Some People Need Killing: Book Review

Some People Need Killing is former Rappler reporter Patricia Evangelista's account of Duterte's drug war. 

The story is familiar to everyone. Duterte was elected as president of the Philippines in 2016 on the promise of killing drug users and criminals and cleaning up the country.  As Duterte warned:

“I’m telling the Filipino people, not me,” said the mayor. “It’s going to be bloody, because I will not sit there as president and just like any other regime, say, ‘That’s all I can do.’ If you put me there, do not fuck with me.”

But, Patricia notes, none of Duterte's supporters took his words literally. In fact to believe anything he said was to be meshed in a net of contradictions.

To vote for Rodrigo Duterte, you had to believe in certain things. You had to believe, for example, that he was a righteous man. You had to believe he wasn’t a rapist, and didn’t want to be a rapist. You had to believe he was poor, or was once poor, or had lived with the poor. You had to believe in destiny. You had to believe in God. You had to believe that God had a peculiar preference for deadly autocrats, because the presidency is destiny and Rodrigo Duterte was destined to lead.

To believe in Rodrigo Duterte, you had to believe he was brave. You had to believe he would cut America out of military agreements and that Barack Obama was a son of a bitch. You had to fear China, or you had to love China, or you had to believe, in the face of China’s territorial aggression, that Rodrigo Duterte was willing to ride a Jet Ski out into the open sea to plant a flag on the disputed islands China had seized.

To believe in Rodrigo Duterte, you had to believe he was a killer, or that he was joking when he said he was a killer. You had to believe in the specter of a narco state, or you had to believe that he was only playing to the crowd. You had to believe drug addiction is criminal, that drug addicts are not human, and that their massacre can be considered acceptable public policy. You had to believe he could make crime and corruption and illegal drugs disappear in three to six months. You had to believe that a mayor who kept peace by ordering undesirables out of his city could succeed in a country where undesirables were citizens too. You had to believe the intended dead would be drug lords and rapists, only drug lords and rapists, and not your cousins who go off into Liguasan Marsh to pick up their baggies of meth. You had to believe there would be a warning before the gunshots ring out.

To believe in Rodrigo Duterte, you had to believe he was just. You had to believe he was honest. You had to believe he was untainted by the oligarchy and beholden to no one. You had to believe he was your father. You had to believe he was your savior. You had to believe he loved you, because you love him enough to carry his name.

Months before the election Patricia collaborated on a Rappler series profiling each candidate and imagining how their presidency would play out. Of Duterte Patrica wrote:

In the three months before the presidential election, I collaborated on an opinion series with the sociologist Nicole Curato. The Imagined President was a series of presidential profiles published in Rappler, mapping the narrative arcs of every presidential candidate. We compared myth with reality in an attempt to understand what resonated with the voting public.

The final installment was published on May 2, seven days before the elections. It ended with a warning: “If Rodrigo Duterte wins,” we wrote, “his dictatorship will not be thrust upon us. It will be one we will have chosen for ourselves. Every progressive step society has made has been diminished by his presence. Duterte’s contempt for human rights, due process, and equal protection is legitimized by the applause at the end of every speech. We write this as a warning. The streets will run red if Rodrigo Duterte keeps his promise. Take him at his word—and know you could be next.”

I regretted those sentences within a day of publication. They were sensational, colorful, with none of the restraint expected of working journalists. I would have expunged them if I could.

On June 30, 2016, we became Duterte. The streets ran red.

The rest of the book is mostly a catalogue of how the streets ran red. 

Patricia documents particular killings, the involvement of vigilante groups such as the Confederate Sentinels Group (CSG), the attitude of the PNP, the deception of the PNP and their involvement in the killings, and her own journalistic endeavors. 

It is a matter of record that Duterte promised cops they would not be prosecuted for murder so long as they were doing their duty. 

The president offered every cop a promise. He would believe them if they claimed to have killed in the performance of duty. Every cop charged and convicted who followed his orders would be pardoned. “Don’t be afraid. Don’t be afraid to kill for as long as it’s those idiots, if they start to fuck with your city.”

So, the killings began. Every night the bodies piled up with each time the cops claiming the dead pulled a gun and the killing was done in self-defense as their duty. Analyzing many individual cases Patricia notes the PNP was getting an unbelievably high and accurate kill ratio:

More than a hundred suspects “who yielded” were arrested. All thirty- two suspects who offered armed resistance were shot and killed. There were no injured cops. There were no wounded suspects. To believe this narrative is to believe that local cops clocked a 100 percent kill rate, higher than the already improbable 97 percent reported by a Reuters investigative team in 2016, higher than the 83 percent of the notorious police shootings in Rio de Janeiro.

“Luckily,” wrote one Bulacan lieutenant colonel, “there were no casualties on the PNP side.”

Were they murders? The cops did not call these deaths murders. If they were not murders, was every Bulacan policeman, including the rawest of recruits, a marksman of such astonishing talent that every random armed encounter was met with such fatal accuracy? If they were not murders, how was it possible that police reported no casualties after twenty-five separate gunfights inside a single twenty-four-hour period? And if they were not murders, did every suspect who shot at the police miss the target?

Luck, said the police.

Good, said the president.

Patricia spends a good deal explaining how language was subverted, not just to describe the drug war, but also in everyday parlance. Take for instance the word "salvage."

There are other terms for this. Extrajudicial killing. Vigilante-style murder. Targeted assassination. In the Philippines, a specific word evolved for this specific sort of death. The word is salvage.

Contronyms are Janus words, two-faced and adversarial. An alarm can turn off, or it can go off. A moon might be out as the lights go out. Contronyms mean the opposite of themselves, occupying an abstract category of the English language. He left; she was left. He ran fast; she held fast. He sanctioned the killings; she sanctioned the killers.

Salvage, in my country, is a contronym. It is a hopeful word everywhere else. To salvage is to rescue, regardless of whether the salvaged is a ship or a soul. Salvage and salvation are rooted in the same word—salvus, “to save.” So sayeth the book of Luke: “And Jesus said to him, this day is salvation come to this house, as much as he also is a son of Abraham, for the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.”

During the drug war no one was killed, they were neutralized. 

Here is another word for death. The word is neutralized.

Project Double Barrel, laid out in Command Memorandum Circular No. 16-2016, seeks, among other goals, the “neutralization of illegal drug personalities nationwide.” Human rights lawyers argue it is an order to kill.

On the basis of that word, they have challenged the entire drug war apparatus at the high court.

Nowhere in the memorandum, or elsewhere in Philippine law, is the word neutralization defined. “Neutralize means to kill,” wrote the lawyers of the Free Legal Assistance Group.

The government insisted that to neutralize meant only “to overcome resistance.” Whether that meant to disable or to kill depended on the exigencies of the moment. Those moments are many. Twenty-six-year-old Raymond Yumul of Concepcion in Tarlac was neutralized. Jeffrey Cruz of Carcel Street in Quiapo was neutralized. Samar native Wilfredo Chavenia was “neutralized while the other suspect managed to escape.” John Ryan Baluyot of Olongapo City was “completely neutralized.” Two unnamed male suspects, distinguished only by the color of their shirts—one white, one gray—were both neutralized. Fernando Gunio of Quezon City, who “sensed the presence of police operatives,” allegedly pulled out a handgun and fired, forcing the police to “neutralize the said suspect.” Forty-two- year-old Arnel Cruz and fifty-one-year-old Oliver Reganit “were neutralized before they could hide in the middle of the cornfield.” Renato dela Rosa, alias Jay-jay Toyo, after allegedly opening fire, was cornered and “subsequently neutralized by the responding police officers.”

Each of these men is dead, but in the official reports of all these cases, none of them were referred to in the narrative of events as killed. They were neutralized, verb and noun, as was narrated by the Bulacan officers who shot Justine Bucacao and Bernard Lizardo: “Neutralized suspects sustained gunshot wounds on different parts of their bodies.”

Then there is the word "good." Duterte called the drug war killings "maganda 'yun." But as Patricia informs us Duterte did not mean the killings were "good" he meant they were "beautiful."

