the start we were holding major level positions and in many places” – interrupting himself – “medyo magbubuhat ako ng bangko, we were the core forces of our commanders.” In due time, Batac became the bridge that linked the officers in C2 and the officers in MND. “I told them, ‘Hey guys, there’s a group here that seeks to reform the Armed Forces. What do you think? Should we develop it?’ They said, ‘We’re joining.’ I told Greg it could be a breakthrough in developing the political consciousness of the officers. I had no idea it would balloon.” Soon, Honasan and his colleagues took part in the regular sessions and dominated the discussions, captivating the officers with their charisma and whipping up sentiments that emboldened many officers to speak out.
The office of the production branch was getting too small for the bandwagon of new converts, or those pretending to be one. Even the original young reformist officers took the backseat as the reform movement acquired such a momentum there was no time at all to hold the ground. But others were not too naïve not to discern Honasan’s hidden agenda; those who watched uncomfortably from the sidelines knew it was a perfect vehicle for a coup. But they chose to ignore what could be dreadful consequences for them. If they turned their backs on the movement, Ver would be ready to pounce on them. There was no other way but to ride with the current. The recruitment, meanwhile, expanded to military camps in the provinces. The core group agreed a steering committee in Manila would be responsible for disseminating policies in various regions, and it sought guidance from a council of advisers composed of senior officers including Ocampo, Almonte, and Aguirre. The organizing work was no always smooth sailing; there were personal rifts among some senior officers, one of them decided to take it upon himself to tell Ver he was joining a reform movement because he could no longer stomach the ugly charades in the Armed Forces. When it became impossible to hide it from Ver, the group paws forced to come out into the open and formally launch the Reform the Armed Forces Movement at the defense ministry’s social hall on April 2, 1985, with Navy Captain Rex Robles, Enrile’s military assistant, serving as spokesman for the group.
The public had been deaf to the rumblings in the Armed Forces, until the surprising RAM show of defiance in March 1985 revealed that Marcos was not in full control of his army. It gave Marcos’s political opponents a glimmer of hope they could crack the strongman’s power base. During the traditional parade of alumni at the Philippine Military Academy, officers from classes 1971 to 1984 broke the marching line and unfurled a banner saying: “WE BELONG.” It was a direct stab at Marcos who, sitting on stage at that time, was seen whispering to Ramos.
Their message: We belong to the reform movement.
Ver’s intelligence network went to work, spying on fellow officers. A secret report to the palace promptly issued a list of the troublemakers, the names of Honasan, Batac and Kapunan high on the list. Instead of taking steps to mend the rift, Ver’s camp mounted a witchhunt, resorting once again to threats that further intensified the divisions within the military. “The command learned,” the report said, “that We Belong is not just a reform movement seeking reforms, but a propaganda vehicle designed to boost the presidential ambition of the minister of national defense and to speed up the eventual assumption of Lt. Gen. Ramos as AFP chief of staff.” If Marcos dismissed the gravity of the situation, the reform group found a friendly ally in the Americans, who were keeping a close watch on the movement. “The US,” wrote one officer in a report to Ramos, “welcomed the existence of the movement through statements and reactions aired by various U.S. officials (presumably embassy officials). The reforms being espoused by the RAM are in consonance with the US pressure on the President to institute military reforms.”
Marcos, a master in the art of politics, always ferreted out an enemy to see where he was hiding his weapons. He summoned Enrile to the palace for a private briefing. The minister in an officer report later said he raised several issues to the President regarding complaints by the RAM officers, but carefully avoided the subject of a coup. Marcos followed up the palace meeting by inviting a small group of RAM officers to see him. Facing the officers with a pleasant smile, while his son, Ferdinand Jr., stood sternly behind him, a pistol bulging on his waist, the President lectured the officers on Filipino ideology, the rallying campaign of his martial rule. His guests responded quite passively, behaving like good children in school. To clear the air of suspicion, they had a nice but naughty surprise for the President. As Marcos wound up his monologue, the officers pulled out the book Filipino Ideology , which was ghost written for Marcos, and politely requested the President for this autograph. It was a cute anecdote in RAM’s brief passage, but in truth, it was the ideology they were searching for, an ideology without the guidance of its supposed chief ideologue – Marcos.
