Delicate issue of Subic and Clark

Press, 23 July 1986, Page 18

Delicate issue of Subic and Clark

By

CHARLES J. HANLEY

of Associated Press in Angeles

City, Philippines

The United States military complex here, far-off hub for a far-flung Pentagon network, is becoming a battleground in the political wars of the new Philippines. Both the Administrations of United States President, Ronald Reagan, and the Philippine President, Corazon Aquino, have sought to play down questions •about the future of sprawling Clark Air Base in Angeles City and the big, versatile United States Navy base at Subic Bay, 48 kilometres south-west of here. Recent interviews with politicians, diplomats, military men, and others in Manila and elsewhere indicate, however, that the issue of whether the Philippines should extend the life of the bases beyond 1991 could ignite quickly into a major dispute. J. V; Bautista, a leading antibases Leftist, promises “It is going to be one of the major flashpoints in the days to come.” Filipinos quickly taking sides include delegates writing a new Philippine constitution, columnists in Manila’s lively newspapers, and Communist guerril-

las in the embattled countryside, who have made dismantling the United States facilities a major demand in planned peace talks with the Aquino Government Since taking over from the deposed Ferdinand Marcos last February, Mrs Aquino herself has sounded neutral on the issue and many here believe in the end it will be a straight business deal — the bases will be extended in exchange for a huge increase in United States payments to the Philippines. “Shutting down the bases would have a significant economic impact on the Philippines," noted Clark Air Base’s policy officer, Colonel James Cozza. “In an economically troubled nation, the president would have to keep that in mind." Although some critics disagree, Pentagon strategists unanimously describe Clark and Subic — the biggest American military complex outside the United States — as vital to United States security interests. The bases’ runways and docks are just a few air hours or sea days from Japan and Korea, United States Pacific possessions,

Australia, and the “chokepoint” straits through which tankers carry Gulf oil to East Asia. Subic naval base is a key waystation for the 40 or more United States Navy vessels normally deployed in the western Pacific. Eighty kilometres north-west of Manila, the great deep-water harbour at Subic, rimmed by jungled hills, usually shelters a dozen or so Seventh Fleet warships taking on provisions or undergoing maintenance. Subic has large beach areas for marine amphibious training, shoals for naval gunnery practice and a naval air station that averages 400 takeoffs and landings a day, including the flights of Navy Orion reconnaissance planes that track submarine and other Soviet activity in the region. At Clark, where monsoon rains pound the 3000-metre runway this- time of year, the United States 13th Air Force maintains a tactical fighter wing of almost 60 Phantoms and Eagles, along with training and airlift units. Clark’s sophisticated Crow Valley bombing range, where Australian, Thai, and Singaporean pilots often join the Americans in war exercises, is

matched only by the United States Air Force’s Nevada facilities for realistic training of air crews. The Philippine air and naval facilities serve, too,,as jump-off pointe for supplying Diego Garcia, the major island base the United States has developed in the mid-Indian Ocean. The United States military says Clark and Subic counter-balance a growing Soviet naval and air presence at Cam Ranh Bay in Vietnam. “The Philippines are absolutely crucial to our ability to operate not only in the western Pacific, but in the Indian Ocean,” said one strategist at the Pentagon, speaking on condition that he not be identified. The Pentagon says the bases also are crucial to the defence of the Philippines, an assertion not echoed by the Manila brass. General Fidel Ramos, Philippine chief of staff, told a reporter: “The economic value to the Philippines is perhaps more significant at this time.” Along with more than 14,000 United States military and 2000 United States civilian personnel, the bases employ almost 42,000 Filipinos. That Filipino payroll and local spending by Americans and base purchasing agents, puts an estimated SUS4SO million (SNZB4I million) a year into the Philippine economy. In addition, the United States has pledged a total SUS9OO million (SNZI6B3 million) in military and economic aid to the Philippines over five years, 1985-. 90, an. amount equal to almost 10 per cent of Philippine tax collections. The underlying bases agreement has a 25-year term that ends in 1991, after which the term becomes indefinite, subject to abrogation at any time by either country. A formal review of the agreement nas long been scheduled for 1988, but President Aquino is now widely expected to press for earlier talks. The feeling in the Philippine Government is that the United States has had it on the cheap and resentment over the bases clearly spans the political spectrum. A leader of the political umbrella organisation, Bayan, explained why the nationalist Left wants the bases shut down: “It’s a question of our independence as a nation, our desire for neutrality, and for making our country nuclear-free.” Like-minded Filipinos have introduced resolutions in the current constitutional convention calling for a ban on foreign bases, or at least on nuclear weapons. Another constitutional proposal, introduced by a former Marcos Labour Minister, 5 Blas Ople, takes more of a negotiator’s tack. It calls for dismantling the bases at the end of a new 20year accord.

Meanwhile, the United States would be required to open its market to Philippine goods, helping local industry and giving the Manila Government a real bargaining clout with the United States, Mr Ople said. The Filipinos are clearly ready to wield that clout One local economist has suggested SUSI billion (SNZI.B7 billion) a year as fair rent for the bases, as opposed to the current base-related aid of less than SUS2OO million (SNZ374 million). Another suggests tying a new base agreement to progress in getting American banks to ease up on repayment terms for the Philippines’ SUS 26 billion (5NZ48.62 billion) foreign debt. President Aquino herself says she is keeping her options open, but she is wielding a lever of her own — she favours a national referendum on whatever agreement emerges from United States-Philippine negotiations. That prospect worries United States officials. Even if they win the vote, the campaign would stir up anti-American sentiment ‘in the Philippines. The bases debate, inevitably, will reach back to Washington, especially as the price mounts for maintaining military facilities some call luxuries. “We’re in a rut there,” said Gene La Rocque, a retired admiral who heads Washington's Centre for Defence Information, a group critical of Pentagon policies. “They justify the Philippine bases as a stepping-stone to the Indian Ocean base, which we don’t need to begin with,” said Mr La Rocque, who favours scaling down the United States military network world-wide. Those in Washington looking for alternatives to Clark and Subic focus bn what they call a fall-back arc east of the Philippines, a string of United Statescontrolled islands centred on Guam. The Pentagon estimates the cost of building such new bases at SUSB billion (5NZ14.96 billion) and pointe out that the fall-back islands do not have the large, skilled, low-cost work force that makes the Philippines so attractive. The United States Administration has shown little interest in other alternatives, such as greater Japanese naval involvement in securing East Aslan sea lanes, or regional proposals for simultaneous shutdowns of Soviet and United States bases in the area. The debate may be heating up in the Philippines, but the United States Navy and Air Force appear confident of their future here, having requested SUS63O million (SNZII7B million) worth of new construction at Clark and Subic in the next five years. “They’re digging . themselves deeper and, "-deeper into that trench of how important the bases are,” a Manila diplomat noted. "And they may not be able to dig themselves out if they have to.”.