“Thirty-two died early in Bulacan in a massive raid,” said President Duterte. “Maganda ‘yun.”

In Filipino, maganda means “beautiful.” It can also mean “good.” It was unclear what the president meant that afternoon in August, but there was a reason every English-language local news organization chose to use the word good instead of beautiful. Good, as egregious a judgment as it was, was far less outrageous than beautiful. Beautiful would have offered an element of pleasure, a romanticizing of brutality, the impression that the commander in chief of a democratic republic was not just pleased but delighted by the ruthless killing of his citizens.

Those of us who wrote of the president and his frequent incitements to violence did so in good faith, offering the benefit of the doubt to a man whose rambling threats had come to target members of the free press. We translated his putang ina into “son of a bitch” instead of “son of a whore.”

We repeated his spokespersons’ smiling excuses, their explanations that the president should be taken “seriously, not literally,” that his words required “creative imagination” in their interpretation, and that it was only “heightened bravado” that had him encouraging his soldiers to rape on the battlefield.

I quoted the president’s statement on my own social media page: “ ‘Thirty-two died early in Bulacan in a massive raid,’ said President Duterte. ‘That’s good.’ ”

A reader left a comment. “For the record, he did not say 32 dead was a good thing,” he wrote. “Duterte said it was beautiful. Let not the perversity be lost in translation.”

Here then is what the president said in the late afternoon of August 16, 2017.

“Thirty-two died early in Bulacan in a massive raid. That’s beautiful. If we can kill another thirty-two every day, then maybe we can reduce what ails the country.”

It is rather odd that Patricia speaks of writing "the President and his frequent incitements to violence did so in good faith, offering the benefit of the doubt." After already noting that he threatened to kill and after writing a profile warning "the streets will run red if Rodrigo Duterte keeps his promise. Take him at his word." What benefit of the doubt was there to give except to take him at his word which she says is literal? 

During Duterte's term and even now the argument rages on whether Duterte ever ordered the cops to kill anyone. Yet, that is exactly what happened as soon as he was elected. Why? Because he told the cops to do so. Likewise the killings stopped when Duterte told the cops to stop killing. This came about because of the killing of South Korean businessman Jee Ick Joo.

The story made the international news. The South Korean embassy called for an investigation. The Senate held hearings. Two police officers were charged with, one later convicted of, the crime kidnapping with homicide. There were reports the victim’s head had been wrapped in packing tape and his corpse cremated—before a panicked funeral parlor employee flushed the ashes down a toilet.

It was seven months after the declaration of the drug war. More than seven thousand were dead, and only then was Rodrigo Duterte finally willing to concede his cops had done wrong. “I apologize for the death of your compatriot,” he told the South Korean government in a public address. “We are very sorry that it had to happen.”

The chief of the Philippine National Police, Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa, stood before the media and said the police would “focus on internal cleansing.” He said he would have preferred to kill the cops involved, if only it were legal. He called the crime offensive. He would “melt in shame if I could.”

President Rodrigo Duterte called the incident an embarrassment but refused Dela Rosa’s offer to resign. On January 30, 2017, the president suspended the same police institution he had empowered from participation in the war against drugs. Police antidrug units were dissolved. He called the police “the most corrupt, corrupt to the core.” He called them criminals. The war would continue, but there would be no more police operations against illegal drugs.

On that night, every drug war journalist I knew gathered at the press office of the Manila Police District. We waited. There were no crime scenes that night. No drug addict died; no dealer was shot. Not in Manila, not in Caloocan, not in Cebu or Navotas or the slums of Quezon City. The president had spoken, and for the first time in seven months—with the exception of Christmas Day—no new names were added to the death count. It came as no surprise that the cops kept their guns holstered, but the vigilantes did too. There were no salvagings, no drive-by shootings, no masked gunmen kicking down doors of suspected meth dealers. The uniformed militia stood down, and so did, if the reports were to be believed, the killers they employed. The death toll stopped at 7,080.

The war, or what had been called the war, ended with the flush of a toilet.

How can anyone read that and come away with any other conclusion than the PNP was working off the orders of Duterte?

The book ends with a discussion of how many were killed during the drug war and profiles the regret of several former Duterte supporters. Needless to say the exact number of the dead will never be known.

I cannot, with any certainty, report the true toll of Rodrigo Duterte’s war against drugs. Numbers cannot describe the human cost of this war, or adequately measure what happens when individual liberty gives way to state brutality. Even the highest estimate—over 30,000 dead—is likely insufficient to the task.

When the intention is to lie, numbers can make extraordinary liars. Even government agencies fail to agree on how many the police killed in alleged antidrug operations. The PNP’s Directorate for Operations put those deaths at 7,884 in August 2020. The government’s communications office, two years later, lowered the total to 6,252 in May 2022. The last of the DUI numbers was released in 2019, but the number is meaningless in determining drug-related deaths, conflated as it is with every possible variation of homicide.

The truth is almost certainly much higher. A study by Columbia University’s Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism estimated that government figures were “a gross underestimation of the extent of drug- related killings in the Philippines.” The Supreme Court demanded all documents on the “total of 20,322 deaths during the Duterte administration’s anti-drug war.” The Commission on Human Rights chairperson Chito Gascon said the number of drug-related deaths could go “as high as 27,000.” International Criminal Court prosecutor Fatou Bensouda said that “between 12,000 and at least 20,000 killings” were committed in relation to the drug war.

Of course all these numbers are called baseless propaganda by the government. 

While Patricia writes a compelling narrative about the facts of the drug war one thing she does not do is offer a reason as to why it happened. She gives a "what" but not a mechanism of "why." Perhaps one quote from the book offers insight. At the funeral of one drug war victim several people dressed like PNP officers showed up. But they were not cops. They were "force multipliers" going by the name of Philippines Hotline Movement Incorporated (PHMI). One observer commented:

“They look like idiots,” Vincent Go said, when I caught a ride with him to the cemetery. “That’s the thing with Filipinos. They put on a uniform, and suddenly they think they’re kings. Even during the pandemic, even in the villages, even if they’re just security guards. They’re so proud of their outfits, their vests, something changes inside of them. Clueless morons thinking they’re enforcing the law, but really they have no goddamn clue what they’re doing.”

Why did the drug war happen as it did? Why did the PNP kill with impunity and why do they continue to be a corrupt organization? Because of those uniforms which imbue them with a sense of superiority and bestows upon them their power. They are cops, a brotherhood, who can do whatever they want without consequence because they stand above the crowd. As Gaspar de San Augustin wrote in 1720:

43. They act tyrannically one toward another. Consequently, the Indian who has some power from the Spaniard is insolent and intolerable among, them—so much so that, in the midst of their ingratitude, some of them recognize it, although very few of them. Yet it is a fact that, if the Spaniards had not come to these islands, the Indians would have been destroyed; for, like fish, the greater would have swallowed the lesser, in accordance with the tyranny which they exercised in their paganism.

http://www.philippinehistory.net/views/1720sanagustinb.htm

During the Referendum of 1599 Filipinos thanked the Spanish from saving them from the tyranny of their chiefs. 

The bishop of Nueva Segovia, Don Fray Pedro de Soria, collected those Indians together, by order of his Majesty, and told them of the advantages of the Spanish monarchy, and how beneficial it would be for them to have Don Felipe, the king of the Spaniards, as their king, who would protect them peacefully and with justice. The chiefs answered not a word to this. Thereupon, the bishop spoke again and asked them whether they had understood the words he had spoken to them, and if they would answer. Thereupon a clownish Indian arose and said: “We answer that we wish the king of España to be our king and sovereign, for he has sent Castilians to us, who are freeing us from the tyranny and domination of our chiefs, as well as fathers who aid us against the same Castilians and protect us from them.”

https://philippinefails.blogspot.com/2021/11/the-philippine-referendum-of-1599.html

In the Philippines it has always been the way of the ruling class to oppress the masses even before the Spanish arrived. The tendency towards tyrannical rule is in the blood of Filipinos.