What is the role of the Armed Forces in our society? That was the question always asked by RAM officers. In mid-April, following the officers’ demonstration at the academy, Ramos held a lengthy meeting with the officers that exposed the growing politicization among officers who were saying it was time for them to become vanguards of changing the society, using none other than the “Filipino ideology” as their tool for change. It was the ideology that Batac espoused, as he opened the meeting attended by RAM officers. At the start of the meeting, Lieutenant Colonel Flores gave a preview of the group’s aim to infuse ideology into the movement. “The movement,” he began his speech, “started with talk about what is happening in the country, how it is related to us, how it is related to the individual PMA graduate. We were asking one another, ‘Ano ba ang role natin ngayon sa AFP, sa society?’ The AFP is being slowly and gradually isolated from society. Even our old (civilian) friends do not want to talk to us anymore. When we hear of somebody getting killed in Mindanao or Isabela or in the Mountain Province, he is only a statistic. It is no longer heroic to die for one’s country. While the enemy gets a seven-day or even one-month (news) coverage for his death, the PMA graduate is not a hero when he dies for his country. We asked ourselves, ‘Ano nga ba ang sitwasyon ng bansa natin at kung ano ring ang sitwasyon ng AFP?’ The CPP (Communist Party of the Philippines) has strengthened its position in relation to other revolutionary socialist forces and other political forces.
“We arrived at the conclusion that the AFP and the government are being isolated. We feel we are no longer as popular as before. The people are shying away from us. Therefore, we have to find solutions to regain the trust and confidence of the people. In our search for solutions, we can reform ourselves within the sphere within which we can effect changes: But it should go beyond that. Based on the President’s Filipino Ideology book , we have found, in fact, the solution to recapture the credibility of the AFP. Based on this reading, we found that there is, in fact, the call to undertake the revolution from the center – meaning the government itself spearheading the revolution. Instead of letting others revolt and destroy this government, why don’t we spearhead it? Phrases from the book should be our battle cry. This We Belong group offers to the national leadership the need to reform the system, so that this will be a very fitting solution to the ills of the past, which have been imposed upon the society. The We Belong group offers the alternative to reform the AFP. We can present better alternatives than what the other political parties are trying to present now.”
The revolution from the center never took off. Instead, the reformist officers toppled the center; otherwise there would have been no place for them to present the change they were offering as an alternative to a crumbling political system. To them, Marcos was the problem, not the solution. One does not tell a dictator to change his habits.
Not a single mention of the word “coup” was heard during that seven-hour meeting with Ramos, but the time was obviously ripe for one. Honasan’s group, for example, delighted in trying to rattle palace intelligence officers. This invitation showed how …. [an invitation to a “Back to Basic” Workshop, a shooting practice, which says that “ammo will be provided … ]
When an alarmed general passed on a copy of the invitation to Ramos, Ramos instantly dispatched a memo to Enrile subtly warning him and his lieutenants that the prospect of military officers sauntering off to a firing practice disguised as a picnic might be taken as a sign of hostility by Malacanang. It was not the way to challenge Ver. With caution, at least 28 officers and 10 enlisted men went ahead with the picnic in suburban Novaliches but scrapped the shooting practice.
At Honasan’s Security Operations Group, the tactical plan for a coup was already being put together. Honasan’s forces teamed up with the Special Action Force (SAF), which Ver’s henchmen privately ridiculed as the “Small Army of Fidel.” SAF was Ramos’s brainchild, the only elite and mobile unit left of the Philippine Constabulary, after Ver disbanded the Constabulary brigades and dispersed them to the provinces as territorial forces, to clip Ramos’s control over the Constabulary. Razon, SAF’s deputy chief, was the link to Honasan, and he directly reported to Ramos developments of the tactical plan. Ramos was deliberately non-committal, despite insinuations that his credibility was being exploited by Marcos as his “deodorant” in the Armed Forces. Ramos, who had been the logical choice to become the next chief of staff after Marcos’s first martial law-appointed chief, had lost the job to Ver. He had expected his appointment to the plum post after he received a congratulatory note from his father, the former Foreign Minister Narciso Ramos. But Marcos eventually placed his bet on Ver, and Ramos, acquiescing to the President’s decision, sent his rival a formal message of congratulations to calm brewing resentment. Ramos’s wife Amelita, who shies away from military affairs, later said it was a very unhappy period in her husband’s life. “If I resign,” he told her, “what will happen to the professionals. They (Ver’s men) might go after them.”
