‘We don’t have any fears here’

You could almost call it their Hillah holiday.

For the combat-hardened Philippine contingent of 96 police, military and medical personnel deployed in the southern town of Hillah in post-war Iraq, the assignment is a walk in the park compared with the action they have seen back home, according to a report in Time Magazine’s Asia edition.

"Because of our experience, we are prepared. Compared with the Philippines, we don’t have any fear here," Capt. Ben Zulueta, 42, told Time.

The Philippine contingent in Iraq is composed mainly of veterans of various Philippine combat zones, the youngest of whom is only in his late 20s.

Few countries in the coalition of the willing that are rebuilding Iraq and extending humanitarian aid to Iraqis "have as much counterinsurgency experience as the Philippines," the Time report last month said. Nearly all of the men and women in the contingent have seen combat back home, the report added.

These Filipinos are used to strife that is measured in decades: 34 years of warfare with the New People’s Army (NPA) all over the hinterlands, and the three decades of vicious fighting between combined troops of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and the Philippine National Police (PNP), against Muslim separatist rebels of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in the South.

The MILF used to also initiate bomb attacks using improvised explosives and is now engaged in peace talks with the government.

Add to that the fighting brought on by the Abu Sayyaf bandits who make a living kidnapping people — particularly foreigners — and holding them for ransom and you have the sum of battle experience of the average Filipino soldier and military medic.

Before their Iraq assignment, these Filipinos went through the cruelest of crucibles, survived and remained in the service. Some of them have been trained by United States Special Forces in joint military exercises. Many of them have been wounded in the line of duty and most of them have seen their friends die in combat.

But, instead of being glum or tense, the Filipinos "stay up until nearly midnight dancing and singing along to the karaoke machine they’ve brought from home," eating roast goat and shrimp chips washed down with non-alcoholic beer and diluted vodka.

Comfort Zone

"Iraq has so far been more comfort zone than war zone," the report said. "They have received a warm welcome from Iraqis in and around Hillah, the town where Camp Charlie is located, and, more importantly, have suffered no casualties yet, apart from a soldier who was slightly injured in a car accident."

"Sometimes the Filipinos seem almost like they are on vacation," Time reports. "They ride in civilian vehicles, occasionally forget to carry their military IDs, and often opt not to wear their helmets and bulletproof vests — even though regulations of the Polish-led Multinational Division Command South, under which they serve, say they should."

"When they are on the move, they stop on the roadside for leisurely breaks, taking photos, waving and smiling at nearly every passing car, M-16s slung casually behind their backs. They have yet to fire a shot in Iraq," the Time report said.

But, for all their seemingly carefree duty, the commander of the Philippine force, Col. Joel Ibañez, said his men are always on alert. "We wave and smile at people, but we keep our fingers on our triggers," he said.

The Filipino contingent has also applied some hard-earned combat lessons to the Iraqi setting. "We don’t follow convoy roads because the enemy attacks on convoy roads. The best way to avoid being ambushed is not to be there," he said.

Ibañez learned this lesson firsthand a few years ago in Luzon, when a patrol he was leading was ambushed by the NPA and he was shot just beneath his collarbone.

The Filipinos’ mission is not to pursue and confront the enemy. It is to help rebuild the Iraq by building schools and clinics, laying roads and bridges and training the local police.

"Still, the challenges they face can’t be underestimated," the report said. "Even in the south, safety is an ever-present concern, especially while on base — mortars have been lobbed at Camp Charlie."

Homesickness

While the situation in Iraq is relatively peaceful, other things are having an adverse effect on the Filipino contingent in Iraq, including homesickness and dealing with the constant stream of Iraqi complaints.

"Having been stationed in Iraq for almost six months already, the Filipinos miss their families, their homes, their food," the report said.

"This sense of disorientation is intensified by the fact that they’re often forced to tackle problems that weren’t part of their training, such as taking bids from local contractors to build schools and water-treatment plants," it added.

Since the Filipino contingent enters villages as representatives of the coalition, "they often bear the brunt of the innumerable complaints Iraqis have about fuel and electricity supplies, water, sewage, corruption, and unfulfilled promises of better days to come," the report said.

According to Maj. Donald Gumiran, "we are the shock absorbers."

Each day, the Filipino police officers help train the "nascent" Iraqi police force, the report said, "while Filipino soldiers and doctors travel on back roads and along muddy tracks from village to village, offering checkups, handing out medicines and vitamins, or ensuring that building projects are proceeding on schedule and on budget."

"They are surrounded by need: mud-brick schools that need to be made of concrete, children who need medical attention, villages that need purification plants to make the water drinkable," the report added.

These Filipinos are dealing with people "schooled in dependency" by over three decades of Saddam Hussein’s tyrannical rule — a factor that makes their job more difficult.

"That the Philippines is itself impoverished does not register here. The Filipinos are part of the coalition, so they are expected to have the answers and the cures," the report said.

Compassion’s Filipino Faces

T/Sgt. Natividad Constantino led games for the local children and also handed out toothbrushes, toothpaste and cans of sardines in the town of Erada, which the Filipinos visited recently.

According to Time, "a smitten teenage boy pinched (Constantino’s) nose and held her hand for as long as she would allow."

"Constantino, who spent most of her 17 years in the Army working office jobs and who often prepares Philippine dishes for the other troops at base, eventually had to take cover on the team’s bus," the report said.

Dr. Flor Llesis conducted checkups in a dirt-floor classroom in Erada using the Arabic words for common respiratory and gastrointestinal ailments that she learned in Iraq.

Llesis hails from Davao City and has treated evacuees from the conflict between the AFP and the Mindanao rebels. She said she applied to the Philippines’ Department of Health (DOH) for a place in the contingent after seeing Iraqi children on the news.

"The faces kept haunting me," she said. Llesis, who is married and has no children, "even looked into adopting an Iraqi girl. But the process was too complicated, forcing her to abandon the idea," the report said.

Since October, Ibañez has been writing letters to superiors in the division and the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) trying to find the funds to send a girl named Hameda abroad for treatment of a life-threatening magnesium deficiency that causes regular seizures.

According to Time, "standard procedure for applications for medical care outside the country involves a lengthy process (and) Ibañez is trying to find a way around the wait."

"Her father came to this unit and asked for help," Ibañez said, "so we have no choice but to try to find some."

He will soon return to the Philippines to be executive officer of Southern Command (Southcom) and he is already thinking about how he can apply what he has learned in Iraq back home.