Military’s Divided Loyalties Pose Dilemma for Coup-Rattled Aquino : NEWS ANALYSIS

A week before rebel planes strafed and rocketed Malacanang Palace, Philippine President Corazon Aquino relaxed on her guest house couch and assessed her performance after nearly four years in office.

“I am politically secure,” she told a British journalist. “Foreign investment is increasing because the message has got through that the country is politically stable and the daily danger of coups is long past.”

But with the nation staggering from the sixth and bloodiest attempted coup of her tenure, political and economic stability is a distant memory. Worse, political analysts, diplomats and politicians here say, Aquino faces daunting, if not impossible, problems if she is to forestall yet another revolt.

Her greatest dilemma comes from the military itself, for it is both her biggest threat and her only protector. But her own troops were so reluctant to fight that pro-government F-5 fighter pilots refused to fire on the three rebel T-28s attacking the palace early Dec. 1, a top Aquino aide said.

“They said they were classmates,” the aide said in frustration.

That reluctance apparently accounts for the surprisingly low casualty count of 83 reported dead, despite a week of sometimes fierce battles involving bazookas, armored personnel carriers, grenade launchers and other light artillery. Only 36 of the dead were soldiers, and at least seven of them died by friendly fire or accident.

“It was an acoustical war,” said one Western military official. “They don’t want to shoot at their fellow soldiers.”

Nelson A. Navarro, columnist for the Malaya newspaper, noted that Aquino raised soldiers’ daily subsistence allowance from 60 cents to 90 cents after a failed coup attempt in August, 1987. On Friday, she boosted it again to $1.50. Troops call it their “Gringo bonus,” for cashiered army Lt. Col. Gregorio (Gringo) Honasan, who has played a role in practically every attempted coup to date.

“This wasn’t a war,” Navarro said with a laugh. “This was collective bargaining.”

And while pressure grows to severely punish the coup plotters and mutinous soldiers, much sympathy remains within the armed forces for their stated goals of replacing military leadership and ending rampant government corruption. As the rebel troops marched defiantly back to barracks Thursday brandishing their weapons and waving their hands in time-out signs, many were hugged or saluted by their ostensible foes, government soldiers.

As a result, analysts say, too harsh a punishment against the renegade troops might provoke yet another mutiny.

“She’s got to appease the military at the same time some of their best soldiers are trying to overthrow her,” Max V. Soliven, publisher of the Philippine Star, said of Aquino. “She’s in an impossible position.”

Aquino’s strongest ally is her defense secretary, Fidel V. Ramos, who has led government forces through all six attempted coups. But it is his troops who have mutinied time and again. And this time, he faces an even bigger problem.

“You cannot disband two battalions of Marines and one battalion of Scout Rangers without severely disabling the armed forces,” said Alex Magno, a political scientist at the University of the Philippines.

In one way, said another analyst, the nation’s move to democracy in 1986, after Ferdinand E. Marcos’ 20-year regime, planted the seeds of military disarray. Greater efforts were made to professionalize the armed forces, with better training, pay and equipment. Officers are better educated and come from more elite backgrounds.

“The irony is (that) all the professionalism has done is make them see the incompetence of the political and military leadership,” the analyst said. Constant squabbling between the executive, the legislative branch and the government bureaucracy has produced little change since Marcos left. “The only disciplined mob is the armed forces,” he said.

And while the attempted coup produced a temporary run on banks, hoarding and price gouging, much deeper problems remain in the economy. Nearly half of the nation’s budget goes to service the $28-billion debt, leaving little for desperately needed services in a nation where the annual per capita income is about $600. Despite steady economic growth, government figures show that the poorest third of society controls only 9% of the nation’s wealth--virtually the same as under Marcos.

None of that is likely to improve any time soon. Inflation, now running at about 14%, is expected to grow because of a 25% fuel price hike the day before the coup attempt. Bank lending rates are already 30%. Tourism, foreign investment and Manila’s financial markets are sure to suffer from the weeklong fighting.

Many analysts believe the rebellion was timed to take advantage of a breakdown in services in the capital so severe that some compared it to the period just after World War II.

In recent weeks, so few buses roamed the streets that crowds lined up in the roads, worsening already nightmarish traffic. Telephone service was intermittent at best. Strikes and shortages were common. Crumbling infrastructure cut water in many neighborhoods. Power failures darkened homes and offices for hours each day, sparking dire headlines of a “black Christmas.”

Aquino’s popularity had fallen to its lowest level as a result, and palace aides are shaken at the lack of visible civilian support during the coup attempt--or after.

“The population is ambivalent,” said Magno, the political scientist. “They are unhappy with the way we’ve been governed the last three years. But they weren’t ready to support military rule.”

For now, Aquino’s options are limited. Her own party is divided in the Senate, while the House of Representatives has repeatedly frustrated her attempts for social reforms. Although supporters urge her to revamp the Cabinet, widely considered incompetent and indecisive, she will probably let them go “one by one,” an aide said.

“She has to make serious changes in terms of personnel, in terms of social and economic policy,” said a Western diplomat. “She has to develop a political constituency. Her support has fizzled.”

Moreover, Magno said he’s not sure that the urgency of the situation has sunk in, noting that Aquino declared a state of emergency only after six days of street fighting in Manila.

“The indications are not very promising,” he said.