When Ver was forced to take his leave because of his alleged involvement in the 1983 Aquino assassination, Ramos was nominally appointed acting chief of staff. Behind the scenes, however, Ver remained in full control of the military, using his office staff to keep an eye on Ramos and to feed him with information on Ramos’s daily activities, including photocopies of all documents. “We had difficulty convincing Ramos to go against Ver,” said Razon, who was also the general’s all-around assistant. Ramos never made clear what was really on his mind. He never did. Having felt that SAF was being singled out by Very because of its ties to Ramos, Razon and other pro-Ramos officers like him gravitated toward Honasan, forming a partnership with him in a growing cabal to oust Marcos. Together, both units underwent rigid close-quarter battle training in mountain hideouts supervised by two retired British instructors of the Special Air Service Regiment. The weapons started flowing in – Uzis and Gahlils imported from Israel and smuggled into the airport through the Bureau of Customs with help from their contacts. The tactical operation of the planned coup was primarily headed by Honasan. It included daily organizing, with Almonte regularly contributing ideas to shape the plot into its final form. As envisioned by Honasan, his team would sneak into the palace through the Pasig River. An explosion would be a signal for another team to break into one of the front gates of the palace and a separate team backed by tanks would assault the presidential security compound on the other side of the river. “It was automatically understood that Ver had to be killed,” Razon admitted. “No one objected.”
Razon never saw Honasan waver in his determination to strike not give any hints of second thoughts. Honasan’s strength was his confidence. If anyone harbored any fear, they didn’t show it because Honasan didn’t show it. “When Honasan gave me the order, ‘Okay, you handle Bonifacio.’ Just like that. Imagine! Attacking Bonifacio with a few dozen men. I must have felt the same thing Jesus felt in the garden of Gethsemane.” There was just no saying “no” to Honasan. Razon recalled an incident many years ago when, still a young lieutenant, he first saw Honasan skydive at a park. Honasan made him put on a suit and shoved him into the helicopter. In mid-air Honasan gave him the thumbs up sign. Who? Me. Razon froze. I’ve never jumped before, he wanted to shout to Honasan, but his sense of manhood had been challenged. He closed his eyes, prayed silently and jumped. “I felt good when the parachute opened. I made a second jump and by the third time, I had the feel for it.” Similar episodes are common among officers who have dealt with Honasan, and they never forget them. It was Honasan’s hypnotic spell.
RAM postponed its coup plans when Marcos suddenly announced his call for an early election. Benigno Aquino’s politically inexperienced widow challenged Marcos to the presidency, her moral superiority over him her only weapon. Businessmen and private groups gave financial and logistical support to the RAM’s campaign for an honest election called “Kamalayan.” History sped on its tracks. Marcos rigged the votes, the people were enraged, the coup was scuttled, and EDSA burst into flower.
RAM After EDSA
After the success of EDSA, many officers wanted to be RAM, or pretended to be RAM, or made up stories that they were RAM. It became a fad to be a RAM officer in the New Armed Forces. Ramos wanted it stopped. One of his first orders as chief of staff was to disband all fraternities within the military, without specifically naming RAM. But the message was there. The regular sessions of pre-EDSA days naturally dissolved. Captain Ferrer hosted a reunion of the original RAM, but after that, they saw less of each other when they began working for new assignments. What significantly remained of RAM was streering committee, composed of at least 11 elected officers who actively took part in the February revolt. The committee revived the standard agenda, like briefings on the national situation, appraisal of performance of senior commanders in the field and renewing publication of “We Belong” newsletters to be distributed to military camps. The production branch of C2 was no longer the place to meet. “The SC,” according to a summary prepared by the RAM secretariat, “will meet regularly at Café 576, MND-SG every Tuesday at 1500H.” Café 576 was an ordinary soldiers’ canteen behind Honasan’s office, but it was MND territory. An outsider may be allowed to join the steering committee meetings by invitation. One of them was the vice chief of staff, Lieutenant General Salvador Mison, who wrote a memorandum containing details of the meeting to Ramos. Perturbed by his deputy’s report, Ramos abruptly sent out a confidential message to key members of the general staff and major service commanders calling them to a meeting with the RAM steering committee. By arranging the meeting, Ramos was obliquely telling RAM, this is how we handle the Armed Forces, not any ruling clique.
RAM had something to offer Ramos – an honorary chairmanship of the group. “We wanted him,” Batac explained, “to start developing the reform movement in the Armed Forces.” Ramos, sensitive to the nuance of their gesture, declined. “I’ll be biased to one organization,” he told them. And from then on, things went downhill.
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