Apologists for U.S. imperialism present this as a move in the "war on terror." In reality, the intervention is consistent with 100 years of U.S. policy toward the Philippines, whose working people have a long history of struggle against the U.S. armed forces.

The bloody history of the U.S. rulers' military action in the Philippines goes back to their victory in the Spanish-American war. In the words of President William McKinley, the Philippines "dropped into our laps." The Philippine people, who had waged their own revolution against Spanish rule, fought a war of resistance against the new occupiers. By conservative estimates, hundreds of thousands of Filipinos died. The fighting was particularly hard in Mindanao, the Muslim region that is being targeted today. The Philippine-American war ended with the country's annexation by Washington.

Formal independence was granted in 1946, but the next year the U.S. took Philippine territory for the Subic Bay naval base and Clark air base. For the next four decades, Washington poured money into the Philippine military and backed a succession of neocolonial governments, including Ferdinand Marcos's martial law regime.

After Marcos was forced to stand down, Philippine working people stepped up their struggles for land, democratic and union rights, and national sovereignty. A number of huge protests targeted the U.S. military bases, opposing the presence of thousands of imperialist troops, and pointing out their degrading impact on social life, and especially upon the thousands upon thousands of women forced into the prostitution rackets around them. Under this mass pressure, the bases were closed in 1992.

Washington is now pressing to regain some of this lost ground. The Philippine government of Gloria Arroyo, installed one year ago with the backing of the military brass, has made closer collaboration with Washington a centerpiece of its policies. However this move plays out, the U.S. troops will be involved in terrorizing and brutalizing any workers who take action to defend their rights. They will defend the Philippine landlords, their huge estates, and their private armies, against impoverished peasants who are still fighting for land and dignity.

Stationing forces in the Philippines better positions the U.S. imperialists to advance their interests in a region where it has historically taken heavy blows from revolutions in China, Vietnam, and Korea. For the same reason, Washington is also eyeing the possibilities of increasing its military collaboration with the Indonesian government.

The slogan championed by the anti-bases movement speaks to the needs of working people in the Philippines and elsewhere, including in the United States, Australia, New Zealand, and other imperialist countries. Together, we should demand: U.S. Out of the Philippines!
 
 
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