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With The NPA Guerrillas In The Philippines: "We Join To Recover Our Ways"

By Zoltan Grossman

The battle-hardened guerrilla thinks of his next move. Deep within the forest, he is facing an opponent with nearly equal skill and determination as he; one false move on either one's part can mean the end. The guerrilla has chosen t encircle his opponent, flanking him now on both sides. He makes his move. His bishop takes a pawn. "Check."

These are the guerrillas of the New People's Army (NPA) of the Philippines, who, between battles, hone their military tactics on the chessboard. To them, the mock warfare between plastic rooks and pawns is more than a game. Pointing to the king, one laughs, "This is the dictator." To make up for their relative weakness in firepower, the rebels say, they need to have superior brainpower. Indeed, if the NPA fighters fight half as well as many of them play chess, the regime of President Ferdinand Marcos is in serious trouble.

I am in a NPA base camp high in the Cordillera Mountains of northern Luzon Island, 275 kilometers north of Manila. I am spending a week in the guerilla zone which extends throughout much of the homeland of the Igorot tribal peoples. The Igorots, like the other 'national minorities" who make up 10% of the population, are Filipinos who resisted conquest and cultural assimilation throughout the Spanish, American and Japanese colonial eras. Today they are fighting giant development projects funded by multinational corporations and agencies and are being joined by the NPA, the armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP).

The Igorots are famed for their sophisticated system of rice terraces. Concentrated in the valley of the Chico River, the terraces form enormous steps, each anywhere from 5 to 60 feet high. An intricate irrigation network has been maintained by hand, in some areas for over a millennium. Hiking on the terraces, one often comes across old women and men, smoking pipes as they tend the paddies. Along the Chico it is as if a painter brushed the steep hillsides an unforgettable bright green. Without the sustenance of the terraces, the Igorots would have to rely solely on their slash-and-burn agricultural plots and the outside market, including dancing for tourists who flock to the region.

It is for this reason that the Igorots were alarmed when, in the mid-1970's, the Martial Law government went ahead with plans to dam the Chico, to provide electricity to lowland industries. Financed partly by the World Bank, the plans called for relocating the Igorots from their flooded lands to government camps. The Bontoc and Kalinga tribal village councils talked with authorities to no avail. As a woman elder said to me in the Bontoc village of Belwang, "Land is life... Kanunian (God) gave this land to us for us to use, not for other individuals or countries....Even our blood will flow over this land before it is grabbed. Let them come.... We would die for our ancestral lands."

Igorot women have the distinction among other tribes in the world of being able to own and inherit land. With the phasing our of intertribal warfare and the diminished stature of male warriors, the women have played an increasingly vocal political role within the villages. Whereas before the wives could only influence through their husbands, they now freely interrupt or reprimand the male elders.

The engineers arrived to build the dam; village women disrobed in front of some to shame them. Others were killed and their camps burned. The military retaliated harshly, and in desperation, the Igorots say, the turned to the NPA. Until that time, the NPA had little presence in the area; one male fighter had married a local woman to integrate into the culture. But then the process of recruitment began the result of which is, today, a regional NPA which is, from my observations, at least 90% tribal.

Over the same period of time, Igorot elders, youth and professionals drew together to openly call for tribal rights, culminating in 1984 with the formation of the Cordillera People's Alliance, led by Atty. William Claver. Faced with the combination of ecological protest and insurgency, the government has at least temporarily shelved its plan for the dams.

The degree of local sympathy for the NPA can be seen in the militia training camp, which is on the other side of the valley. Forty local kids train in a two-week course; all came under the guidance of their parents. The weapons they train with testify to the arms shortage the NPA faces: three U.S. made Armalites, Springfield rifles from the war against the Spanish and Americans, a few M-1's, and air gun, wooden mock rifle, and a beautifully carved homemade .22, "our weapons are not the most important thing," a militia leader says; "Political unity comes before the armed struggle. Why fight if you don't know what you're fighting for and against?"

Every morning the students go through a rigorous calisthenics session designed to build the climbing muscles. They are divided into three age groups—from 12 to 22—and particularly seem to relish dashing to hide in the trees upon the warning of "helicopter!" During one session, an NPA medical team passes through the camp headed west; a militia leader points out a man smoking a cigarette who lost his young son when the military raided his home.

