Aquino Challenged in Staged ‘War of Images’ : Assault Troops Ring Broadcast Station

Hundreds of assault troops armed with bazookas, mortars and mounted machine guns surrounded a Manila broadcast station just after noon today, apparently preparing for an all-out attack as priests, relatives and friends made a last-minute effort to persuade 200 rebel soldiers to end a two-day siege that began as an apparent mutiny against President Corazon Aquino.

Hundreds more troops loyal to Aquino were deployed throughout the city to track down and neutralize at least 100 rebel soldiers still on the loose in the Philippine capital after Tuesday’s aborted attempt to take over two military bases, military sources said.

“There is concern that if we attack, there could be a counterforce,” said one senior military commander who asked not to be named. “We could be flanked.”

8 Generals Rounded Up

The military added that at least eight generals and scores of officers and soldiers believed to be still loyal to deposed President Ferdinand E. Marcos have been rounded up and arrested since the initial pro-Marcos attack forces apparently failed in their bid to challenge Aquino’s government.

Civilian officials also were concerned today that the “battle of nerves” could continue even after the government retakes the television complex. And despite Aquino’s traditional policy of tolerance, they said they favored using all-out force against the rebels.

“I don’t like this kind of life where every month you are faced with some kind of a coup,” said Jejomar Binay, mayor of Manila’s business district of Makati. “Its just like surgery. Sometimes you have to cut out a bad part.”

The scene around the station was desolate and grim at midday today. The deserted main boulevard around the complex was sealed off and closed to all traffic.

The more than 200 heavily armed rebel soldiers who held the complex housing Channel 7 and radio station DZBB insisted that they would not surrender. They took over the stations in a pre-dawn attack Tuesday that included raids on two military garrisons in which one rebel was killed and 16 were wounded. A large sign on the roof of the station complex declared, “Live Like a Soldier, Die Like a Soldier.” Beside it was another sign: “God Help Us.”

On the side of the government troops, the feeling was more light-hearted. Soldier listened to blaring renditions of Bruce Springsteen’s “Dancin’ in the Dark,” as they strapped on flak vests and grenade launchers.

But clearly the lingering fears of military commanders ran deeper.

Early today, the military chief of staff, Gen. Fidel V. Ramos, said that the rebellion was part of “a bigger scenario” aimed at splitting the military, destabilizing the government of Aquino and possibly clearing the way for the return of Marcos from exile in Hawaii.

Not once did Ramos use the word coup to describe Tuesday’s rebellion, but he made it clear that the troubled nation is still facing serious threats from within.

“There is a bigger scenario than just these attempted takeovers,” Ramos said. “It is possible that these (rebel) soldiers . . . have either been misled, misinformed or manipulated into taking certain actions.

“This is not just military action. . . . This is military action as a prelude and supported by political action.”

Ramos conceded that government troops no longer loyal to Aquino were moving around the island of Luzon. In his televised press conference, Ramos warned the rebel soldiers’ leader, air force Col. Oscar Canlas, “That particular unit you are depending on is not . . . inclined to join you.”

Eighteen roadblocks manned by troops loyal to Aquino have been set up at key points both north and south of Manila, Ramos announced, and he appealed to Canlas to give up.

Aquino’s health minister, Alfredo Bengzon, announced early Tuesday that Marcos’ mother, Josefa Edralin Marcos, 93, had disappeared from the government nursing home where she has been staying since before Marcos fled into exile at the height of last February’s rebellion.

The former president’s mother was taken to Marcos’ home province of Ilocos Norte along with “certain VIPs as well as friends and relatives identified with the Marcos group,” Ramos told reporters this morning.

In Honolulu, the former president said Tuesday that he was keeping in touch by telephone with friends in his homeland.

“I would like to go back and try to stifle all this ridiculous blood-letting,” he told reporters at his home.

“I hope that this dangerous situation does not escalate,” he added.

The uprising was the most serious effort by disaffected soldiers to take power since Marcos fled the country and Aquino became president last February.

In Washington, the Reagan Administration said it understood that the rebellion had been quelled and expressed continued support of the Aquino government.

“We are told that the armed forces have apprehended the majority of the dissidents involved,” said White House spokesman Larry Speakes.

” . . . We believe President Aquino and her government offer the best opportunity for the reform of the political structure and the revitalization of the Philippine economy and that this is the path to stability.”

Col. Canlas, the leader of the rebel forces at the television station, has said repeatedly in interviews, radio broadcasts and negotiations with the government since the revolt began that he and his men are not loyal to Marcos. Rather he asserted, they took over the station to call the nation’s attention to serious flaws in Aquino’s counterinsurgency strategy.

“I don’t think this can be considered a coup d’etat, “ Canlas told several Western journalists who had climbed over the wall of the broadcast complex to interview him. “We’re trying to measure the people’s reaction against communism. The basic issue here is the way of life we want to adopt for our future.

“The (Marcos) loyalists are riding on what we’re trying to do here.”

However, several of the more than 40 television station employees whom Canlas had held hostage for more than 15 hours, then freed, said the troops occupying the station were split evenly among “professional soldiers” protesting the counterinsurgency and Marcos loyalist soldiers known as the Guardians. These were the same soldiers who participated in an abortive uprising last July, in which they took over the Manila Hotel.

In addition, top Philippine military intelligence officials confirmed that the takeover of the television station was tied directly to the simultaneous attacks on two key military bases, which Ramos’ troops repelled. The plot also included the possible return of Marcos, those same intelligence sources told The Times.

Canlas, a career officer considered by independent military experts here to be a “highly professional and dedicated soldier,” also attempted to convince reporters that he and his troops were not rebels. “We are not asking Mrs. Aquino to step down or her ministers,” he said. But, when asked whether he considered Aquino his commander in chief, Canlas said, “I refuse to answer that.”

Ramos’ deputy chief of staff, Gen. Eduardo Ermita, spoke with Canlas for more than two hours, then reported that most of the conversation centered on Aquino’s proposed national constitution, which will be presented to the Filipino voters next Monday.

Canlas is concerned about provisions that he believes would damage the armed forces’ ability to fight the nation’s 18-year Communist insurgency, Ermita said, and several analysts said there is considerable support for Canlas’ opposition to the constitution within the entire 200,000-member armed forces.

Later, however, during negotiations between Canlas and Ramos himself--crucial talks by telephone that, almost incredibly, were broadcast live on a Manila radio station at 3:30 a.m.--the colonel added: “We are bothered by the way the people are being treated right here (at the television station). If they support our position, they should be allowed to express this. Every time the people come, they are dispersed. The people who are bringing us food are being harassed.”