AFP's heroic role on containing unrest in Mindanao
Soldiers of Juan de la Cruz get paid for over P400 a day they say, a meager amount in exchange of their very lives and the huge gamble of fate with their would-be-widowed brides and orphaned children. Ironic as it is, those who sit behind a desk job in Makati earns twice or even four times their monthly salaries. Of which, it also includes the absence of ordering ranks and unbending command to abide and live with. As such, it led most to believe it is idiotic or even a cry of twisted martyrdom to dare enter the enemy.
But to those who did and responded to the call of duty are neither martyrs nor insane, they are for a fact the cream of the crop. What makes them soldiers are their very act of heroism and patriotism, which at countless times have been tested by death-defying combat duties mostly spent in the bloodied plains of Mindanao. In a rate of 1-10 only four of those get to go home alive and well. Most die on bunkers, others lose an arm or leg while the too unfortunate get to live but become mentally incapacitated.
The AFP's adherence not only to the chain of command in an onset measure to contain hostilities within the PALMA borders and periphery of Lanao del Norte poses one commendable pursuit of both duty done and justice served. Within the past few weeks soldier's main role was simply to contain sporadic threat measures of MILF elements led by Commanders Kato and Bravo. As such, they are to "drive" back among their forcedly occupied villages given that the use of armed clash was a last resort. In such, it made them vulnerable to retaliating groups which include the ambush of a patrolling army truck that killed Lt. Col. Angel Benitez.
The death of marine corporal Angelo Abeto in the recent clashes with the armed MILF rebel group in Lanao following the indiscriminate attacks on civilian localities in the area is not just an act of heroism but a commendable display of sworn duty accomplished. As days pass, the public will forget about a certain Abeto who bled and died for the people of Lanao but the courage he had that freed those civilians from danger to death could never be carved-out of history. Abeto died in order for others to continue living.
The death of an army intelligence officer would pose no less than another mortality ration printed on broadsheets but his years of loyal service to the country and each innocent soul he kept safe will continue to exist and will count as living evidence of a needed Peace.
Corporal Abeto and Lt. Col. Benitez are only two of the several soldiers who died during the latest hostilities carried out by MILF rebels in North Cotabato, Lanao del Norte and Shariff Kabunsuan. Sadly, their stories unlike that of Abeto and Benitez which were carried in by various broadsheets will only be remembered by their respective families who were left behind by these admirable soldiers.
The emotions displayed by Brig. Gen. Antonio Supnet during a caucus with local officials illustrate that soldiers at the forefront of the war are human beings despite their desire to serve the country are prone to human emotions such as fear and pain. Fear for the death they would face and pain in knowing that they might leave their loved ones behind.
Each time a soldier suits up for a routine combat patrol or march to war, his thoughts would inevitably lead to his loved ones. Would he ever see them again? Would they be able to cope emotionally and financially without him? How many hugs have his children missed for the number of times he was on tour of duty? Would they grow up to be a man or woman he wants them to be? These are thoughts that no man should ever have.
As residents of Lanao del Norte fled their homes heading towards safety, soldiers with their rifles and mudded combat boots trek an opposite path. They march back to these endangered homes, driving the rampaging rebels back to their hub and altogether keeping themselves alive the next day till talks on peace surface and takes them back home. Of which Abeto and Benitez could never have.
Every soldier knows that the life he has decided to take on would never be safe. They expect always on the move, isolated from their family and always in danger of clashing with the enemy. This is a life they chose. However, it is a slap to their face if the peril they face day in and day out would be taken for granted by the very people they have protected and change them of not doing their sworn duties.
No Filipino should ever fight another Filipino. A country's armed forces was supposed to serve as a force of protection against outside threat and not from within the home front.
As guns continue to talk in the Moro land causing lives spent and many homeless, once cannot help but realize the importance of relying on pens and papers to inscribe ACCORD. The butt-fired statesmen who have been employing their self-drawn "rising threats" caused no less by political plights of possible constitutional changes or a stall on the 2010 elections should best reflect on the definition of the very word "threat." For it is but a fact that Filipinos across the country have been living witnesses not just to the very existence of "threat" now escalating in Mindanao but of its very victims. Soldiers, civilians and rebels alike have been filling the body bags. Are they to be regarded as plain casualties of war provoked by ego-driven political opportunists?