Why Taiwan is vital to the security of the Philippines

The "transport summit" being organized today by the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) is pure gimmickry and palabas. If President GMA is dragged into it, she’ll be bombarded with, and saddled with questions which could – and should – have been answered long ago by DOTC Secretary Leandro Mendoza and his staffers.

The truth is that the only "new" problem to be discussed, and even this is not particularly new, is the spiralling cost of fuel. Otherwise, Mendoza ought to have spared the President and solved things himself.

The "summit" being held is a waste of public funds, and, worse, of the Chief Executive’s time and concern. The trouble is that, owing to DOTC neglect, certain militant transport groups may join aggressive leftist labor elements in the touted "massive demonstration" planned for Labor Day, May 1st. Remember the old saw? A stitch in time saves nine. The transport industry is coming unstitched.

Let’s review the entire stupid affair.

On the day of last week’s nationwide transport strike, Larry Mendoza and Undersecretary Ricardo Alfonso met with several Metro Manila and provincial bus operators at the Makati Shangri-la Hotel. The operators were asked to submit their position paper on industry problems which Mendoza maintained would then be discussed and addressed.

It was on the following day that, voilá! – the DOTC announced its plan to mobilize this so-called "transport summit" which would include government agency heads to discuss transport issues, etc. The drawing card was to be the attendance of La Presidenta herself.

GMA should be warned that she’s wasting her time. The "causes" of the unrest and discontent in the transportation industry are already well-known to Sec. Mendoza and these involve agency heads reputed to have powerful connections.

As early as July last year, the DOTC’s attention was called by the Senate. Its foot-dragging was dunned in Senate Resolution No. 25 which criticized "its neglect and indifference to the problems confronting land transportation operators" and its "failure to effectively exercise its mandated responsibility of administrative supervision and control over the LTFRB (Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board) to the detriment of transport operators in particular and the riding public in general."

Admittedly, there are problems the Executive Department cannot address, such as the repeal of the Oil Deregulation Act, but there are reforms which are within the power of the DOTC Secretary to implement. At the head of the list of headaches plaguing the industry are: (a) worsening graft and corruption, through extortion, at the LTFRB, with the "culprit" already known to Sec. Mendoza; (b) astronomically high and oppressive filing fees several thousand times higher than previous legal fees; and (c) months-long delays in the processing and release of papers which expose operators to mulcting by Land Transportation Office (LTO) and Metro Manila Development Authority (MMDA) fieldmen.

Mendoza, a former Chief of Police and PMA Cavalier, hasn’t, inexplicably, demonstrated the guts to tackle those issues first. He can’t pretend not knowing about them. How dare he toss them into the President’s lap?

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Senator Aquilino "Nene" Pimentel’s silly quip that "no nation has won the fight against terrorism by issuing identification cards alone" I trust doesn’t indicate growing senility on his part. Perhaps he was just trying to sound pa-cute. Of course, requiring a national I.D. card doesn’t defeat terrorism – but it’s a start. We have to be able to tell who the Good Guys are before we zap the Bad Guys with fire and sword.

It’s as simple as that.

Of course, some complainants will once again go to the Supreme Court to challenge the "Constitutionality" of the President’s Executive Order 420 implementing a national I.D. system. I hope the High Tribunal upholds it. As usual, congressmen and senators are grumbling that it should have been Congress which debated and decided whether to pass a law mandating a national I.D. system. Congress? If the British House of Commons styles itself the "mother of parliaments," our Congress has been the Mother of Procrastination. If we leave the matter of I.D.’s to our solons, they’ll talk it to death, the Leftists in the House will rant and rail against it, then veto it, while the rest will tack it onto the VAT issue, as yet undecided.

Sanamagan. While terrorist bombs exploded throughout our archipelago, and Abu Sayyaf and Jemaah Islamiyah threats escalate, our Congress has not yet passed an "anti-terrorism" law.

If we leave it to Congress, we’ll all be dead before they wake up from either junketing abroad or snoring among the cobwebs in the chamber. GMA at least did it. Let’s implement it, period.

Who are against an "Identification Card"? Only those who want to hide their identities. Among them are the thieves in the night who bring death in their hands. Are those I.D. cards an invasion of privacy. Why keep your name, status, address and hometown secret unless you’re up to no good? Aren’t you proud of yourself, or your family? The opposition to an I.D. card is ridiculous – but, alas, there are too many loudmouths with hidden agendas. They shout their defiance in order to conceal their bad intentions.

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Some friends have asked me why I consider the small scatter of islands to our north, namely Taiwan (their main island), Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu, so important to the Philippines. My reply is plain enough. From our northernmost islands, indeed Northern Luzon itself, you almost see with the naked eye the southernmost tip of Taiwan, also known to history as "Formosa."

