Long Fight Over for Filipino Vets : Citizenship: The promise of recognition made by President Franklin D. Roosevelt is finally fulfilled for guerrillas who fought alongside U.S. troops in World War II.

For Filipino war veterans such as Mariano B. Campanilla, the fighting that started with World War II is finally over.

Campanilla and hundreds of thousands of other Filipinos who fought alongside American forces against the Japanese have finally become eligible after a controversial, emotional battle for something that was promised them nearly 50 years ago--U.S. citizenship.

An estimated 10,000 Filipino veterans in Southern California are among nearly 100,000 natives of America’s one-time colony expected to gain U.S. citizenship under a sweeping immigration reform package that President Bush signed into law last month.

A slight, 74-year-old ex-guerrilla fighter, Campanilla has been waiting since he first filed for U.S. citizenship on Dec. 27, 1945.

“I wasn’t afraid to fight then,” he said, “and I’m not afraid to fight now. The United States has finally redeemed the honor and integrity of the Filipino veterans.

“Finally . . . !”

The citizenship provision is part of a legislative package passed last month that sharply increases immigration limits on some European nationalities and offers temporary safe haven to Salvadoran refugees. Beginning in May, the bill will give citizenship to thousands of Filipinos who fought during World War II under the control of the U.S. military.

The provision, added to the immigration bill by Congressional supporters of citizenship for Filipino veterans, is an attempt to correct what they claim was an injustice that occurred when the U.S. government reneged on a 1941 executive order signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

The order incorporated the Philippine armed forces into the U.S. military, pledging citizenship to Filipinos who joined the fight against Japan. At the time, the Philippines was a U.S. colony.

“I can still remember his words,” said Jose Ibarra Salcedo, 69, founder of the Los Angeles-based United Filipino American World War II Veterans Assn. “ ‘Come fight with us and we’ll make you U.S. citizens.’ They promised us everything.”

Thousands of Filipinos joined after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The enthusiasm for the fight kept up, even after Gen. Douglas MacArthur was forced to retreat from the Philippines in 1942.

After the war, however, the hopes of virtually all of the Filipino vets wanting U.S. citizenship were dashed. The U.S. government bowed to pressure from a Filipino government that feared a loss of manpower. Americans who had been sent to the Philippines after the war’s end to process the anticipated requests for naturalization were withdrawn.

Naturalization examiners later returned to the Philippines to process the applications. But by then, many of the men had returned to civilian life and were no longer eligible for U.S. citizenship, which was limited to those on active duty. Later, President Harry S. Truman declared Filipino veterans ineligible for most benefits.

As far back as the 1960s, some Filipino veterans mounted legal challenges in U.S. courts. But the efforts failed.

According to Willie Jurado, publisher of the Eye, a Bay Area-based Filipino newsmagazine, the topic continued to attract more letters than any other subject. Jurado should know. He is one of the veterans who will be eligible under the bill.

“A lot of my friends died in the (Japanese) concentration camps,” the former guerrilla fighter recalled. “We didn’t want to surrender. We wanted to fight on but our American officers begged us to surrender. It’s a pity they are not here for the citizenship.”

The issue packs such an emotional punch in the Philippines that Filipino negotiators raised it during the talks over the future of America’s two major military outposts there, Clark Air Base and the Subic Bay naval base.

Led by Salcedo, a group of World War II veterans who fought the Japanese on the Philippine island of Luzon formed an association seven years ago to continue pressuring the Congress to make good the promise of citizenship.

Working out of an office in the Angelus Plaza senior citizens housing project in downtown Los Angeles, the determined veterans--the youngest of whom is 63--planned lobbying visits to Washington.

At one point during a Congressional hearing two years ago, a frustrated Campanilla asked legislators to arrest him as an “illegal alien.”

The Filipino veterans said they became particularly incensed when public apologies and $20,000 payments were made to the U.S. citizens of Japanese descent who were interned during the war.

“Good for them, but what about us?” Antonio M. Rubin, current president of the Filipino veterans association, asked. “We fought for America. What about us?”

In the last decade, a few veterans managed to obtain citizenship, but only after lengthy court battles in which the U.S. government was forced to explain why Roosevelt’s pledge was not carried out.

Encino lawyer Philip G. Abramowitz said 100 Filipino veterans were naturalized by two federal judges in Los Angeles--on separate occasions in 1987 and 1988--only to have the actions overturned by an appellate court.

Last month, the veterans and their supporters in Congress finally won over House and Senate leaders to include the citizenship in the immigration bill that passed both houses by large margins. The President then signed the reform package into law.

Now that they will be citizens, the Filipino veterans will be in the position to petition the INS to have their grown children and other relatives join them in the United States.

Their explanation is simple: America, the country they fought for, is still the best place to live despite past injustices.

“I would prefer my children to live under a government where everybody is equal,” said World War II veteran Antonio Cruz.

Campanilla agreed.

But with the citizenship battle over, he is already getting anxious about May 1--when he can begin filing his application. With many comrades in arms already dead, Campanilla now prays that he will live long enough to finally gain his elusive prize.

“I have asked the Lord to let me stay until I become a citizen,” he said.

BACKGROUND

An estimated 100,000 Philippine veterans are expected to be eligible for U.S. citizenship under a provision included in the sweeping immigration reform bill signed into law last month by President Bush. Eligible are those persons whose World War II service can be verified by the U.S. Department of the Army. Excluded, however, are Filipino veterans who were not born in the Philippines and later acquired Philippine citizenship.