“History has shown us time and again that violence only begets more violence and is never a lasting foundation for peace.” 14th Dalai Lama.”
-- 14th Dalai Lama
The Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army’s armed insurgency is one of the longest-running (57 years as of last Sunday, April 5, 2026) in the world. Yet it is farther than ever from achieving its objective of instituting Communism -- a one-party political system and a state-owned and -controlled economic system -- in the country.
Thousands of Filipino lives have been and continue to be lost including a significant number of idealistic Filipino youth. A corrupt government keeps the insurgency going for the intelligence funds and commissions military and civilian officials get in conducting counter-insurgency measures. The NPA, for their part, extort money from politicians and businessmen. Both sides exhaust the nation’s resources at the expense of the general population.
Meanwhile, the situation of the marginalized waxes worse. Government officials, assailed from all sides for incompetence, corruption and neglect of people’s basic needs, defend themselves not by resolving issues but by red-tagging all who call out their corrupt and self-serving ways.
Red-tagging leads to state violence. This frightens away well-meaning and otherwise peaceful people from opposing unjust government and business systems and practices. To cite a recent example, Megawide (or is it Cebu City LGU or both?) is fending off legitimate efforts to stop the privatization of Carbon by red-tagging small vendors instead of looking for win-win solutions.
Karl Marx was right about the existence of a class struggle, about a higher form of social existence after the contradiction between social classes is resolved. But he was wrong to resolve contradictions with violence. In fact, in his later writings Marx admitted to the possibility of peaceful change in countries with strong democratic traditions. We don’t exactly have a strong democratic tradition but it is clear that violence is painfully worlds away from installing the system insurgents believe will improve social conditions in this country.
If “insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results,” then it’s time for armed insurgents to recognize the futility of continuing on a strategy of violence that has not produced the desired results. It would seem the sensible thing to do to abandon a strategy that is not working.
One option is to give peace talks another chance and, together with all progressive but non-communist groups, decide on a non-violent strategy to deal with the country’s problems. Nobody’s head has rolled so far in the flood control scandal and while neighboring countries simply kick-started their pre-planned crisis-management programs, our inept government is winging it and hopelessly improvising for ways to deal with the crisis the war in the Middle East has brought about.
We just might be more effective in helping solve the nation’s problems today (and why not tomorrow?) if we came together simply as Filipinos. It is the sensible thing to do in the face of an armed insurgency that has so far been more of an aggravation than a solution.