U.S. Pullout Leaves Philippine Forests in Peril : Environment: Home to monkeys, deer, snakes, bats and many species of birds, the virgin land contains some of the most expensive hardwoods to be found anywhere.

One of the last large rain forests in the Philippines is in danger of destruction after the pullout of its U.S. Marine guardians.

Much of the 7,100-island nation has already been denuded by illegal logging, driving the Philippines to the brink of what one authority calls “full-scale biodiversity collapse.”

A rare virgin forest of valuable mahogany and teak trees now flourishes on what was the U.S. naval base at Subic Bay on the island of Luzon. After 45 years, American forces left last November. Without the protection of Marines, much of the 20,500 acres of timber could be cut down by poachers, American and Philippine environmentalists fear.

“At this point we’re all keeping our fingers crossed,” said Bruce Eilerts, a Navy wildlife biologist stationed in Hawaii, whose office oversees natural resources management for all naval bases in the Pacific. “If they start cutting it down, the ecosystem would collapse. It would take hundreds of years for the forest to regenerate to the state it’s in now.”

Home to monkeys, deer, snakes, bats and many species of birds, the forest contains some of the most expensive hardwoods found in the Philippines, including mahogany and teak. It is also a vital watershed, preventing erosion and providing drinking water for the area.

The story of the Subic Bay forest and its American protectors is the bright side of a darker tale of environmental damage left by U.S. forces as they withdraw or cut back operations in the post-Cold War era.

More than 492 bases, mostly in Europe, are being reduced or abandoned as the military budget shrinks. Enforcement of Pentagon policy requiring implementation of U.S. or host-country environmental laws--whichever are stricter--has been spotty. In many areas, that has led to contamination of soil, ground water, streams and harbors.

A recent Army report estimated a cost of nearly $200 million to clean up 309 confirmed and suspected pollution sites in Germany alone, where degradation of drinking water is a sensitive issue. Three underground toxic chemical plumes from an American installation in the Mannheim area are threatening an aquifer that furnishes drinking water for some 350,000 people.

But the story of the Subic Bay forest is different.

The last of 12,000 Americans left Subic Bay Nov. 24, after a 45-year occupation under successive agreements between the American and Philippine governments. The Philippine Senate in 1991 rejected a renewal of the lease, precipitating the largest withdrawal in naval history.

Before the pullout, the Navy ran a strict management program at the forest, including regular Marine foot patrols to ferret out hunters and timber poachers. Offenders were turned over to Philippine authorities for prosecution.

“Some of these old military bases have been better preserved than national parks in our own country, because they’ve been so strictly controlled,” said mammalogist Merlin Tuttle. “I can assure you that many of these animals in the Subic Bay forest very likely will be killed and eaten if they suddenly become vulnerable to the outside.”

Tuttle, founder of the nonprofit Bat Conservation International in Austin, Tex., said that several species of flying foxes have been driven to extinction by overhunting in unprotected areas of Pacific islands.

“Sites like Subic Bay have been the last refuges for some of these bats,” Tuttle says.

Continued preservation of the forest was discussed by U.S. and Philippine officials during planning for the withdrawal.

“It was one of the issues that came up: What’s going to happen to that jungle, now that we’re out of there?” said Lt. Ken Ross, a U.S. Pacific Fleet spokesman. “Our concern was that we turn everything over, including the forest, in the best condition possible. Now it’s in the hands of the Philippine government.”

Government officials have pledged to save the forest.

“What we want to be able to do is replicate or at least approximate fully what the Americans have done,” Fulgencio Factoran, environment and natural resources secretary, said during the withdrawal talks. “This is one reason why our proud people will exert more effort to show everyone it doesn’t take Americans to protect their own forests.”

But many Philippine and U.S. conservationists are skeptical that the government will take the needed measures. Although logging in virgin forests is illegal, the government has a poor record of providing resources for enforcement--partly, say environmentalists, because powerful political and military figures profit from the timber.

Factoran and natural resources administrator Herman Laurei have expressed dismay at the annual budget the government approved for forest protection in the province that includes Subic Bay: the equivalent of $1,740. Laurei complained that “it’s almost a joke to expect serious results.”

Philippine officials estimate that their tropical rain forests are being cut down at a rate of 445,000 acres a year, about three times the worldwide rate.

Widespread poverty and a rapidly expanding population are blamed for the constant pressure to clear land. Timber produces quick profits, as well as firewood for scavengers.

“That nation is one of the most nearly deforested tropical countries in the world,” said Edward O. Wilson, Harvard’s Pulitzer Prize-winning authority on biodiversity. “Forest reserves there are few and far between, and are of extraordinary value to future generations in the Philippines as well as in the rest of the world.”

In his 1992 book, “The Diversity of Life,” Wilson warns that the Philippines are “at the edge of a full-scale biodiversity collapse. At best the ultimate losses will be heavy.”

Philippine officials estimate that at least 7,000 acres of forest in Bataan National Park, just outside the naval base, already have been destroyed by uncontrolled logging and a forest fire caused by farmers.

The lush green tree line of the Subic Bay forest now ends abruptly at the perimeter of the former base, giving way to brown dirt and denuded hills.

Without adequate protection, many wonder how long the green will last.