But rare, non-existent really, is the journalist, the writer, the researcher who will investigate the Philippines by noting racial characteristics unique to Filipinos and extrapolating from those traits a reason for Filipino society being the way it is. Thankfully Gaspar de San Augustin was not afraid to do so.

Book Review: Conspiracies and Controversies: Philippines' Favorite Conspiracy Theories and Most Controversial Filipinos of the 20th Century

Conspiracies and Controversies: Philippines' Favorite Conspiracy Theories and Most Controversial Filipinos of the 20th Century is a book chock full of so much conspiratorial terminology and references that the casual reader might get lost in the verbiage. The prose can also be a bit rambling as the author rehashes obscure stories from arcane magazines which could very well be mere opinion. And how can one tell the difference between fact and fancy when access to those magazines is not so easy being that most of them are from the 80's, a time when digitization was not a common  practice?

https://www.amazon.com/Conspiracies-Controversies-Dr-Erick-Juan/dp/1536898392

Nevertheless many of the author's sources are available online and not so out of reach to the reader with a black belt in Google-fu. Erick San Juan is also the author of Marcos Legacy Revisited: Raiders of the Lost Gold. Let us not forget the editor of that book wrote:

How much of Erick's book is based on fact, and how much on conjecture, is difficult to say. What is easy to conclude is that if there is one single person who has looked at the gold from a wide range of angles and has accumulated wheel-barrow loads of documentation, that person is Erick.

p. xi

https://philippinefails.blogspot.com/2022/02/book-review-marcos-legacy-revisited.html 

Alas, this volume gives the reader no such warning to heed but such caution is necessary.  

The entire book can be summed up on pages 100-101.

After all has been said and done, our political and military leaders will come to the inevitable conclusion which many around the world before them have to realized, that "It is not ultimately ‘humanity’, but a frighteningly small conclave of political figures — some more or less ‘democratically elected’, some not — who wield the authority of life and death over the entire planet. Some of them are intelligent and responsible, but some are unimaginative, insensitive, even positively stupid. Some are manifestly incompetent. Some are arguably insane, to one or another degree. Yet it is they who, with a signature appended to a document, or even with a single spoken word, can send individuals into battle, can determine people’s nationalities, can dictate the circumstances in which one lives, can pronounce where one can go or cannot go, what one can do or cannot do. It is they who, for example, by drawing a line on a paper map, can conjure a ‘frontier’ into being, a barrier as restrictive and insurmountable as any physical wall...And it is they, not ‘humanity’, who, if there is indeed to be an apocalypse, will bring it about."

Frightening, isn't it. But look what they have done to our country and the rest of the world since the turbulent 1960s. We are headed toward a one-way Socialist "new world order." Only then will our distinguished RAM officers and their men fully realized that, just like the 1896 Revolution, the 1986 EDSA Revolt was not a spontaneous people power uprising, but a well-planned, foreign-hatched conspiracy which used Filipino stoolpigeons.

pgs. 100-101

Yes, indeed, the post-Vatican II Liberation-Theology-promoting-Catholic Church, Jewish Bankers, the Committee of 300, the World Council of Churches, the CIA, the Trilateral Commission, the Bilderberg Group, the Illuminati, the IMF, George Soros, and every other nefarious conspiratorial group is seeking to bring the Philippines under the boot heel of the New World Order. That quote above, by the way, is from The Messianic Legacy - Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh & Henry Lincoln which is the sequel to their debunked and discredited book Holy Blood, Holy Grail. 

Here are two among many documents Erick San Juan cites to prove this conspiracy.

https://larouchepub.com/eiw/public/1985/eirv12n44-19851108/eirv12n44-19851108_040-the_philippines_scenarios_and_op.pdf

https://larouchepub.com/eiw/public/1986/eirv13n29-19860725/eirv13n29-19860725_037-the_cv_starr_foundation_dope_inc.pdf

Of course "The Jew" is behind all of the aforenamed groups.

Rapacity is a passion which has become the Jew's second nature and to which he instinctively lends obedience. The lust of gain is so strongly entrenched in his organism that it overrides every other feeling, every other passion. He knows no respect. If you sneer at him, he rages like a tiger. His only life in aim is gain. Hence, everything which does not have this object in view deserves no attention from him.

The Jew's unlimited rapacity puts him in an everlasting antagonism to the rest of mankind. This is why he wages war against all other men. This rage lead the Jew to believe that men exist only to cheat and devour one another. The maxim, "Dalawang klase lang ang tao sa mundo...isang manloloko at isang naloloko," which has become a favorite saying among Filipinos is of Jewish descent. In this rivalry between men, it is the Jew;s option that the most cunning and rapacious must, in the end, devour the others. For them, this is the supreme law of the jungle, which is now being widely used by the Neo-Malthusian globalists and free traders.

pg. 9

That saying Erick quotes translates as, "There are only two kinds of people in this world, the deceiver and the deceived." To this effect even Misuari has been deceived by the Jews and their front organizations.

Misuari's political moves - his use of propaganda- only show who his real employers are: the globalists, free traders and narcotic legalizers whose objective is to destroy nation-states.

pg. 10

Of course the Muslim Independence Movement was not about Independence. It's all about the Jews destabilizing the Philippines. 

Here in the Philippines, the same "balkanization" process in unfolding before our eyes. It's the Christians and Moslems slaughtering each other, while their Jewish masters laugh.

pg. 6

Funny how Erick San Juan paints the globalists as being very bad for the Philippines and yet claims in the preface that he is not fighting them.

To prove that history does not just happen is my primary reason for writing this book. How can it be when conspiracy is one of its active ingredients?

I am not fighting the globalists nor any other organization. I just want the Filipinos to know what's really going onto that our leaders and compatriots would know what to do.

pg. vi

If his purpose is not to fight the globalists then why even bother? Perhaps he is a globalist? Perhaps he is engaging in what is known as "revelation of the method?"  What are Filipinos to do? They don't run the government. They elect people to run the government and then those people do whatever they fancy. And make no mistake that the Philippines is firmly entrenched in the World Order even in the New World Order. One wonders what Erick would think about the Duterte administration kowtowing to the WHO as regards the pandemic or even The Hague ruling on the WPS. Most importantly what would he think about a President who was married to a Jew and whose half-Jewish daughter is currently the Vice President and poised to become the next President. 

The second part of this book is about several controversial figures. These figures include Cory Aquino, Cardinal Sin, Imelda Marcos, Potenciano Illusario (the director of Maharlika who cast Dovie Beams), Ninoy Aquino, Ramos, and Erap. 

The chapters on the Aquinos are the longest at 27 pages for Cory and 45 pages for Ninoy. Both are accused of heinous activities and conspiracies against the Philippines and Filipinos. Concerning Ninoy Erick San Juan writes:

Is it possible therefore to say that it was indeed Masonic teaching which molded Ninoy Aquino to what he was highly suspected of: a cold-blooded, ambitious politician who had no scruples about eliminating his rivals? History tells us to conclude affirmatively.

pg. 137

Erick San Juan then proceeds to give a litany of facts from a variety of sources to back up this claim. Many of these sources are not available online and would require lots of legwork at a university library to verify.  The book "This is Ninoy" is one of his sources but it is only available on library shelves far out of my domain.

https://books.google.com.ph/books/about/This_is_Ninoy.html?id=nM1wAAAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y

Of Cardinal Sin, who was instrumental in the 1986 EDSA People Power Erick writes:

But what about Sin and Bacani? Are they not to be blamed for the spiritual death of millions of Filipino Catholics whom they have "judaized?"

pg. 105

Why Erick employs the term "judaized" I have no idea because his truck is with post-Vactican II Liberation Theology of which he treats extensively throughout the book. There is nothing Jewish about Vatican II.

