REVIEW & OUTLOOK
The Plight of the Burnhams
Will America surrender to terror in the Philippines?
Yesterday marked the one-year anniversary of the kidnapping of American missionaries Martin and Gracia Burnham from a Philippine resort. Yet it appears that the U.S. military may soon wrap up its training mission in that Asian country no closer to having retrieved the couple.
Back in February there were high public hopes for the deployment of U.S. Special Forces to the southern Philippine islands: The hostages would be freed, their Abu Sayyaf captors would be vanquished and Southeast Asia would be cleansed of one major breeding ground for Islamic terrorist groups. With six weeks before the U.S. troops are scheduled to pull out on July 15, none of these objectives have been met.
Neither government is admitting failure, to be sure. The chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff has called joint U.S.-Philippine military maneuvers a "great success." General Roy Cimatu, his Philippine counterpart, on Saturday called the Abu Sayyaf a "spent force."
According to government officials, Philippine and U.S. forces have captured major Abu Sayyaf weapons depots, the bandit body count stands at 250 and their ranks have reportedly fallen from about 800 to fewer than 100. There are also signs of squabbling among the bandits. Abu Sayyaf leader Abu Sabaya reportedly has run off with ransom money and is being targeted by his own guerrilla fighters.
This is all worth applauding, especially given the fears raised in the usual precincts about a new Asian quagmire at the time of the U.S. deployment. Bobby Capco, spokesman for Manila's Malacanang Palace, told us yesterday that the American presence has been a success: "U.S. troops have trained our soldiers in new ways of fighting and transferred cutting-edge technology. The Americans' arrival boosted our troop morale, and their presence has relieved the fear Basilan residents had of the Abu Sayyaf. Now that the locals no longer fear them, the bandits have no future."
Yet U.S. departure from the Philippines still seems premature. Estimates of a large Abu Sayyaf fighting force were always inflated. The real problems are that Islamic radicals could hide within the local population and use ransom booty to purchase sophisticated weaponry. The fact that a rag-tag group can outfox the combined efforts of U.S. and Philippine forces on an island that's less than 18 miles in diameter demonstrates the elusiveness of Islamic militants. The 7,000 islands of the Philippine archipelago are impossible for the coast guard and army to fully control. Radicals trained by Abu Sayyaf and other terrorist groups come and go from Malaysia or Indonesia.
The U.S. has only begun to build roads on Basilan that would make the Filipino military more effective and the local population less likely to cooperate with Abu Sayyaf. Engagement with the Philippine military has other benefits, such as demonstrating how armed forces are supposed to behave in a democracy.
Congressional sanctions against U.S. dealings with the military in both Indonesia and Pakistan have meant that a generation of officers in those countries have not been exposed to that lesson. If nothing else, sticking around will further help the Philippines grapple with its security problems while buying more time for American forces to try to help free the Burnhams.
Hostages should never dictate U.S. foreign policy, as we've often learned the hard way. But the U.S. government has already winked at a private ransom payment of $300,000, only to have Abu Sayyaf demand even more. This struck us as a bad precedent at the time, but it will only look worse if the Burnhams are never released. Pleading for more patience, a statement from Malacanang Palace yesterday made excuses for the ongoing Burnham captivity by stating that soldiers have been extra cautious in rescue attempts to avoid "rush actions that would place lives in jeopardy."
After the attacks of September 11, President Bush declared that violence against Americans would not be tolerated and would guarantee reprisals. There are now worries that the Bush Administration is softening that stance. Perhaps those worries are overdrawn. But pulling U.S. troops out of the Philippines while Americans are still held captive, and before al Qaeda is defeated, sends the wrong message to terrorists around the world.