This is why it’s vital for us to know whether Taiwan will remain independent, despite our kowtowing to Beijing and paying diplomatic lip-service to a "One China" policy – just as, by the way, the United States and most of our friends in the United Nations do – which mandates that eventually a reluctant, even defiant Taiwan, may be gobbled up by the People’s Republic of China.

On Friday the other week, April 15, I flew from Taipei down to Kaohsiung in the south to address the 1,400 cadets of the historic Whampoa Military Academy.

The cadets who train to be their country’s officer corps have a spacious campus of 234 hectares, including a beautiful man-made lake, and their war games are geared to a defense of their nation of 23 million against Chinese invasion from the mainland.

Just as in the Philippine Military Academy, my host, Superintendent Lt. General John Young, introduced me to their faculty, toured me through their campus and their museum buildings, one exhibition hall including a completely accurate lifesized fully-uniformed wax diorama of the Japanese surrender. Then we went to the giant Mess Hall for lunch, after which I addressed the assembled Corps of Cadets. My translator must have been good, or else they had been briefed to be extremely polite, because they gave me a standing ovation.

What is significant about the Whampoa Military Academy is that it was relocated to Fengshan in Taiwan only on March 1, 1950 a few months after its first Superintendent, Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek and his Nationalist Forces retreated from the mainland to Taiwan, leaving it to the Communist People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in 1949.

The Academy was really founded by Dr. Sun Yat-sen, the Father of Modern China, whose revolution freed China from the last Emperor of the Manchus. When he opened classes at Whampoa on June 16, 1924, Dr. Sun Yat-sen entrusted it to Chiang Kai-shek as its first Superintendent. The first seven classes were graduated in Canton (Guangzhou), then the Academy was moved to Nanjing, later Chengtu, and finally to Fengshan (Taiwan). Its graduates fought the warlords, then the Japanese, then each other. While most of them remained loyal to Chiang and his Kuomintang, others like Zhou Enlai, went on to lead the Communist Party and the PLA forces.

In any event, I reminded the Whampoa cadets that Filipinos had fought their forebears, too – since Taiwan (Formosa) was under Japanese rule when the Pacific War broke out, and was indeed literally a province of Japan. Hundreds of thousands of Taiwanese were enrolled in the Japanese Imperial Army and Navy. It was from Taiwan that, in December 1941, the Japanese launched their assault on the Philippines.

Five hundred Japanese bombers and fighters were assigned on December 8, 1941, to attack US bases in Luzon. Takeoff from various Taiwanese (Formosa) airfields was set for two hours before dawn. In the west were the airfields of the Imperial Japanese Navy’s long-range, landbased 11th Air Fleet, and in the east were the Japanese Army’s Fifth Air Group under the 14th Army. The Army’s planes first hit Baguio City and other northern targets at 9:25 a.m. while the Navy’s planes afterwards struck Clark Field and Iba, Zambales, where the American radar set-up was located.

Mind you, this was on the same day as Pearl Harbor, since December 8 in the Philippines is December 7 in Hawaii and the continental USA.

In his book, MacArthur and Defeat in the Philippines, Richard Connaughton puts it dramatically: "While the Japanese naval pilots impatiently bided their time at Tainan airbase, Formosa, a voice over the loudspeaker pierced the thick mist: ‘At 0600 this morning, a Japanese task force succeeded in carrying out a devastating surprise attack against the American forces in the Hawaiian Islands.’ Pandemonium broke out as ecstatic pilots danced in the gloom around their grounded aircraft . . ."

Fog had delayed their take-off, but at 1045 a.m. the strike force of 53 bombers and 45 Zero fighters took to the sky and set off for Clark Field.

Saburo Sakai, later to become famous as one of Japan’s top aces of the war, arrived with his squadron of Zeros in advance of the bombers. He subsequently described his wonder: "The sight which met our eyes was unbelievable. Instead of encountering a swarm of American fighters diving at us in attack we looked down and saw some sixty enemy bombers and fighters neatly parked along the airfield runways . . . the Americans had made no attempt to disperse the planes and increase their safety."

The Japanese bombers arrived in waves of 27 each to finish off the US aircraft on the ground. The 34 Zeros completed the job by repeatedly strafing the airfield for over an hour. It was a shambles. More than half of the new B-17s which had just flown in from the US were scattered about in thousands of pieces. MacArthur had lost most of his air force – in just one blow. From Taiwan, mind you.

When the invasion came two weeks later, the main landing force (also from Taiwan) waded ashore at Lingayen Gulf, 100 miles north of Manila – a complement of 43,000 men. A secondary landing was made the following day, in the south. Their goal was to trap MacArthur’s army by hitting him from north and south.

In sum, geography continues to bind our fortunes intimately with those of Taiwan. Our archipelago lies 5,000 miles from Pearl harbor, and 7,000 miles from San Francisco, USA. We are 1,800 miles from Tokyo.

But from Taiwan? Only a few miles. By jet plane, just an hour and a half away. Need we say more?