‘Enrile’s Boys’: Elite Unit at Heart of Coup Rumors

The sound of machine-gun fire from a rifle range behind the Ministry of National Defense provides a daily reminder of the existence of a military force that has become the focal point of the Philippine political crisis.

At practice are men of the National Defense Security Group, a small, elite corps that threatens the unity of the armed forces and the stability of President Corazon Aquino’s government.

The unit, which has been practicing from dawn to dusk every day this week, filling the air with a staccato sound track, consists of 700 of the best-trained, best-equipped and most disciplined and ruthless soldiers in the Philippine armed forces.

Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile, the man these troops have committed their lives to protect, calls them “my boys.” He often reminds the Philippine people that it was this group that started the military uprising last February that ousted President Ferdinand E. Marcos.

Aquino has been told that members of the security group are plotting against her, and on Sunday she denounced its leaders as “self-appointed messiahs” and “misguided elements” who are threatening to tear the armed forces apart.

Other critics have been even harsher, describing the group as “a trigger-happy cabal” that uses psychological warfare as well as weapons in its effort to influence the policies of a government it is paid to protect.

At the moment, while Aquino is on a state visit to Japan, the security group is at the center of a storm of rumors that have pushed the Philippines to new levels of fear and tension--fear of a coup, fear of a military crackdown on dissidents and leftists, fear that when Aquino returns Thursday, some of her most trusted aides may be in jail.

For the record, Defense Minister Enrile and the security group’s commanders have denied that they are involved in any plot against the government. Privately, however, they have confirmed that they are.

They have made it clear that the rumors are part of an overall strategy to protect the government against Communist infiltration and to protect Enrile’s personal and political future.

Also involved in this strategy, they have said, is an effort to “surgically remove” several members of Aquino’s Cabinet that they regard as threats to Enrile and to the country, as well.

Some Officials Leave

Some of the most controversial of these Cabinet ministers, men who have been criticized by Enrile and his security group as leftists or incompetents, left the country last week amid rumors that the military was planning a crackdown aimed at forcing Aquino to reorganize the Cabinet.

Luis Villafuerte, chairman of the Presidential Commission on Government Reorganization, has stayed on in Manila despite being branded as a Communist in a leaflet distributed recently. Nonetheless, he said Monday that he is convinced that the security group is planning to move against the government this week.

“There is no doubt that there is a group advocating such a move,” Villafuerte said in an interview. “But they want to disguise it as some sort of emergency. . . . They do not want to harm Cory (Aquino). They would hold her hostage.”

Quoting from intelligence gathered by presidential security forces, Villafuerte said: “First, they will try to arrest as many leftists and Communist elements as they can. That would lead to a fight . . . between the military and the Communists . . . and eventually give the military the moral authority to declare a state of emergency and take over the government to save it from the Communists for Cory.”

‘God Save the Queen’

The military has code-named the alleged plot “God Save the Queen,” and Gen. Fidel V. Ramos, the military chief of staff, reportedly leaked it to the press last week. But not until Aquino left Monday for Tokyo did many known leftist leaders begin bracing for a crackdown.

There have been signs from leftist leaders that the strategy ascribed to Enrile could work.

The largest leftist party, the 2-million-member People’s Party, has vowed to take to the streets in a “massive protest action” if the military does crack down.

More important, top two commanders of the Communist military wing, the New People’s Army, said they would mobilize their 23,200 armed guerrillas to oppose the 200,000 troops of the armed forces if there is an attempt to take power.

‘We Will Be There’

“Whether they (Aquino’s government) want an alliance or not, we will be there,” said a New People’s Army commander who identified himself as “Kumander Ben.”

Such statements appear to play directly into the hands of Enrile’s security group, whose leaders have said that their primary goal is to crush communism, to put down the insurgency that has continued for 17 years.

Not long ago, one of the security group’s chief political planners said privately that the group’s strategy is aimed at polarizing the forces behind Aquino to make it appear that the Communist Party has “kidnaped” her government.

“None of us thinks Aquino is a Communist herself,” the strategist said, asking that his name not be used. “What we want to do is bring out those forces that are behind her, identify them and eliminate them.”

Aquino left no doubt in her remarks Sunday that she is opposed to any such effort. “This queen does not want to be saved,” she said. “. . . I reject unsolicited coups.”

Aquino Vows to Use Force

She said that “all the force at our disposal” will be used against violators of the law, and added that “this includes any actions taken by forces of the other extreme--the left, which also may wish to take advantage of my absence.”

Aquino gave Ramos, who stood with Enrile in the February coup against Marcos, a free hand to fight the Communists. And on Tuesday Ramos ordered military commanders to “track down, apprehend and neutralize . . . terrorists without let-up.”