There is nothing critical written about Imelda. Erick relates two stories concerning her that are brushed off as being, "Ha, ha! That' so Imeldific!" The first one is about the time she was contemplating jumping bail and returning to the Philippines disguised as a nun and then hiding out at the INC's compound. The second is the well-known snub of the Beatles. As regards the latter he writes:

The thing is, during those days, one must never f__k around with the likes of Imelda Marcos, if knowingly, he does not have the backing of the Royal British Army.

pg. 123

How charming. The thing is this book is about the "Most Controversial Filipinos of the 20th Century" and Erick San Juan only gives Imelda Marcos a scant 7 pages! That is scandalous and shows where his biases lie. In fact there is no chapter devoted to Ferdinand Marcos who is by far the "Most Controversial Filipino of the 20th Century." Instead Marcos, Erap, and Ramos are depicted as victims of the globalists. 

The bottom line is this book falls in the genre of speculative conspiracy and Erick San Juan fails to give any concrete proof for many of his claims. That makes many of its conclusions questionable.  The Muslim Independence Movement was orchestrated by the Jews to destabilize the Philippines?? How ridiculous especially given the long history of the Moros vs the Spanish.  It's not as if the Philippines has ever been stable anyway. 

There are a lot of facts and data stuffed on every single page but as even Erick San Juan writes concerning Alfred McCoy and which is just as applicable to this book:

"He writes very well. He's an extremely seductive analyst because he can marshal data to support his claims," Robles insists.

Don't they all do? I mean the paid hacks.

The great American industrialist Henry Ford said: "history is bunk." Napoleon Bonaparte called it "a collection of lies statesmen hav agreed upon." For countless generations already, history is what happens in history books.

So far, a Catholic scholar was able to capture history's most fitting definition when he said, "Education rests on texts revised with every shift in public policy."

pg. 196

Perhaps if Erick San Juan wrote this book today he would no doubt add Ella Cruz's unwise dictum, "History is like tsismis."

A Filipino Remake of The Lord of the Rings

The new Rings of Power TV show is set to debut on September 2nd and the whole world is excited. Even the fan boys who have examined every detail of every frame of the trailer and of the cast interviews and absolutely hate it are excited. They are going to meme the heck out of it.

One of the things about this new series we keep hearing about is "representation" meaning, "We need more people of color in the show." But why? Do people have to look like you in order for you to enjoy or relate to a show? Squid Game was a massive worldwide success and it's a South Korean TV show. I enjoy the films of Akria Kurosawa and I am not Japanese.  Neither are the many Weebs who binge anime!

That is all a prelude to this, a Philippine version of the Lord of the Rings.

https://interaksyon.philstar.com/breaking-news/2018/04/03/123785/abs-cbn-remake-lord-of-the-rings-poll-facebook/

ABS-CBN seems to be delegating casting decisions to social media in conducting informal polls on a supposed Filipino remake of “The Lord of the Rings” franchise.

Last week, the Kapamilya network polled Facebook users on actors and actresses they think would be best to play the main characters in JRR Tolkien’s classic trilogy — Lady Galadriel, Arwen Undómiel, Legolas Greenleaf and Frodo Baggins — if a remake were in the works.

"Among these Kapamilya actresses, who would you like to play Galadriel if there is a remake of 'The Lord of the Rings'?" one of the posts says.

ABS-CBN, however, has yet to formally announce if there is any serious pursuit to produce a Filipino version of the epic. The polling came ahead of the network’s Holy Week Filipino-dubbed television broadcast of Peter Jackson’s acclaimed trilogy.

Whether ABC-CBN was serious about remaking the Lord of the Rings or not is moot now since the bootlickers in the Duterte administration denied them a franchise renewal. 

But what is important to note is that Filipinos, who are not British, and anyone who knows Tolkien knows he wrote the Lord of the Rings as a myth and legend for his own country of Britain, care about his world. 

While many chose their picks, not everyone welcomed the idea. Fans questioned the television giant’s ability to equal the award-winning production.

“Dear ABS-CBN, please don’t ruin the movie. You will just humiliate yourself. I’m pretty sure you cannot give justice to it,” commented one Facebook user.

Another Facebook user asked to respect the vision of the author: "LOTR is the best movie with good graphics and good story. If you can't match it, don't remake it!"

Just look at those comments. These people know what's up. Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings film series was a flash in the pan. It was lightning in a bottle. It will never be repeated. Yeah he changed some things because that is what happens during an adaption but the Spirit is there. Christopher Tolkien hated them but of course he would since he was the gatekeeper of his father's life work. Sadly Simon Tolkien, the grandson of Professor Tolkien, who is the new gatekeeper says Peter Jackson was too faithful which is why he wanted him to have nothing to do with the new Rings of Power series. 

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What's important to note here is this work of fiction is beloved by so many people all around the world. People that nave nothing to do with the ethnic group for whom Tolkien wrote. This is because the themes are universal and timeless. In fact Tolkien confessed that it is a Catholic work and there are billions of Catholics. The world does not need a black elf or the first black female dwarf to be able to get lost in Middle Earth.  All we need is a cozy nook in which to crack open Tolkien's books. The magic works all on its own. Even, perhaps especially, in the very Catholic Philippines.

Book Review: Marcos Legacy Revisited: Raiders of the Lost Gold

Marcos Legacy Revisited: Raiders of the Lost Gold reads like a collection of short stories with a similar theme more than a book with a coherent singular story. That's because each chapter focuses on a different account concerning the Marcos gold narrative. What this book ultimately reveals is that no one knows the truth about Marcos' gold. There are too many conflicting reports, eyewitness accounts, and documents. The majority of the stories in this book are based on unproven and unprovable speculation.

Even the editor of this book says she does not know if the author, Erick San Juan, is being factual.

How much of Erick's book is based on fact, and how much on conjecture, is difficult to say. What is easy to conclude is that if there is one single person who has looked at the gold from a wide range of angles and has accumulated wheel-barrow loads of documentation, that person is Erick.

p. xi

While looking at a subject from a "wide range of angles" is usually a strength, this approach ultimately only serves to cause a lot of doubt. This is because Erick San Juan is very clear about what is the source of the Marcos gold. It is not the Yamashita treasure as many claim. 

...the Marcos gold haul is separate and distinct from the Yamashita treasure. The former dwarfs the latter, in terms of the total amount involved.

A close friend, privileged to have read the contents of Marcos' last will and testament, swears that when he scanned the document about seven years ago, he realized he was actually looking at a few sheets of paper worth US$947 billion!

p. 2

Erick says the Yamashita treasure cannot be the Marcos gold because the Japanese successfully shipped all of that gold back to Tokyo and used it as a loan to the Illuminati in exchange for Western technology.

Moreover, the Japanese war booty was successfully shipped to Tokyo after the first route of Gen. Tomoyuki Yamashita, from Singapore to Mongolia, and the rest kept in the Philippines by officers of the Japanese imperial forces, after having been buried in 172 carefully selected sites within the Philippine archipelago, prior to 1945. It was largely made up of gold bars, assorted jewelry and religious artifacts seized from the ship Awa Maru, General Percival, and the defeated British forces of Malaya and Singapore.

Later, the Japanese government used a big chunk of it as an "investment loan" to the "Illuminati," in exchange for Anglo-Saxon technology which it badly needed to rebuild the ravaged Land of the Rising Sun.

p. 3

Erick does bring up the discovery of the golden Buddha by Rogelio Roxas in 1970 but he dismisses it saying no other evidence of the Yamashitsa treasure still being in the Philippines has ever been found.

Aside from the rare discovery by Roxas, no other evidence indicating that the treasure of Yamashita really existed was ever found. Clearly, the Japanese succeeded in shipping everything that was looted to Japan. It was to be Tokyo's solid investment and contribution to the all-powerful rulers of the world, the Illuminati, which helped transform Japan into a superpower despite its humiliating defeat in the hands of the Allied Forces.

p. 29

Because the author is certain that the Yamashita treasure is not the source of Marcos' gold hoard that makes every single story in this book which does revolve around that narrative false. Maybe. Again, nothing in this book is anywhere near being certain. So, where did Marcos get his gold? Ferdinand Marcos' gold fortune was actually stolen from the Vatican. 

