Saturday, September 27, 2008 Military anticipates retaliation
FOLLOWING the series of encounters with suspected New People’s Army (NPA) rebels in Negros island, Central Command has ordered all its units to patrol telecommunications towers and other vital installations.
They believe rebels would try to retaliate by targeting soft high impact targets such as telecommunication towers that are not heavily guarded.
Lt. Gen. Pedro Ike Inserto said armed rebels could decide to create diversionary tactics to help their comrades who are being pursued by burning these cell sites.
Command
“I will not be able to call my family if they keep bombing the cell site,” Inserto said in jest.
The military has had 13 clashes with suspected rebels since Inserto assumed office as commanding general of Centcom. Recent clashes led to the death of three persons and the wounding of two soldiers and one civilian.
Inserto said the public could expect more clashes in Negros Oriental as he has ordered his men to crush the Central Visayas Regional Party Committee headed by Roy Erecre.
Inserto believes Erecre and other top NPA officials are “running around” in Negros.
“I don’t want them going back to Bohol or Cebu and destroy the peace we are enjoying here,” he said.
Insurgency
The Armed Forces of the Philippines is targeting 2010 to completely wipe out insurgency from the country, but Inserto hopes to do that in Negros before that.
Centcom is also planning to visit colleges and high schools to counter the alleged recruitment of students into the NPA.
Lt. Col. Oscar Lasangue of the Civil Relations Group said idealistic students were prime targets of the NPA and that they plan to visit schools so they will “not be misled.”
Lasangue said the NPA target intelligent students because they are well-respected and their credibility is useful in conducting lectures in the mountains.
Inserto, though, clarified that they do not conduct surveillance of students in schools although they “know” who among the students are involved in alleged NPA legal
fronts.
He also belittled comments that their campus tours are a form of harassment, saying as long as they were telling the truth, they were not harassing anybody. (MEA)
