Philippines to Restrict U.S. Troops

U.S. military advisors training Philippine soldiers to fight against the Abu Sayyaf Muslim extremist group will remain at heavily guarded field camps with little chance of coming under fire, Philippine army officials said Thursday.

Gen. Diomedio Villanueva, the army chief of staff, said the U.S. troops will accompany Philippine officers and provide advice at tactical headquarters during the six-month mission.

“They will not be permitted to patrol,” Villanueva told a Philippine Senate inquiry probing allegations that the joint exercise violates a constitutional clause limiting the presence and activities of foreign troops. “My guidance is that they will not join combat operations.”

Vice President Teofisto Guingona also outlined the terms for the exercise that were drafted by the Philippine government but not yet approved by the United States.

Although the mission formally began last week with a ceremony, training on the southern island of Basilan--an Abu Sayyaf base--will not begin until the U.S. approves the terms, he said.

The draft gives the Philippine government command of the exercise, bars U.S. troops from combat operations, fixes the U.S. presence at a maximum of 660 soldiers, prohibits permanent U.S. military facilities, and limits training to Basilan island and the nearby city of Zamboanga on Mindanao island, where most of the U.S. soldiers are staying.

It also states that the mission can last no longer than six months and allows the Americans to fire back in self-defense.

Guingona said self-defense must be “proportionate to the threat, and the right to self-defense ends when there is no more threat.”

The United States has reportedly objected to any terms that could give a foreign government authority over U.S. troops and to a strict limit on the number of U.S. soldiers.

On Wednesday, Brig. Gen. Donald Wurster, senior officer for the more than 260 U.S. military personnel already in the Philippines for the exercise, said his troops are ready to take casualties to help vanquish the Abu Sayyaf, which has abducted Martin and Gracia Burnham of Wichita, Kan.

About 160 U.S. Special Forces soldiers are expected to travel to Basilan, where about 100 Abu Sayyaf members are believed to be holding the Burnhams.

Critics of the U.S. mission have said conflict in the southern Philippines, a hotbed of Muslim separatism, could escalate if U.S. troops are attacked.