At Least 30 Filipino Police Commandos Killed In Clash With Rebels

[Old55]

The US has agreed to provide military weapons once more to Philippines. I don't want my taxes sent to support some corrupt Filipino. Without leadership there is no way this kind of waste will end. I pitty the families of those slain.

 

 

At Least 30 Filipino Police Commandos Killed In Clash With Rebels

 

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — More than 30 police commandos were killed in a clash with Muslim insurgents Sunday in the southern Philippines in the biggest single-day combat loss for Filipino forces in many years, officials said.

Dozens of commandos had entered the far-flung village of Tukanalipao at dawn looking for a top terror suspect, but had a "misencounter" with members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, Mayor Tahirudin Benzar Ampatuan of Mamasapano town told The Associated Press by telephone.

Other insurgents in the area later joined in fighting the outnumbered police forces, the mayor said.

The 11,000-strong Moro group signed a peace deal with the government last year and forged a cease-fire, which has been safeguarded by a Malaysia-led team of foreign truce monitors and has halted major conflicts between the two sides for years.

Ampatuan, the Moro group and military officials said the police commandos did not coordinate their plan to enter the Muslim rebel village before sunrise, apparently resulting in the fierce fighting.

The fighting in the marshy village of cornfields and coconut plantations subsided after several hours when members of a cease-fire committee and foreign truce monitors intervened, Ampatuan said, adding he deployed a team of village leaders and guards, who saw more than 30 of the slain commandos scattered in the battle scene.

"What they described to me was gruesome," Ampatuan said.

At least two villagers were wounded in the gunbattle. A few thousand villagers fled from their homes near the scene of the fighting, he said.

At least two Philippine security officials told The AP that the target of the police commandos was Zulkifli bin Hir, a Malaysian terror suspect known also as Marwan, who has been blamed by U.S. and Philippine authorities for several deadly bombings in the south. Marwan, who allegedly has provided bomb-making training and funds to local al-Qaida-linked militants, is believed to have been hiding in the country's south since 2003.

The two officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to reporters about operations to capture Marwan, who they said may have been wounded or killed in Sunday's fighting.

Aside from Moro rebels, hardline insurgents who broke off from the main Moro group a few years ago because they opposed peace talks with the government also inhabit Tukanalipao and outlying villages. Some of the Moro rebels and breakaway insurgents are relatives and co-exist in the same villages.

Ampatuan said his village leaders managed to extricate only five of the policemen's bodies by nightfall because they were afraid for their safety amid sporadic gunfire and the darkness in the village, which is 2 to 3 kilometers (1.2 to 1.9 miles) from the nearest road.

It remains unclear how many police commandos entered the village, he said, adding the death toll would likely increase.

An initial police report seen by AP said at least 37 police commandos perished in the fighting while 6 insurgents were killed and 11 others wounded.

Military spokesman Col. Restituto Padilla said government troops were helping the police retrieve the dead from the scene of the clash. "No military units were involved the fighting," he said.

While the tragic fighting underscored the difficulty of forging peace in the long-volatile southern region, homeland of minority Muslims in the predominantly Roman Catholic country, it also showed how the cease-fire and the foreign truce monitors, troops and rebels who jointly enforce it have effectively prevented occasional flareups from degenerating into a full-blown fighting that could endanger the peace deal.

The pact, which was signed in March, aims to establish a more powerful and better-funded autonomous region for minority Muslims in the south and end a decades-long rebellion. The conflict has left 150,000 people dead and helped stunt development in the country's poorest region.

At least four smaller armed groups, including the al-Qaida-linked Abu Sayyaf group, have continued fighting government forces and staging attacks in the south.

[Methersgate]

...Mayor Ampatuan....

 

nuff said.

[i am bob]

And these were police... The military didn't have know what was planned not did they take part.

[Dave Hounddriver]

Without leadership there is no way this kind of waste will end. I pitty the families of those slain.

 

Ditto.  Supplying arms to poorly led and trained cops will just mean more arms being stolen by or sold to the rebels (by the cops I mean)

[Methersgate]

There is a suggestion that the US$5M bounty on the head of the al-Qaeda bomb maker "Marwan" was behind the un-co-ordinated attack - the cops wanted the money.

[Dave Hounddriver]

Just following up this old story.  It appears that one or more caucasians were among the dead.  There is a video at this link and it claims that the US Special Forces were behind this botched raid.

 

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/721976/unidentified-caucasian-killed-in-mamasapano

[Richieboy67]

I always wondered why they do not send in like 20,000 trips. The Philippines does actually have a pretty decent military and could deal with this.

Edited September 15, 2015 by Richieboy67

[Richieboy67]

The US has agreed to provide military weapons once more to Philippines. I don't want my taxes sent to support some corrupt Filipino. Without leadership there is no way this kind of waste will end. I pitty the families of those slain.

At Least 30 Filipino Police Commandos Killed In Clash With Rebels

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — More than 30 police commandos were killed in a clash with Muslim insurgents Sunday in the southern Philippines in the biggest single-day combat loss for Filipino forces in many years, officials said.

Dozens of commandos had entered the far-flung village of Tukanalipao at dawn looking for a top terror suspect, but had a "misencounter" with members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, Mayor Tahirudin Benzar Ampatuan of Mamasapano town told The Associated Press by telephone.

Other insurgents in the area later joined in fighting the outnumbered police forces, the mayor said.

The 11,000-strong Moro group signed a peace deal with the government last year and forged a cease-fire, which has been safeguarded by a Malaysia-led team of foreign truce monitors and has halted major conflicts between the two sides for years.

Ampatuan, the Moro group and military officials said the police commandos did not coordinate their plan to enter the Muslim rebel village before sunrise, apparently resulting in the fierce fighting.