In a recent communication to the Inquirer's editor-in-chief, Letty J. Magasanoc, Tagle revealed, among other things, that Marcos had obtained his wealth from Father Jose Antonio Diaz, the Vatican's Filipino-Spanish treasure, whose expertise in handling the Holy See's priceless possessions gained for him the complete trust of Pope Pius XII, a trust he would later betray.

Jsut before the outbreak of World War II, Tagle continued, Father Diaz returned to the Philippines to secretly carry out his Mose prized agenda. He changed his identity to "Colonel Severino Sta. Romana," to better carry out his devious plan to transfer the Vatican gold bullion and treasures to his personal accounts in various banks. He then befriended a young, brilliant lawyer in the person of Ferdinand E. Marcos, who willingly helped him carry out his clandestine activities. In exchange, Diaz taught the young Marcos everything he needed to master in the art of international gold trading. One proof of this special relationship is the fact that Marcos attended the inaugural ceremony of U.S. President Harry S. Truman as the official representative of J.A. Diaz & Company, a listed firm in the New York Stock Exchange.

p. 5

So, where is the proof that Marcos attended the inauguration of Harry Truman? Erick San Juan does not provide any proof for that claim. In fact despite the almost 200 pages of appendixes showing various documents most of the claims in this book are not sourced. One is left to go searching for proof but the only things that come up are quotes from this book! A Google search does show us a picture of Marcos on the website of the Truman Library.

https://www.trumanlibrary.gov/photograph-records/2013-3136

Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos (standing) delivering a speech during the inaugural ceremony for the Pacific War Memorial. Seated behind him are United States Ambassador to the Philippines G. Mennen Williams (front row, third from the left), Philippine First Lady Imelda Marcos (fourth from left), and Nancy (Mrs. G. Mennen) Williams (fifth from left). All others are unidentified. The memorial is located on the island of Corregidor, Philippines. June 22, 1968

It is not my job to fact check this book but many of the stories told are simply not possible. I am speaking of the amount of gold and amount of money allegedly owned by Marcos.

I have seen documents  saying that the gold under the control of the umbrella (there are smaller stocks not reported to or controlled by the umbrella) is in the neighborhood of 1.33 million metric tons (MT). Whether one believes this figure or a lessor figure is not material given the magnitude of the entire scenario. One metric ton of gold is worth about $11 million. The Phippines' annual gold production is estimated at between 40-60 metric tons. The world's "legal" annual gold production, which is regulated by the London gold cartel so as not to upset gold pricesas well as the value of currencies of the world, is estimated at between 1,200 to 1,400 metric tons.

p. 46

That is from a report by PTV4 given to Cory Aquino. The Umbrella is 54 people tasked by Marcos to manage his assets in the event of his death. Who are they? We are never told. This report also says that the Yamashita treasure

...appears to be the basis for the Marcos' hidden wealth.

p. 43

That effectively makes this story a lie from the author's viewpoint. There are also not 1.33 million metric tons of gold in the world. The total amount of gold ever mined in the entire world is 166,500 tonnes. Of course there is no official figure on the total amount of gold ever mined and estimates vary. But it is simply not believable that Marcos had in his possession 1.33 million metric tons of gold in various accounts.

One man, Larry Henares, claims he got a figure of 400,000 tonnes!

Just how much gold are we talking here? No one knows exactly. But Hilarion (Larry) Henares, the national economic adviser of the Macapagal, administration has given us something slightly better than a ballpark figure.

"At thee time I was appointed chairman of the Gold Commission, I inspected three sites in Metro Manila where the gold was stored. The highest authority told me that the total gold amounted to 400,000 metric tons. One metric ton of gold is equal 32.151 troy ounces,  is worth at $400 per ounce, $12,860,400. Multiply 400,000 tons of gold, we get $53,144,160,000,000 or more than $5 Trillion." These figures, which appeared in Henares' regular Inquirer column (Make My Day), have probably reached the $15 Trillion mark interests included and compounded. 

'This gold can transform this country into a prosperous and powerful nation, with the right kind of leaders," Henares added. "But I do not trust the Cory government, I do not trust her economic advisers, the Council of Trent who will only steal the gold for themselves. I do not trust the Americans who need our gold to save their floundering economy."

p. 91

That figure is not believable in the slightest yet we are to believe he got it from an official government source.

As for the value of Marcos' wealth, it varies. The highest amount given in this book is $50 trillion.

During the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee hearing on October 14, 1997, Tagle claimed that his findings are the result of 10 long years of research which brought him to places like Hong Kong, Switzerland, Singapore, the Bahamas, London, New York and Canada, among other countries. 

"It is very difficult to uncover the Marcos assets or estates, because it is tied to many accounts linked to the Sta. Romana Estates,” says Tagle. “Through intricate maneuvers and appointment of many nominees, trustees, and coded accounts, President Marcos, acting as legal counsel and chief trustee of Col. Severino Sta. Romana had succeeded in isolating the nominees or trustees of the gold certificates from the physical assets, so much so, that it is almost impossible to recover them without collecting the various pieces (of the puzzle).” Tagle likewise disclosed that foundations were used to hide the accounts amounting to a whopping “$50 Trillion.” 

p. 16

If that is all true then why did Tagle, just two years later, claim the Marcos gold was worth only $10 trillion?

A former Catholic priest here claims to have evidence that the alleged Marcos gold horde is composed of World War II “Yamashita gold and Vatican gold.’ Ex-priest Marcelino Tagle of Bataan, a former director of Caritas Manila and one of the nation’s “Ten Outstanding Young Men’ in 1967,said in a recent interview that the nation “should benefit’ from the Marcos gold, which he estimated at “10 trillion dollars.’

https://falconbase2008.wordpress.com/2015/06/23/the-secret-history-of-marcos-wealth/

None of the figures in this book are believable. They are out of all proportion. And they all contradict one another. The fact is no one knows how much Marcos was ever worth or how much gold he had or the state of all that alleged wealth now. Erick makes it clear that Marcos told lies as a smokescreen to hide his wealth.

But the tales about the huge treasure purportedly given to USAFFE Major Ferdinand E. Marcos during the dark days of the Second World War which became the basis of his fortune (then estimated to be $35 billion) are nothing more than a cleverly concocted diversionary tactic floated by Marcos himself, a smokescreen to confuse the “raiders of the lost gold”, so that none of them would know exactly where the lost bullion is deposited. 

There is, however, one thing which Marcos overlooked: The Swiss banks are booby traps used by the Elite to trap the unwary. Four years ago, The SPOTLIGHT ran an article on how the Rothschild Bank in Zurich, owned by Baron Elie de Rothschild of London, had been charged with embezzling money from an estate. The article warned of possible trouble when leaving an estate in Switzerland. I couldn’t agree more. However, those who are foolish enough to choose a bank owned by international rip-off artists can expect to have trouble. 

p. 3-4

The entire book can be summed up on page 97:

The mystery of the Marcos gold remains a mystery, incurring heavy losses on those who dare to uncover it.

Well, the curse of Marcos gold is not stopping the Raiders from attempting to retrieve it. And just who are the Raiders of the Lost Gold? Jewish Bankers and the Illuminati.

Who will get the Marcos Gold Haul in the end? Will it be the Philippine government acting on behalf of the Filipino people and the Marcos heirs? Or, will it be the Raiders [Khazarian-Bolshevik-Zionist-Bankster Jews] and their One-World apparatus? 

The odds, of course, are very much stacked against us, simply because we have a natural knack for “not getting our act together”. The wily opposition is exploiting this chink in our armor to the hilt, to compound the problem. Can anyone count the number of paid CIA and U.S. State Department hacks operating in and out of our government? 

We are facing an extremely powerful group of counter-claimants. Very few people are aware that the Bank Secrecy Act of 1936 was enacted expressly to protect this group’s assets from being taken over by the Nazis. The same law also made it impossible to trace Jewish money in flight from Germany to Switzerland—something the Germans regarded as “an unfriendly gesture on the part of the Swiss against them”. In short, nothing ever happens, neither in international banking nor in geopolitics, without the knowledge of this group of financial oligarchs. 

p. 11

That bit in brackets about the Bankster Jews is not in the book. It is in the September 2, 2006 edition of the Phoenix Journal Review on page 5. Parts of the book were printed in that magazine. Basically it's the Philippines vs the Illuminati. Who will win? Apparently Marcos.