All political/military instruction at the camp is conducted by three NPA regulars in the Bontoc-Kankaney language of the students. In one night class, the NPA instructor outlines how the village militia backs up the NPA, defends the village and its internal security. In between lessons the class sings traditional songs but with reworded verses about the dams, the military and the U.S. An older instructor, Ka Delfin ("Ka," is short for "Kasama," meaning "companion" or "comrade") sings the tribal lyrical poem called the "ulalim" which echoes hauntingly through the woods, mixing with the songs of the forest birds.

The alliance between the NPA and the tribes is personified in a very unusual priest. Father Conrado Balweg is a member of the Tinggian tribe form Abra Province. He is also the best know guerrilla commander in the entire country.

In 1972, Balweg was a young parish priest who combined the Catholic mass with Tinggian rituals. Confession became a collective affair, planting and harvesting celebrations were held in the ricefields, and the tribal ways of sharing were encouraged as "Christianity in practice."

The same year the Cellophil Resources Corp (CRC) began a gargantuan logging operation in Abra, restricting Tinggian access to wide swaths of the forest. Under new decrees, the tribe became squatters on their own ancestral lands. Balweg and his parishioners delivered pronouncements against the project, but as Balweg says, "The bishop just kept his mouth shut ....the old folks were being imprisoned, the houses were being burnt, the rice fields that were ready for harvest were being bulldozed—and no moral pronouncement yet from the church."

For his activities Balweg was accused of being and NPA sympathizer though he claims he had never met the rebels. After receiving many death threats, in 1979 he fled to the hills and joined the NPA. "We could no longer continue with our services, our education, so what should we do?" he asks; "should we surrender? ...The people should really stand on their own and build their society, their community ....It was very clear to me that the church is the business of the people."

Ka Rick is also a Tinggian from Abra; though quiet and reserved, he is recognized hands down as the most captivating singer in Balweg's combat unit. During tense periods his soothing voice can often be heard from thick moss and trees intoning revolutionary ballads. As a translator and youth organizer in Abra, he was shot near the hip by a government agent. "I grabbed the gun barrel," he says, "so it couldn't discharge again. That's why I'm alive today." After weeks in the hospital, he joined the NPA. Today, he walks with a slight limp behind the other fighters and wears a cross made out of two spent M-16 casings.

The relationship between lowland and highland Filipinos is critical to the grand chess game in the country. In some countries, tribal peoples have been armed by foreign governments to combat other nationalist armies of the Left. The Montagnards of Indochina, the Khoi-khoi tribes in Namibia, and the Miskito Indians of Nicaragua have all had their populations divided over support for revolutionary movements. Why has the situation developed in the Cordillera more like that Guatemala or Chile where indigenous people are joining the Left en masse?

One answer can be found in the program of the National Democratic Front (NDF) of which both the CPP and NPA are members. It calls for the "right of self-determination" for the "national minorities" such s the Igorots, and the Islamic Moro peoples of Minanao. Self-determination, the NDF stresses, is necessary if the tribes are to join the other sectors of society; workers, peasants and students, in a democratic coalition government. Ka Jun, a CPP regional officer stationed at Balweg's camp claims that the NDF program goes beyond the "autonomy" offered in existing socialist countries, allowing the tribes a veto power over any resource development project.

The Igorots I have spoken with want to stay part of the Philippines and accept small-scale resource and technical development appropriate to their cultures. Balweg says, "The consciousness of our people in the Cordillera is we are Filipino people .... Our people, the minorities here in Cordillera, have always been the collective master of their society. And it's not for any outsider to destroy... Anybody who would not respect this, they have to confront it.... So it is up to them (the NDF) to prove that we respect each other, and we unite." A Kankaney student in the underground put it to me more bluntly: "At times there were problems—the lowland cadre didn't understand us as a nation....It's impractical for us to fight along, but we have to be respected. We don't want mistakes made here like in Nicaragua."

Most Filipino leftists agree that avoiding these "mistakes" means understanding the tribal cultures, respecting their integrity, and defending them as living, developing cultures rather than relics of the past. They do respect the tribes' closeness to the land, and how they have fought to protect it. Activists often stress what they see as the positive aspects of the societies, such as the "communal" system of labor exchange. "Marxism is basically the philosophy of the elimination of oppression of man over man," says Balweg. "It coincides to a great degree with the present stage of the minority wherein the communal life is very strong. Class society is not yet developed.... So in that way it is very similar."

