It’s a strategy
A nephew once saw my copies of Carl Von Clausewitz’ work “On War” and Sun Tzu’s “Art of War” bunched with the law books in my library. Dexter Ampong, that is his name, told me that these two books are particularly among the few “must read books” in military schools like his alma mater, the Philippine Military Academy. Sun Tzu’s Art of War philosophizes the Oriental way of conducting wars and Clausewitz book puts together the Occidental frame of mind of waging warfare. While they vary in their approaches, they, in the end, do not differ much.
Dexter was actually both amused and surprised when I told him that I read Clausewitz work more times than I pored thru Sun Tzu. I kept from him though the embarrassing fact that I had difficulty understanding the German’s opus as the reason why I had to read it again and again.
A part of “On War” dwells on Strategy of Diversion. The term strategy, by the way, is often confused with tactics. They are, in fact, not the same. Tactics are the actual means used to gain an objective, while strategy is the overall campaign plan, which may involve complex operational patterns, activity, and decision-making that govern tactical execution.
Let us give substance to strategy and tactics using a new incident in Philippine politics. I refer to the confidential and intelligence fund for the Office of the Vice President. During a Senate budgetary hearing, Sara Duterte-Carpio informed the senators that she wrote a letter to President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr., asking for some funds. This was in August 2022 barely a month after her assumption of office. The vice president revealed to the senators that her letter was favorably acted by the president in December 2022 with the transfer of more than P200 million. Accordingly, Duterte-Carpio placed P125 million as confidential funds.
All hell seemed to break loose. Sen. Risa Hontiveros succeeded to extract from the mouth of the vice president details of the so-called augmentation of funds. Then, former Senate president Franklin Drilon, learned in law and an acknowledged expert legislator, opined that the act of Pres Marcos Jr. of releasing the funds and the treatment of such money by Vice President Duterte-Carpio as confidential funds violated the Constitution. In citing the specific provision of our fundamental law, Drilon made it clear that Marcos and Carpio could be impeached.
I am sure that the legal minds of this administration studied carefully the pronouncement of Drilon and they must have been horrified to realize the impeachable offense done by the president and the vice president. This is where tactics came in. Some government agencies and high profile personalities came up with claims that the confidential funds were legitimate expenses. They focused on the supposed necessity of such expenditure. Even the vice president went on ad hominem in saying that those opposed the CIF are “enemies of the state.”
All of this noise is tactical. It is aimed to divert our attention from the real issue of the impeachable offense committed by the two highest leaders of our country last year in releasing supposed augmentation funds in clear violation of the constitution. Unfortunately, people have taken the tactical bait. We now are indignant to learn that the Philippine Coast Guard received only a total of P117 million in CIF for more than 10 years while we set aside for Carpio’s spending in less than two weeks P125 million. And we are led to debate whether she used the money in 9 or 11 days! We are canalized into garrulously talking about the billion peso CIF of Mayor Sara and yet forgetting that millions of our taxes were siphoned from one office against constitutional guidelines. The strategy is working! Hail BBM! Hail Sara!
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