The aborted deal of  The Corporation International with the late Pres. Ferdinand Marcos (better known as the Trilateral Commission) involved an agreement in which the president was promised power for life and a guarantee of an Investment Loan to be coursed through a Mini-Marshal plan to save the failing Philippine economy. All this in exchange for his gold bullion.

p. 147

Unbelievably the Illuminati, under the branch of the Trilateral Commission, wrote a nice letter to Marcos asking for his entire stash of gold. In exchange they would give him an investment loan and he would be in power for life. 

https://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/secretgoldtreaty/trilat_appendix6.4.htm

This official Trilateral Commission stationery not only has the all seeing eye and pyramid at the top of the page but there are also three addresses on the side margin

Fifth Avenue at 55th Street, New York, NY 10022 212 753 4500 

Lancaster Gate - Hyde Park - London W23NZ Telephone: 61-2525090 Telex:291655 Prestel 3441100

Weinbergstrasse 45, CH 8006 Zurich (the book has 8008 but that is clearly wrong)

The first address is for the St. Regis Hotel. The other address turn up private residences. Are we really supposed to believe that the Illuminati, the group that controls the world, wrote a polite letter to Marcos rather than stealing his gold outright when it is they who own the Swiss banks in which that gold is deposited? It does not make sense and this story contradicts much of what Erick has to say about the banks being designed to steal people's money. 

To conclude here, everyone has their own version of the Marcos gold. 

Frank Pasion, an outstanding labor leader and the author of a thesis entitled The Incomparable Achievements of President Ferdinand E. Marcos, offers simple computation which will prove that Marcos had done many good things for the country: "Just add the loans Marcos inherited in 1965 ($13.5 Billion) to those incurred by the private sector ($7 Billion), together with the amount of reserves left by Marcos ($2.5 Billion), and you gel $23 Billion. Since the outstanding loan obligations of the country at the time of Marcos' departure from the political scene totaled only $24 Billion, it follows that the dreaded Marcos regime—in its twenty years of absolute rule—incurred only a measly loan of $1 Billion, not $24 Billion as attested by his detractors."  

Pasion also reminds the political opponents of Marcos that it was during the later's incumbency that the price of imported crude oil rose from $2 to $24 per barrel. Yet in the same period, the Philippine economy managed to weather the scams despite the worldwide recession, compounded by the growing Muslim insurgency in the south. The situation became unmanageable only when Senator Benign° Aquino Jr. was shot to death by an unlmown gunman.  

Marcos knew that the only key to Philippine progress would be the establishment of an industrial base, or a "machine-tool" industry. But his effort to implement a heavy industrial program "was opposed at every tum by his technocrats, by spokesmen of the Opus Dei, and the Makati business community, all of whom echoed the position of the IMF-World Bank opposing the eleven major industrial projects," Lichauco claims. 

When Cory Aquino took over whew Marcos left off, the situation became worm. "Prices of prime or essential commodities soared from 50 percent to 200 percent as compared to January 1986," wrote Pasion. "Laborers, on the other hand, were given a miserable PIO additional daily, despite the fact that the average laborer had to pay for daily expenses which increased 100 percent. And this figure excluded rental payments." 

How then did Marcos accomplish so much with so little? We can only conclude that he used part of his gold haul to support the govemment's garganman projects. 

p. 120

Erick San Juan believes that Marcos used the stolen Vatican gold to build all of his projects in the Philippines.  But if that were true then the paper trail left behind should shed some light on that. "The Incomparable Achievements of President Ferdinand E. Marcos" is not available online. A search for it turns up nothing but references to this book. Because this is a persistent claim Rappler has a whole article devoted to proving the math of Frank Pasion is wrong. 

But aside from erroneous economic analysis, many red flags are also in the references included. 

First, it appears that many of the arguments in the post are derived (almost word-for-word) from the book Marcos Legacy Revisited: Raiders of the Lost Gold (title only, questionable) written by Marcos supporter Erick San Juan in 1998. 

The book cited the thesis “The Incomparable Achievements of President Ferdinand E. Marcos,” which was used to say that Marcos owed only $ 1 billion. But that thesis had no hits on Google, other than an apparent conspiracy theory periodical published in 2001 in Las Vegas.

[Analysis] Marcos Debt: What is The Truth?

This book and its fanciful claims have bounced all around the internet being used by revisionists to paint a picture of Marcos as an awesome dude who gave his all for the betterment of the country but who has subsequently been unjustly demonized by his detractors. Unsurprisingly Get Real Philippines has been bamboozled by the claims made in this book.

It is indeed this preconceived opinion or prejudice perpetuated by the yellows that Marcos has pilfered the people’s money that is more effective for their purposes than it is to reveal that Marcos’ wealth was rooted in gold transaction schemes (gold that was not the government’s to begin with).

https://www.getrealphilippines.com/2016/05/yellow-lives-matter/

Granted that article does not cite this book but the same claims are made about the gold and Tagle's testimony is taken as gospel truth. 

If Marcos would have wanted to benefit the Philippines with his gold he would have done so. But history shows that he did not. This book certainly does not show he did so. Everything here is conjecture which would not stand in a court of law. It does not even stand in light of reading. Everything in this book concerning Marcos' gold is transparently false.

Book Review: Neither Trumpets nor Drums

Neither Trumpets nor Drums is a memoir written by former Vice President Salvador "Doy" Laurel about his time in the Cory Aquino administration. Rather than being a pean to or a complete takedown of Cory Aquino, Salvador Laurel gives his honest impressions of the time both documenting his hope for her Presidency after years of martial law under Marcos and his disappointment at what actually happened. The subtitle is Summing up the Cory Government.

The major drawback of this book is that it is a big tease. Though Salvador Laurel offers "revelatory" insights and behind-the-scenes stories about Cory Aquino’s governance he never explores them. It's all a sketch with a very faint outline. He skips over a great deal during the period of 1986-1987.  For instance, while he makes a big to-do about Cory scraping the constitution and imposing a revolutionary government he never once mentions the newly written Constitution and the 1987 plebiscite. That is a huge and stunning omission. 

Several times he mentions people were secretly advising Cory but he never asks "who." He seems disinterested in that subject as if their identities are obvious and either we should know or perhaps he would rather not say. For instance, Doy notes that Cory Aquino swore to him she would never seek the nomination for the Presidency and to show her sincerity she nominated him at the UNIDO convention. But then she heard a voice from God and decided to run. Doy did not think it was the voice of God speaking:

One day, she told the Cardinal: "I will run. I have decided. My decision was made on December 8." It was the closing of the Marian Year. Cory was then on retreat at the Pink Sisters Convent. "I am sure to run. It is God's will," she repeated.

Our first meeting was at her house on Times Street on Saturday, November 23 at 5:00 p.m. I told her she should not run. "You are are Ninoy's widow. If you run, they will attack you and vilify NInoy. Your victory will be Ninoy's victory but your defeat will also be his defeat. You should not risk that. When you go up a boxing ring and put on gloves, they will hit you even if you are a lady. You should just be our symbol - above and beyond the fray. Let me do the fighting, let me take the blows for you," I said. But she did not answer. It was obvious that she was told just to listen by a hidden group of advisers.

p. 37-38

Why is it obvious she was being advised by a hidden group? Who were these people? Doy refers to this hidden cabal again a few paragraphs later.

Our fifth meeting was held at the Puyat residence in Quezon City. Present were my brother Sotero, Cory's daughter Ballsy, and our host, the late Vincente "Teng" Puyat. On that day, Cory confided to me that she was not really interested in running the government. She simply wanted to be the instrument to remove Marcos. Since she did not know anything about running a government, she said she would be just a ceremonial President, like Queen Elizabeth.

She then offered me the Prime Ministership and promised to step down after two years. She offered 30 percent of the Cabinet, the remaining 70 percent to be appointed after prior consultation between us. All these were written on a piece of paper which she initialed, item by item, on the left margin of the document.