Among some Christian and Marxist activists in the cordillera, one can detect the kind of romanticization of Western science that is common in the colonized nation. While they oppose large scale projects such as dams and nuclear plants, there is sometimes an air of condescension toward the "pagan superstitions" that are still strong in the villages. This criticism often barely mentions the poor track record of Western science toward nature, or the "material basis" for many so-called superstitions (though NPA medics do use herbal medicines). Balweg, for example, emphasizes scientific education—that a poor harvest may be caused by mice rather than angry gods. Yet he opposes eliminating any tribal beliefs. While MPA members at times seem uncritical of Western thought, they seem to have enough respect for the tribes not to impose their beliefs.

One story brought up by many Igorots concerns a large red bird called the "kuling." Igorot lore holds that if the kuling flies over and sings a certain way, it can be interpreted as a good or bad omen. Upon seeing the kuling, some NPA militia members would refuse to go any further. Some who did proceed were ambushed, "providing" the belief correct. So the NPA had long meetings on what to do about '"that bird." While some fighters ridiculed the whole idea, others tried to explain experiences they had after seeing the kuling. Perhaps, some said, the soldiers had frightened the bird into flight. Balweg urged the fighters to respect the culture even if they disagreed with it. He tells is own story: We were in a barrio when the military came... For their own safety the elders retreated with us .... All around us were surrounded, bombs were dropping nearby. It was very tense. And in the midst of all this, the elders stood aside and held a small ritual. They were talking with the birds... It was very touching."

One night at dinner, over rice and dried fish served in the main camp tent, Balweg is talking to me about the traditional religion of the Igorots. Ka Jun taps us both on the shoulders. With a worried expression he tells us that "We are in a military situation." Hundred of government troops have been flown in by helicopter to nearby towns; and two task forces totaling nearly 90 soldiers are moving in a pincer motions converging on the area. Balweg confers with his unit and gives the order: "Let them hit air." "They are trying to provoke a confrontation to find us," he says; "We won't give it to them."

That night some of the guerrillas sit around the campfire to sing and tell stories and jokes to alleviate the tension. Perhaps indicating the increasing distance of the CPP from China, Ka Jun tells "Chinese jokes." One comments on the current Chinese leader and his policies of commercialism, represented by the sale of Coca-Cola: "It's the real Deng," Other jokes focus on the Maoist era: Ka Victor, an NPA for 15 years, was in China in the 1960's seeing what he describes as "both positive and negative aspects."

Though alert, the guerrillas face the situation calmly. I tell Ka Jun that I had expected the NPA's to be a bunch of tough guys who would talk with cigarettes in their mouths and spit through their teeth. "We do recruit some tough guys," he laughs, "but they mellow out after joining." I have to admit the idea of someone "mellowing out" after joining an armed revolutionary organization hasn't occurred to me before. Yet the entire time in the guerrilla zone, I never hear a voice raised in anger, not an M-16 brandished to prove one's manhood.

Over the next three days I observe perhaps some of the reasons for the confident air about the NPA's. Though the government troops are approaching the vicinity, they have no guide and have lost any element of surprise. At all times we know where the soldiers are, how many there are, what they are asking the villagers, even what they are eating. Villagers constantly watch the soldiers in the woods, and send runners up to the camp with messages as well as rice supplies. One village violates its own taboo—of people entering or leaving during a sacred day—to provide this service.

One runner is roughly questioned by the soldiers, but keeps his message tacked away in his armpit. Another messengers wears the thick grass rain cape of the Igorot elders. Ka Lucas, a 77-year old Kalainga elder at the camp who was a guerrilla during World War II is the Political Officer of his village militia. He joined because of experiences with the military in his barrio including men being tied to banana trees and tortured. "Our customs and traditional ways are being destroyed," he say. "We join to recover our way...which is part of our inheritance from our ancestors."

One of the last major battles to take place in this area was about two months ago when the NPA raided the municipality of Sadanga. According to the account of the residents, shooting started at the town hall (the pockmarks of which are still visible). In the midst of the gun battle, a woman in a nearby house was giving birth. Balweg ordered a ceasefire while the family removed the mother and newborn infant, and then quickly forced the government soldiers to surrender. One local fighter today sports a military cap that he seized that day; and the baby was named "Conrado."

