Bobby Tiglao mans the ‘War Room’, while GMA goes off to parley

I said parley, not party.

President Macapagal-Arroyo flew off yesterday afternoon on the first leg of her trip to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Los Cabos, Mexico. As I pointed out yesterday, her first "stop" in Honolulu is vital. She’ll be in closed-door session and strategic briefing with the CINCPAC chief, Admiral Tom Fargo, and the top brass of the US Pacific Command who command the army, navy, marines, and air force over 50 percent of the earth’s surface.

The CINCPAC’s forces include the Third Fleet in California, the Seventh Fleet in Japan, the Fifth Air Force (Japan), Seventh Air Force (Korea), Eleventh Air Force (Alaska), Thirteenth Air Force (Guam) – the latter liaise with our PAF – which is all air and no force – then the US Forces in Japan and South Korea, Special Operations Command Pacific (some of which remain in Zamboanga and Basilan) and the Alaskan Command.

What does GMA expect to get? All the salutes, honors and frills (she loves ’em), plus military hardware and promises. Alas, no matter how much the Americans beef up their revised military assistance package, it will still be a pittance compared to the overall astronomical rise in the US defense budget.

Remember the forlorn but defiant lament of our boys and their American co-defenders in abandoned and doomed Bataan in 1942, when Franklin D. Roosevelt and Washington, DC junked them in favor of rushing to save Europe? They roared: "We’re the Battlin’ Bastards of Bataan – no mother, no father, no Uncle Sam!" But they didn’t give a damn. They fought on bravely till the end and the horrible Death March.

This time we’ve got to give a damn. GMA has given the Americans the quid but they haven’t given us the quo. The question to put, bluntly, to Fargo and later to her pal, US War Chief George Dubya Bush is: Quo vadis? Where are we going? Bush has just approved the biggest increase in US military spending since the end of the Cold War – a $355-billion defense appropriations bill, giving the US Armed Forces an added $37.5 billion over last year’s budget. We’ll get less than the crumbs. Israel will get a big slice for her defense, as will Egypt (so they’ll not attack Israel), and Pakistan (so they’ll not turn, as they’re already begun, back to the Taliban and al-Qaeda).

Why do the Yanquis take us for granted, treating Filipinos like Little Browns, Gunga Dins, and over-eager Flips (that old-fashioned term which used to irritate us during my school days in the Bronx)? Because our President has begun to exhibit too much all-out "give" without demanding reciprocity.

The word from the Palace was that the Chief Executive consulted her adviser, Ambassador (and former Foreign Affairs Secretary) Bobby Romulo on her "talking points" with President Bush when she meets him in Los Cabos. (There will be a brief private meeting, perhaps during the coffee break).

What I’m afraid of is that Bobby, who’s long headed a lobby for certain American interests, might not remember which hat he’s wearing when he "advises" our President. That of the Team Philippines, or the Stars and Stripes Forever All the Way to the Wild Blue Yonder? I’m not impugning his patriotism. But he may tell her to promise Dubya too give the Yanks that all-out "Open Skies" for which they have been slavering, and the hell with Philippine Air Lines, Cebu Pacific, and our other Pinoy air carriers. (One loudmouthed pressure group, composed of surprisingly prominent people singing rah-rah and hosannas to the US "open skies" conspiracy, is actually being subsidized by US lobbyists – I have in hand a purloined copy of their carelessly-worded contract).

Why, certain traitors to our national interest have even mounted a back-stabbing, smear campaign against Foreign Affairs Undersecretary Franklin Ebdalin who has staunchly been opposing this "Open Skies" sell-out. I’ve known Ebdalin for years, and saw him in action when he was our Ambassador to Budapest (Hungary) and Warsaw (Poland). There’s no straight-shooter in our foreign service more upright and patriotic than he is. As for "simple living", he’d pass the new Malacañang "spy test" in a breeze, getting even higher marks, I’ll bet my bottom peso, than even the First Gentleman. (Oops, Sir Mike. Don’t get sore at Franklin. I merely invoked the first comparison that came to mind.)

In short, Madam President: If I may, as private citizen, offer some unsolicited advice, kindly tell Mr. Bush and his cohorts (including Chief Lobbyist concurrently US Ambassador to Manila Frank Ricciardone), that we’re friends and allies but not lackeys and servile colonials. Serfs and mercenaries they don’t need in their current and forthcoming "wars". Such inferiors in the first instance, and such scum in the second instance, will be the first to cut and run if and when things get rough.

Comrades-in-arms and friends, on the other hand, will stand with Americans, shoulder-to-shoulder through thick and thin, danger, adversity and disappointment. This is a pact of the brave, which cannot be purchased with any coin of the realm. All that is asked is a helping hand in time of trouble and need, but one that is proffered with dignity and concern.

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I wonder why Ambassador Ricciardone seems so desperate to get "Open Skies" delivered to America on a silver platter to our national detriment? It seems so mean and petty an endeavor for a man of his obvious talents and handsome stature – handsome, in fact, to the point of haughtiness.

Is this because Frank . . . well, sort of failed in getting the Iraqi opposition to unite against Saddam Hussein? (Is he being consulted by Dubya at all these days with regard to the brewing Iraq situation?)

