Marawi Siege, a terrorist War?
MARAWI CITY, Philippines, June 13, 2017 -- In more of days to come confronting global terrorism, what perception we have of how terrorists fare in the market for all the dread, in essence, the core, centerpiece to why this bunch of diabolic men and women comprising ISIS <or wannabes>, why they’re important, is measured ironically by how much and the amount of reward money levied, the higher, the better orientated the government may become.
Terrorists' concern when priced high and dollar denominated, however, can hanker to be more important than others hence, may be given adequate attention and the <Philippine> military and police may be more intimately engaging g finding them, neutralize them. Rumors, however, has it that even EJK, to rid of petty street <small time> criminals peddling drugs costs money too, otherwise, nothing of it will happen.
This scenario for law enforcement engaging highly priced terrorists is what appears to be the litmus test, all lumped, success of which depended according to how high reward money are eked, how they are sourced and ‘divided’ from who and what from amongst; it can be highly confidential too and are ‘often’ never known. This is how terrorist wars are engaged in the Philippines; otherwise, the Maute group could have been neutralized much earlier.
The Marawi experience as it is, is more like copying from existing anti-terror platforms, and from the looks of it, it is more Syria-like, short of using barrel bombs decimate the entire living daylight out of the City of Marawi, it looked and is shaping like Aleppo to me, right? If this is precision bombing as they say it is, then ‘friendly fire’ would have been avoided to have as we know, would have eluded killing hordes of our own troops. So it is not precision bombing rather, it rightly should describe as indiscriminate bombardment.
Precision bombing is precisely the manner by which military might is put to the minimum aimed at saving the innocent and for collateral damage not to be in excess of acceptability; the siege by how aerial bombing is done by the military in their campaign is an overkill, and from how structures are decimated by the unrelenting bombardment, the City of Marawi is in total ruin.
Let me be as engaging why I say we have rights under ‘international law’ henceforth, punitive overreacting law enforcement as using aerial bombing, should never employ in ‘populated’ cities or humped communities where many innocent people dwelt. First of all because Marawi City is still a part of the Philippines, and is not an enclave in rebellion, meaning the people there are not up in arms in defiance of authorities.
Under international law, the Philippine government brokered signed peacemaking agreements in 1996, with the MNLF and in 2014, with the dominant Muslim armed front, the MILF. In both agreements, the international community is a witness, therefore, any problem that should arise from the incapacity of either party implement letter of agreement, the likely alternative should, by and large, refer either ‘incapacity’ to arbitration by the international community.
These agreements as witnessed by the international community should, therefore, prove that we the people of Mindanao, Sulu and Palawan, are not to designate as people in rebellion thus our cities and people should be spared.
But this is not the case as we witness live on television systematic ruin of our city, innocent people continue to succumb thus number of casualties already has reached horrible proportions not to mention the City of Marawi totally decimated.
Judging from how the so-called MAUTE terrorist cell emerged from obscurity, from since had been known to be aggressively pursuing recognition by the ISIS in Syria months and months ago. In all their known maladies, the black ISIS flags and emblems had been prominent. How this overt display of aggressive radical behavior by MAUTE, challenging Philippine authority and escaping their intelligence networking, and despite incredible taxpayer money allocated just simply defies conventions, it is unimaginable!
However, the moment Isnilon Hapilon’s name began to rattle to appear like it has graced the terrorist cell the leadership mantra, things changed. Would this sudden interest be because of the dollar-denominated reward money, like US$ 5 million or is it US$ 10 M?
If this should be the case, then our ruin as people was never an issue of law enforcement, it is a continuing criminal behavior and we the people need to review ulterior motives by our government, henceforth, we certainly have rights under international law pursue such cases.
Allow me to reiterate; our war of 48 years in Mindanao was never about religion. This unending warring triggered because of the 1968 Jabidah Massacre incident which was uncovered no less by the Philippine Congress of secretive plotting by people behind the Filipino government to annex the Sabah State of Malaysia by military means.
(Author requested to remain anonymity)