I asked for time to decide. Early the next morning, I left alone for my beach house in Matabungkay. I had to make the hardest decision in my life. I knew Ninoy well. His word was good. But I did not know Cory well enough. Could I trust her? Would her word be as good as Ninoy's? Or was she a mere instrument of her family's interests and her hidden advisers? It was obvious that she has been changing her position and reneging on her words because her secret advisers had been changing her agenda for her.

p. 39

Those are explosive revelations that Salvador Laurel simply does not explore. Not here and not even in his concluding remarks. He never asks who "her secret advisers" might be or what were her family's interests and how they affected her governance. He also never discusses the fact that she said she would step down after two years to make way for Doy. Did he really think Cory offering to step down after two years to make way for him was actually going to happen? Did he really think that it was an ethical offer? He must have since he accepted the offer and later asks her why she reneged on those promises.

These hidden advisers return when Salvador Laurel discusses Cory's decision to abolish the constitution.

I felt it ironic that after abolishing a dictatorship, we should again resort to dictatorial power by abrogating the Constitution and governing by decree. It had become apparent that Cory's manipulators had planned from the very start that they would monopolize power through Cory.

I recall, for instance, that a few minutes before we took our oath on February 25, 1986, Cory showed me the text of her oath of office. I noticed that instead of the phrase "preserve and defend the Constitution of the Philippines," what she had typed out was "preserve and defend the Fundamental Law," obviously prepared by her hidden advisers.

p. 54-55

If "Cory's manipulators had planned from the very start that they would monopolize power through Cory" then it should be rather easy to discover their identities and to figure out exactly what their plan was. Likely it would come through the new Constitution. But Doy skips over that whole period. He does not discuss the writing of the new constitution at all. Not even a blurb. Nothing. Nada. That is a glaring omission of arguably the most important event after EDSA. Why does he do this? He is writing a book exposing the truth about the Cory Aquino administration and he charges her with being manipulated by others seeking to seize power through the abolition of the Constitution and the writing of a new one but he never explores that line of thought. That makes no sense espeically as Laurel is very critical of her decision to trash the 1973 Constitution.

History might have taken a different course if Cory had not abolished the 1973 Constitution. If her avowed objective was to achieve political stability at the earliest possible date, she should have repealed only the Marcos amendments, particularly Amendment No. 6, which had perpetuated one-man-rule. It was like burning a house just to kill a rat.

But Cory chose to burn the entire house. In her attempt to demolish the infrastructure of dictatorship, Cory wrecked the entire political structure and thus delayed and derailed the application of needed solutions to our worsening problems. Her policy of vengeance and retribution likewise fueled a power struggle that would last beyond the end of her term.

p. 59-60

Again, explosive revelation with nothing to back it up. He never gives a single example of "her policy of vengeance and retribution" nor does he discuss this "power struggle." Who was struggling for power? How and to whom did Cory show "vengeance and retribution?"

The issue of the Constitution returns again on page 117. This time Laurel claims he discovered a plot to dissolve Congress and invest the President with legislative powers.

In 1991, I exposed a surreptitious plan to convert Congress into a constituent body with the objective of changing our form of government to the parliamentary system. Although I am not per se against the parliamentary system, the haste and stealth with which the House railroaded Concurrent Resolution No. 42 made it highly suspicious. Not enough time was given for the thorough discussion and deliberation of such a major issue. House Concurrent Resolution No. 42 would convert the Congress into a constituted assembly to amend the Constitution, dissolve both houses of Congress, and then unconstitutionally vest the President with legislative power. Some commentators saw this as an illicit attempt on the part of Cory's manipulators to extend her tenure.

p. 117

That such a brazen plan that Salvador Laurel himself exposed gets only this lame paragraph is brazen in itself. How would this plan have worked exactly? Who were its authors? Why does he refuse to name names? Why does he refuse to discuss who Cory's manipulators might be? Surely Doy was not a stupid man and knew exactly who these people were but he chooses to leave us in the dark.

Laurel does not only brush over the actions of Cory. He brushes over the entire 6 year period of 1986-1992. Here is one example among many.

The most controversial forum took place on March 4, 1991 on the subject of amnesty. At that time, the Secretary of National Defense and the Chief of the AFP were opposed to the idea of a general unconditional amnesty and had proposed instead the grant of a conditional and selective amnesty - a move which stirred very heated discussions. 

I have always maintained that the country's sad star of disunity and disorder is one of the main causes of our economic mess. A nation cannot move forward amidst disunity and disorder. And so we chose "Imperatives of National Unity" as our topic for the sixth CCF.

In preparing for the forum, I met with top military officers in Camp Aguinaldo and visited captured military rebels in their cells. Reports and video tapes of my meetings became the main resource for materials for discussion. A consensus was reached, among others, that the proclamation of a general amnesty accompanied by vigorous institutional reforms, including all-out war against graft and corruption, was the key political solution consistent with the Constitution. 

Because there was yet no Presidential Proclamation of general amnesty to which Congress would concur, the forum urged the President to fill the legal vacuum by issuing a new Presidential Proclamation and to determine once and for all, with the concurrence of Congress, whether such amnesty would be conditional, general or selective. 

p. 119-120

What is he talking about? Amnesty for who and for what? This talk of amnesty comes straight out of nowhere.  At this point in the book it is 1991 and he has mentioned no coups at all except for the one which took place on August 28th, 1987. There were actually nine coups throughout Cory's term. Laurel finally mentions those coups several pages later on pages 135-137 but he says only two were serious. He actually calls the Manila Hotel coup a "cocktail party!"

The Manila Hotel incident of July 6, 1986 was more of a cocktail party than a coup. Although Senator Arturo Tolentino was perhaps dead serious when he proclaimed himself Acting President, the theoretical basis on which he propped himself up was old hat. He claimed that ht legislature had legally proclaimed him and Marcos; but that proclamation had already been superseded  by the EDSA revolt. Besides, nobody was hurt in that tragic-comic episode and the punishment meted out to the conspirators was "thirty push-ups.

p. 136

The Davide Commission report of 1990 gives a completely different account of this so-called "tragic-comic" "cocktail party."

https://www.officialgazette.gov.ph/downloads/1990/10oct/199010-Report-Fact-Finding-Commission.pdf

Barely five months after the assumption into office of President Aquino, a group of armed military men and supporters of former President Marcos occupied the Manila Hotel for 37 hours ostensibly demanding constitutional reform and stronger anti-communist measures, on one hand, while declaring their own government, on the other. There were at least 490 fully-armed soldiers and some 5,000 Marcos loyalists who witnessed former Senator, Foreign Minister, and Marcos's Vice-Presidential running mate Arturo Tolentino take his "oath of office" as "acting President" of the Philippines on behalf of Marcos, who was then exiled in Hawaii. The hotel was declared as the temporary "seat of government". 

p. 135

490 fully-armed soldiers and 5,000 Marcos loyalists showed up to the party. On page 142 of the report there is mention of P10 million worth of damages done to the hotel including cancelled bookings caused by this "cocktail party."  A contemporary report from the Chicago Tribune expands on that.

The last time Tolentino was in the Manila Hotel, his supporters had trashed the place. 

The gleaming Italian restaurant, where Tolentino sat behind a starched white table cloth drinking ice water Monday morning, had been littered then with mud, paper cups, spilled rice and chicken bones. 

Carpets had been pulled up and doors had been kicked in. Phones had been ripped from the walls and safe deposit boxes had been pried open. 

In all, hotel officials said there was $500,000 worth of damage, all done in the name of Tolentino, who proudly proclaimed himself the proxy of Marcos. Tolentino and most of his followers managed to avoid any major reprisals for their actions.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1986-10-14-8603170548-story.html

That's some "cocktail party!" Why does Salvador Laurel dismiss the seriousness and significance of this coup attempt? We shall never know.

One has to wonder what the real agenda behind this book is. Every paragraph is written in such a way as to leave the reader expecting the next revelation. Here is one such revelation.