It is this type of incident that gives the NPA a Robin Hood image in the Cordillera and other Philippine regions. To throw off eavesdroppers, Filipinos can variously refer to the NPA as the "Nice People Around." "No Permanent Address," or, for priests like Balweg, "No Parish Assignment." The CPP is also sometimes called "Colgate-Palmolive Philippines."

"It was never we who would directly recruit," says Balweg, "but the community.... And they always say, "Do not surrender! And do not do anything that would shame your tribe!" He claims that villagers help the family of an NPA recruit with their harvesting and house-building.

This relationship between the guerrillas and villagers had not always been so close. "It used to be that the people would give us supplies because they were afraid of our guns" says Balweg, "So we now have a rule that we pay fairly for everything." (The money comes not from foreign governments, but from an elaborate "taxation" system; corporations operating in the vicinity pay up or face destruction of their equipment. Even CRC has to pay; logging operations have been suspended in some regions by the government to stem this form of fundraising).

Ka Victor also mentions an error the NPA made in the early 1970's when it carried out a major campaign against feudalism which advocated the collectivization of land. "There was only one small problem with that, he says; "There is no feudalism in the Cordillera. The land is already collective and the people told us so. We changed that one in a hurry."

With the more recent popularity of the NPA, the military has placed a 200,000 peso ($12,000) price on Balweg's head, but he seems unconcerned. When last year, Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile sent a personal message to the NPA Commander, requesting a meeting where he could convince Balweg to unconditionally surrender, Balweg publicly replied, "Catch me if you can."

"It's not hard to intimidate the soldiers," says Balweg. "Once when they came close, we threw rocks and yelled 'grandad!' (grenade). They ran away screaming for their mothers." He says that some soldiers "are realizing they are just pawn," and are providing information and even ammunition to the NPA. The regime will find it difficult to win at chess if indeed the "pawn" opt out.

Ka Tina, an 18-year old Kalinga, is one of the three women in the combat unit. Because of the male warrior tradition of the Igorots, fewer women join the NPA in Cordillera than in other regions. Tina left home four years ago, originally against her parents' will, but later with a "mutual understanding." She has been in a number of ambushes and once escaped from encirclement by government troops. She concurs with Balweg that these soldiers are not so brave in the field, and are especially shocked to be facing women rebels.

On the third day of the military offensive, the guerrillas meet at dawn to prepare for a retreat. The military has been sighted one and a half kilometers away, and mortar shelling has been heard. Tina is standing wrapped in a blanket near Balweg, who for brief moments tightens his face muscles and for the first time looks like a hunted man. He is to head seven others in a stay-behind group, which will protect the camp while the rest establish a new camp further up the mountain.

It is a beautiful morning as we climb the dry ridge, knee-deep in grass, camouflaging our backpacks with branches to avoid detection. Leading this group is Pedro Dungoc, a Kalinga from the village of Bugnay. After a half-hour of silent climbing, we hear in the distance seven shots from an Armalite, and bursts of M-60 fire. "They're clearing the forest ahead of their advance," says Dongoc, shaking his head; "A waste of ammunition."

Dungoc, knows as Ka AG (Aboveground) was, before 1981, an organizer against the dam project. He was seen as a deputy to Macli-ing Dulag, a pangat (traditional elder) who was considered the foremost leader in the tribal fight against the dam. When official presented Dulag with papers stating government ownership of tribal lands, he stated: "How can you own that which outlives you?"

Dulag and other pangats concluded peace pacts among themselves, to put an end to chronic intertribal wars, which prevented unity against the dams. Balweg claims that the role in conflicts between tribes and villages which threaten to erupt into warfare. NPA members are also not permitted to get embroiled in tribal warfare. The NDF publication Liberation claims that the NPA has arbitrated settlement in seven cases.

Macli-ing Dulag's role was seen as so threatening to the government's plans for the region that, on the night of April 24, 1980, a team allegedly led by an Army lieutenant shot him dead in his home. Dungoc's home was also raided, and he was shot in the left wrist. Every year, hundreds of Igorots and their supporters gather near the Chico River to commemorate the assassination and renew the peace pact.