Aquino made no specific reference to Enrile, but her remarks were widely interpreted as a slap at him and the security group.

Enrile has not appeared in public since the president spoke out. He canceled a speech scheduled for Tuesday and has refused to see reporters.

Enrile Hurt, Angry

Friends and aides said he was hurt and angered by the president’s open challenge to his inner circle of armed supporters. According to several analysts, he has lost an important round in his effort to share power with the president.

For Enrile and the leaders of his security group, silence is a distinct departure from custom.

For the rumors of a coup are the climax of a campaign that they began several months ago when Enrile became convinced that several civilian members of the Cabinet were attempting to usurp military power. He believed they were spearheading an effort to fire him and open the door of government to the left, which has conceded that it is trying to obtain positions of power in the Aquino administration.

Enrile launched the campaign with a series of speeches in Manila and in key provinces. He warned that the government is corrupt and incompetent and being infiltrated by Communists. He challenged Aquino’s mandate to rule, and he denounced the government’s negotiations with the Communist insurgents.

Corruption Alleged

At the same time, military officers around Enrile began talking off-the-record with domestic and foreign reporters. They criticized Aquino and her Cabinet for weakness on communism, for political corruption and for generally perverting the goals for which they had taken their stand against Marcos. They hinted that it might be necessary to mount another military coup to “rescue” Aquino and the nation.

The campaign reached a peak Oct. 18, when Enrile traveled to the southern Philippine cities of Cebu and Zamboanga. There, he let it be known that he was lining up military support beyond the security group, and he talked with reporters for hours, all off the record.

When Enrile returned to Manila, sources in the security group said, the stage was set for the defense minister to challenge the president.

Using his anti-Communist campaign as a rallying cry, Enrile appeared at two public rallies that security group leaders had said would draw hundreds of thousands of supporters.

Strategy Backfires

But the strategy apparently backfired. Two weeks ago, at what turned out to be the last of Enrile’s rallies, he found himself addressing a crowd of only 20,000, most of them Marcos supporters shouting “Down with Cory!” Enrile, meanwhile, was shouting “Down with Communism!” The next day, Aquino supporters openly condemned Enrile as a fascist.

Amando Doronila, a Philippine political analyst, compared the rally to those of Adolf Hitler and his Nazi followers. Doronila’s newspaper, the Manila Chronicle, warned in an editorial that Enrile and his followers represent “the living threat of military dictatorship.”

Still, leaders of Enrile’s security group have continued their effort to strengthen his position. They have continued--even stepped up--the daily firing on the ministry rifle range.

Several Enrile men, accompanied by the defense minister’s wife, Cristina, dedicated a powerful new armed forces radio station situated behind the ministry--a key tool in any military takeover. Enrile’s men advised reporters confidentially that a coup could be expected while the president is in Japan.

Fear, Tension

Whether the security group planned, or plans, to carry out a coup, or to engineer a Communist threat that would justify a military takeover, are questions that continue to spread fear and tension.

Many Filipinos believe that the group is adequately armed and trained to make such a move. The difficulty, some analysts say, would be in holding the government.

Already, they have hundreds of power Uzi submachine guns and Galil assault rifles, an arsenal that Enrile obtained independently through the years from Israeli arms dealers. And among the group’s leaders is one of the military’s most celebrated officers, Col. Gregorio (Gringo) Honasan.

Honasan, a former jungle fighter who was the chief strategist behind the February uprising, is best known for his years of fighting Communist and Muslim insurgents on the southern Philippine island of Mindanao.

Cobras and Body Counts

He has said that he often parachuted out of aircraft with a cobra looped around his neck, and that he cut off the ears of many of the men he killed in combat, to provide his superiors with an accurate body count.

In an interview last weekend, Honasan denied that he and his men are planning a military takeover. But he did so with what many Filipinos have described as bravado.

Asked who started the rumor campaign, which was described by many Manila newspapers as “a surgical operation,” Honasan said, “By the very term alone, it might have come from the Makati Medical Center.”

“You don’t know whether a coup is planned?”

“No. No coup scheduled this week.”

Honasan denied that a coup, or a threatened coup, is part of his group’s overall security plan.

“I am simply adopting a pro-active attitude,” he said, “which is my security mission, to secure the Minister of National Defense, his immediate family and whoever the minister directs we secure.”

Honasan conceded that “anything is possible in these very complicated times.” Asked what his unit would do if Aquino dismisses Enrile, he smiled and said: “If they remove Minister Enrile tomorrow, there will be a reaction. We just don’t know the magnitude of this reaction, but a coup is still remote.”

Finally, Honasan was asked whether he considered his action of last February to be a coup.

“Semantics,” he said. “Some call it a coup. Some call it a breakaway. Some call it a revolution. It was just a reaction.”