Cory's claim about having restored democracy has to be examined against the facts. When Cory assumed office, a number of media establishments were found to have been operating under Marcos rule as state enterprises. In line with the principle that the press must be free from government control, a process of restoring these media outfits to their original or rightful owners was set in motion. Cory aborted the process by keeping a number of TV and radio stations on sequestry status.

Up to the end of her term, these sequestered media functioned as propaganda arms of her government, competing with the private media, and unabashedly obfuscating issues in her favor.

p. 143-144

As awful as that sounds Laurel offers no proof for this claim. He does not name a single one of the media establishments she kept as a propaganda arm nor does he show any of the said propaganda. I am not accusing him of lying. I am accusing him of not being forthcoming with the whole truth. From the introduction we are told that the purpose of this work is to assess the Cory Aquino government. But there is no assessment going on here, only a superficial description of events. There is a quick movement from one event to the next focusing primarily on the work of Salvador Laurel and not the governance of Cory Aquino. I suppose he could be forgiven having written this book in 1992 when the long term effects of her administration could not yet be seen. 

If there is anything that could be called an assessment of Cory Aquino's presidency it is the oft cited "love letter" Laurel wrote to her on August 13, 1988. Here are a few excerpts.

We promised our people morality and decency in government. What do we have instead? The very opposite. It is now openly admitted by many, including your former Solicitor-General and some of your own close relatives in Congress, that the stench of “accumulated garbage” — I’m quoting your own first cousin, Congressman Emigdio Tanjuatco, Jr. — rises to high heaven; that the last years of Marcos are now beginning to look no worse than your first two years in office. And the reported controversies and scandals involving your closest relatives have become the object of our people’s outrage. 

We promised to ‘break the back’ of the insurgency. But what is the record? From 16,500 NPA regular when Marcos fell, the communists now claim an armed strength of 25,200, of which 2,500 are in Metro Manila. They have infiltrated not only the trade unions, the schools, the churches and the media but your government, above all, and now ‘affect’ 20 percent of the country’s 42,000 barangays, according to official statistics. 

The truth is that the peace and order situation is much worse today than when you came into office. It is now the number one problem of the nation. 

From city to countryside, anarchy has spread. There is anarchy within the government, anarchy within the ruling coalesced parties, and anarchy in the streets. These require your direct intervention. Yet you continue to ignore this problem.

p. 90-95

Once again these are scathing accusations that he has chosen not to explore or mention except for in this letter. Just before the text of this letter begins Laurel gives the context for which he has written it. Laurel had been ordered by Aquino to resign as the Secretary of Foreign Affairs for the stupidest reason possible.

All I could make out was that she wanted the resignation of the entire Cabinet, including mine - all because Joker Arroyo and Joe Concepcion "had shouted at each other" in her presence.

p. 84

In an interview in August 1988 with Louie Beltran, Salvador Laurel gave a completely different answer as to why he resigned. He said it was because there was no counterinsurgency program being implemented by the administration.

5:25 Louie Beltran: When you were in the Cabinet were you aware of any counterinsurgency program being implemented by the administration?

Salvador Laurel: None and that is the reason I resigned as Foreign secretary.

What are we to make of this admission in light of the book which was written 4 years later? These reasons for resigning contradict each other.

A few days later, this is in September 1987, Doy and Cory met. He finally unburdened himself in front of her.

"Whatever happened to all those promises you made, Cory? Why was the constitution abolished without even telling me? Why did you appoint me Chariman of the Presidential Blue Ribbon Commission to investigate the behest loans only to be suddenly abolished again? Why am I now being asked to submit courtesy resignation - just because Joker Arroyo and Joe Concepcion has a shouting match?

Cory looked down and gave a halting reply: "I was told... that the EDSA revolution... erased all those promises..."

I did not bother to ask who had told her so. Everybody was quiet. Doña Aurora's head was power as if in prayer. I broke the silence. "If that's the case, Cory, there is nothing more to talk about."

p. 88

Cory asked what he was going to do now? Would he join the opposition? 

"No. Not yet. I want this government to succeed. I don't want to see it fail. I've worked hard, sacrificed so much, to bring it to power. I'll wait for a year. I'll support you whenever you are right. I'll disagree with you wen you are wrong. I'll only oppose you when you insist on being wrong."

I kept my word. I waited a full year. But I could not see where she was going. The nation was adrift. Government had no direction. "Rela-thieves" and "Kamag-anaks, Inc." were on the rampage. Corruption, vindictiveness, ineptitude and hypocrisy had started to rear their ugly heads.

p. 89

It is maddening to read this. Laurel waited a full year watching the government taking note of what was happening, concluded it was getting worse all the time, and then he penned his "love letter" of August 13th, 1988. Why then does he give no specifics? Surely he had them in hand or else he could not have penned that letter. Or maybe he did not have the specifics. After all he could not even bring himself to ask Cory who told her that EDSA erased all the promises she made to Laurel. 

Without further elaboration these are merely broad and sweeping accusations. The vagueness of these accusations have been useful to those who would seek to return to the so-called golden years of the Marcos regime. They point to Laurel's complaints without the burden of proof because of the authority Salvador Laurel possessed as Vice President and an insider in the Cory Aquino administration. Why would the former Vice Preisdent lie? I am not calling him a liar. I am saying we need something more concrete than mere accusations.

While this book is an important historical document it leaves much to be desired. It is used by many Marcos revisionists to paint Cory as a devil who set out to destroy the legacy of Marcos. This is especially the case with the incident where Laurel was summoned by Marcos to Hawaii. There he was told to relay the following message to President Aquino:

“Please tell Mrs. Aquino to stop sending her relatives to me," he continued. "They are proposing  so many things. I have already established a foundation and I am turning over 90% of all my worldly possessions to the Filipino people. Enrique Zobel has all the papers. He and the Papal Nuncio, Msgr. Torpigliani, will sit in the Board to see to it that 90% of all that I have are properly distributed to our people. That is much better than what Mrs' Aquino's relatives have been proposing. I am leaving only 10% for my family."

p. 108

Salvador Laurel then goes on to relate that Cory would not see him so he could deliver the message. However she did allot an hour to meet with Tom Cruise. He calls this her greatest mistake and says she could have solved the Marcos wealth problem once and for all if she had only accepted the message. I will discuss this tantalizing episode in-depth in a future article. Suffice to say once again Laurel leaves a lot out and does not tell the whole story.

There is not much more to discuss about the book. It has a lot of shortcomings and they are not exactly made up for. Far from being a summation of the Cory government it is a personal memoir written from one man's viewpoint. There is nothing wrong with that per se but it deprives the reader of any nuance or context in many places. The text is in dire need of annotations. As for the strange title "Neither Trumpets nor Drums" we get an explanation in the last chapter.

In the tradition of heraldry, the trumpet served as the symbol of victory or the birth of a new day. Drums, on the other hand, always preceded an execution, their persistent, percussive sound signifying death or a burial, the end of something evil.

The Cory government, by remaining indifferent to the popular glamour for change, failed to herald a new ear for our country or to bury the traditional forces of cronyism, favoritism, corruption and greed.

p. 150

For as much as Salvador Laurel is critical of Cory Aquino's administration it is very important to point out that he never once whitewashes the Marcos dictatorship. He never apologizes for Marcos. He never indicates in any way that life under Marcos was much better than under Cory or that Cory was worse than Marcos. But that hasn't stopped people from twisting his words.

https://twitter.com/ilda_talk/status/1272667107570802694

Cory’s late former Vice President Doy Laurel had something to say about this. He wrote an open scathing letter to Cory outlining the deception she, her family and allies did. She betrayed him and the people. In so many words, he said Cory became worse than Marcos.

Such an analysis by one of the editors of Get Real Philippines is monumentally moronic and proof positive that she has not read this book and does not understand the letter to which she is referring. At no point in this book or in that love letter does Laurel indicate that "Cory became worse than Marcos." On pages 5-8 he gives a scathing indictment of the Marcos regime starting off by noting, "Our country was not free." Any Marcos revisionists looking to use this book for their purpose should keep that in mind.