American experts have rushed to print with regard to the present crisis. One of the best new offerings is The Reckoning: Iraq and the Legacy of Saddam Hussein by Sandra Mackey, a veteran bookwriter and commentator (for the top US dailies and CNN) on the Middle East. The volume, hot off the press, was published by W.W. Norton & Company (New York, London, 2002).

Even more pertinent is The Threatening Storm, subtitled without embroidery: The Case for Invading Iraq by Kenneth M. Pollack, a Council on Foreign Relations book, published by Random House, New York, 2002. A Yale graduate with a doctorate in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Pollack served seven years in the CIA as a Persian Gulf military analyst and has authored books on Arabs at War (Military Effectiveness) etc. He’s currently Olin Senior Fellow and Director of National Security Studies for Gulf Affairs for the Council on Foreign Relations.

Pollack mentions Ricciardone in his volume (page 97-98) as having been tasked by former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright "to be the special coordinator for transition in Iraq" in "recognition of the role that the Iraqi opposition would have to play in any regime change scheme."

The author, thought Ricciardone "an excellent choice", noting that he "spoke fluent Arabic and had spent long service in the region, including a tour at the embassy in Baghdad before the Gulf War. He got on extremely well with the Iraqis and had tremendous reserves of energy and optimism. Ricciardone’s tasks were twofold: to convince the various opposition factions to stop fighting and work together, and to help them become a force capable of making a meaningful contribution to a regime change effort."

Pollack, as it happened, was one of Frank’s collaborators in the effort, which turned a bit sour when wealthy Ahmed Chalabi, a former Iraqi banker (chosen by the CIA in 1991 as a coordinator for the exile groups) and his Iraqi National Congress (INC), turned on Ricciardone with full venom and attempted to undercut him. In the end, the other exile groups disgustedly turned thumbs down on Chalabi and the INC – which brought everything, it seems, back to square one. Frank’s problem, I suspect, is that he’s too "loveable" a guy.

On page 103, author Pollack admits that "the Iraqi opposition fell apart." He praised Ricciardone, however, as having "done yeoman’s work. Through constant explaining, cajoling, bargaining, and begging, he had gotten a large number of Iraqi opposition groups to agree to work together . . ."

Well, why aren’t they still united now? Perhaps Frank R. ought to be recalled to finish the job.

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Sanamagan. Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, who has been opposing (along with France) Dubya’s sternly-worded resolution against Iraq and Saddam in the United Nations Security Council, now has a Muslim "hostage crisis" on his hands in his own capital, Moscow.

At first blush, I thought it had been Moscow’s world-famous Bolshoi theatre that had been invaded and its patrons seized by those 40 heavily-armed Chechens, but it was actually another theater in a working class district. When the "terrorists" barged in late Wednesday night the audience had been enjoying a performance of the musical Nord-Ost (North-East), one of the capital’s most popular productions. There were Americans, Brits, Austrians and other nationalities in the audience.

The infiltrators emerged on stage and fired off their guns. They threatened to blow up the theatre, with everybody in it (including themselves) if Russia did not agree to end the war in Chechnya and withdraw all its forces within seven days. About a hundred men (Muslims, mostly), women and children were released, but 600 or more hostages remain in the hands of the hostage-takers at this writing. I’m not sure Mr. Putin, with this unresolved stand-off in his hands, will be able to make it to the APEC summit in Mexico.

How will he react to the Chechens’ challenge? I can only refer to his surprisingly frank autobiography entitled FIRST PERSON published by Hutchinson, London, in 2000 (translated by Catherine A. Fitzpatrick). Asked about "the question of the independence of Chechnya", Putin had answered (page 142): "Today, everyone recognizes that it is necessary to preserve the territorial integrity of Russia and not to support terrorists and separatists, but let’s say we agreed to the independence of the republic and allowed Chechnya to succeed. The situation would be completely different. If we agreed to Chechnya’s independence, then quite a few countries would immediately grant official recognition to Chechnya, and that very same day, would begin to provide large-scale official support to the Chechens. Our current actions would be viewed as aggression, and not the resolution of internal problems. This would radically change the situation and make it far, far worse for Russia. Last summer, we began a battle – not against the independence of Chechnya but against the aggressive aspirations that had begun to flourish on that territory. We are not attacking. We are defending ourselves. We knocked the rebels out of Dagestan, and they came back. We knocked them out again, and they came back again. We knocked them out a third time. And then, when we gave them a serious kick in the teeth, they blew up apartment houses in Moscow, Buinaksk, and Volgodonsk."

Those words of Putin were uttered before the September 11, 2001 attacks in the Twin Towers and the Pentagon and the term "terrorists" became so popular. Has he softened his hardline stance? It doesn’t seem bloody likely.

What’s happened to Moscow? Last week, a provincial Governor was gunned down in broad daylight on the sidewalk of the famous, crowded shopping street – the Arbat. If Putin is to preserve his image as a strongman, he’d better do something. (How about sending for a Ping Lacson? Some wits suggest.)

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THE ROVING EYE . . . And finally to come to the raison d’être of this piece’s headline. When GMA departed, she evidently left Secretary Bobby Tiglao, just returned from his "sabbatical" at the University of Kyoto and Tokyo, in charge of her War Room as Presidential Chief of Staff. What’s the role of Executive Secretary Bert Romulo then? Vice President Teofisto Guingona – just a heartbeat away et cetera, of course – remains, it appears, still in limbo.