After the shooting, Dungoc joined the NPA and eventually the CPP. (One-third of the guerillas are Party members, a figure which the Underground wants to reduce.) He says, "There is much concern for an individual to integrate into the tribe.... It is not the name Communist or Tribal that is important. What is important is how you deal... with your fellow man." However, he says, "There are some comrades from the lowlands. Of course they have the kind of living they have in the lowlands. In the Cordillera there is much difference. In the national issue we are fighting for the same cause, but there is a contradiction..." "If the NDF is sincere," he says, "The interests of the cultural minorities will be respected." But is they are not, he says, stroking his headband, he will keep fighting. He hopes, though, that he can join his wife and four children and be a farmer again.

Over a month later, On June 28, Dungoc and another guerilla would be killed as typhoon winds toppled a tree onto their camp shelter. At first the military would claim they were killed in battle.

Further up the mountain trails, the guerillas stop in a dense and damp corner of the forest. Within two hours, they build a completely new camp, using their bolo knives to hack out new tent poles. One who is particularly keen with his bolo is the former warrior chief of Bugnay who saw joining the NPA as a better way to defend the interest of his Butbut tribe than his old practice of battling other tribes.

One of his uncles, however, was earlier in the year accused of trying to ignite a tribal war between the Butbut and Sadanga peoples. After a series of warnings, the NPA wanted to expel or "eliminate" him. According to Balweg's version, the barrio folk instead wanted to "reform" him, but failed. When he persisted, Balweg said, they placed him under house arrest and later called for the NPA. A "Peoples' Court" was conducted outdoors, with all the people of Bugnay as 'judges." After being found guilty, he was privately "executed." His NPA cousin claims that he and other family members approved of the execution as a last resort, along with the rest of the Butbut.

Whatever the real story it is clear that the chess game is for keeps, and whoever is in the ay of the military—whether soldier, agent, informer or provocateur—it is fair game. When a rook or a knight is taken out of the game, it is not placed gently by the side of the board.

No one denies that the NPA is growing. A U.S. Senate Committee has estimated NPA strength in whole country at 30,000 regulars and irregulars, while the NPA claims 32,000 full-time and part-time fighters, two-thirds armed with high-powered rifles bought on the black market or captured. The NPA's are spread evenly throughout 58 provinces in the different regions of the country. If the guerillas and the generals are playing chess, the chess board is the 7m100 islands in the archipelago. A favorite joke of the NPA's is that they cannot repeat Chariman Mao's famous Long March which brought him to power, lest it turn into the "long Swim." Both the NPA and State Department agree that within 3-5 years, the NPA could reach a 'strategic stalemate" with the military at which point there's nowhere for the government to go but downhill.

In some ways the war in the Cordillera is similar to the usual guerrilla war in the Philippines (or in other countries) and in some ways it is different. It is a war where ingenuity and creativity ?throwing off old strategies and creating new ones—is the only way to encircle the king. The old military practices of "winning hearts and minds" is infinitely more complex than simply outsiders coming in to plow crops or build roads. It involves recognizing a cultural battle that has been waged for centuries.

It is a war where reclaiming culture is as important as recapturing territory. Like other indigenous peoples, the Igorots are faced with the perils, which come with Westernization, such as alcoholism and suicide. It is not uncommon to see a young woman in the traditional Bird Dance sporting a brand-new "Ghostbusters" t-shirt. But it is through political battles, the legal and underground activists say, that many youth are rediscovering their culture.

It is a war where future plans affect present realities—the promise of a Cordillera autonomous region ranks in importance with the establishment of a new guerrilla front. Whether or not the NDF is sincere to the Igorots is the key; as Balweg says, it will be "answerable to the people of the Cordillera."

It is a war where the long slow process of establishing trust with the villagers has proved more effective for the NPA than major offensives have for the military. After my leaving the Cordillera (which was accomplished with a mixture of luck and good timing), I would receive a letter from the underground describing "...the very heavy militarization they staged just after you left... It was the civilians who suffered the consequences—they had the real scare in their life. According to one of them it was just like World Ware II—bombs being dropped in the mountains and helicopters hovering all day long. As of now they have ceased their operations, maybe because they can't find anybody anywhere."

It is a war where the gongs of tribal dancers are as important as mortar shells, where rice terraces are as important as tanks, where omen birds are as important as armalites. Whoever is on the side of the culture has a better chance of winning, because it is the culture which has defeated all previous invaders. It is one ingredient that the NPA hopes will carry its chess game to Stalemate and, ultimately, to Checkmate.

Zoltan Grossman