The fighting in the marshy village of cornfields and coconut plantations subsided after several hours when members of a cease-fire committee and foreign truce monitors intervened, Ampatuan said, adding he deployed a team of village leaders and guards, who saw more than 30 of the slain commandos scattered in the battle scene.

"What they described to me was gruesome," Ampatuan said.

At least two villagers were wounded in the gunbattle. A few thousand villagers fled from their homes near the scene of the fighting, he said.

At least two Philippine security officials told The AP that the target of the police commandos was Zulkifli bin Hir, a Malaysian terror suspect known also as Marwan, who has been blamed by U.S. and Philippine authorities for several deadly bombings in the south. Marwan, who allegedly has provided bomb-making training and funds to local al-Qaida-linked militants, is believed to have been hiding in the country's south since 2003.

The two officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to reporters about operations to capture Marwan, who they said may have been wounded or killed in Sunday's fighting.

Aside from Moro rebels, hardline insurgents who broke off from the main Moro group a few years ago because they opposed peace talks with the government also inhabit Tukanalipao and outlying villages. Some of the Moro rebels and breakaway insurgents are relatives and co-exist in the same villages.

Ampatuan said his village leaders managed to extricate only five of the policemen's bodies by nightfall because they were afraid for their safety amid sporadic gunfire and the darkness in the village, which is 2 to 3 kilometers (1.2 to 1.9 miles) from the nearest road.

It remains unclear how many police commandos entered the village, he said, adding the death toll would likely increase.

An initial police report seen by AP said at least 37 police commandos perished in the fighting while 6 insurgents were killed and 11 others wounded.

Military spokesman Col. Restituto Padilla said government troops were helping the police retrieve the dead from the scene of the clash. "No military units were involved the fighting," he said.

While the tragic fighting underscored the difficulty of forging peace in the long-volatile southern region, homeland of minority Muslims in the predominantly Roman Catholic country, it also showed how the cease-fire and the foreign truce monitors, troops and rebels who jointly enforce it have effectively prevented occasional flareups from degenerating into a full-blown fighting that could endanger the peace deal.

The pact, which was signed in March, aims to establish a more powerful and better-funded autonomous region for minority Muslims in the south and end a decades-long rebellion. The conflict has left 150,000 people dead and helped stunt development in the country's poorest region.

At least four smaller armed groups, including the al-Qaida-linked Abu Sayyaf group, have continued fighting government forces and staging attacks in the south.

Well the USA supplies weapons to many countries all over the world and it would not be good for anyone of the rebels actually succeeded in thier goals here to have thier own country or what ever it would be called.

[virginprune]

I always wondered why they do not send in like 20,000 trips.

Would certainly make the colours a bit vibrant!

[Old55]

Just following up this old story.  It appears that one or more caucasians were among the dead.  There is a video at this link and it claims that the US Special Forces were behind this botched raid.

 

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/721976/unidentified-caucasian-killed-in-mamasapano

 

Saving face, the Philippines will try to blame the US. I say let them fight their own battles. I love the Philippines but the whole corrupt place is not worth the life of one US Service Person.

 

From LA Times 9/15/2015

http://www.latimes.com/world/asia/la-fg-botched-terror-raid-20150910-story.html

A heavy price paid for botched terrorist raid by Philippines and U.S.

Philippine raid fallout

After a bungled raid in January, the government of Philippine President Benigno Aquino III, center, has delayed plans to give the U.S. wider access to military bases that the Obama administration sought for its strategic “pivot” to Asia. (Jay Directo / AFP/Getty Images)

By DAVID S. CLOUD AND SUNSHINE DE LEON contact the reporter Asia Crime Terrorism Benigno Aquino III

Before dawn on Jan. 25, a Philippine National Police commando team crept toward a thatched hut in the marshy jungles of Mindanao. They were hunting Marwan, an elusive bomb maker with a $5-million U.S. bounty on his head.

But they weren't hunting alone.

Five or six U.S. counter-terrorism advisors assisted from a police command post nearby, tracking the assault team in live video from a U.S. surveillance aircraft circling overhead. "Their main role was to provide tactical, live intelligence," said a Philippine officer who was present.

As the 13 commandos closed in, one stepped on a buried mine. The explosion wounded him and brought a burst of gunfire from the hut.

After a firefight, the American-trained team rushed in and radioed "Bingo, Mike One" to the command post. "Operation Exodus" appeared a success. The wispy-bearded target was dead.

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To make certain, they sliced the right index finger off the corpse. DNA tests by the FBI later confirmed that it belonged to Marwan, nom de guerre for a Malaysian-born, U.S.-educated engineer linked to multiple terrorist attacks across Southeast Asia, including a 2002 bombing that killed 202 people in Bali, Indonesia.

But his death came at a dreadful cost: 44 police commandos and four civilians were killed, along with 17 militants, in a fierce daylong battle after the initial assault. The bloodshed triggered bitter recriminations in one of America's closest allies in Asia, and put sharp new strains on Manila's security relationship with Washington.

NEWSLETTER: Get the day's top headlines from Times Editor Davan Maharaj >>

Within weeks, the Pentagon announced that it was withdrawing a special operations task force. It had been sent to the Philippines after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and had become a model for U.S. counter-terrorism teams later deployed around the globe.

Philippine President Benigno Aquino III's government delayed plans to give U.S. troops, warships and aircraft wider access to military bases that the Obama administration sought for its strategic "pivot" to Asia. The planned expansion has been stalled since.

The botched raid also left a landmark 2014 peace deal between the Philippine government and entrenched Islamic rebels in tatters, sparking a renewal of violence by insurgent groups.

"It was a bungled operation and it has had major fallout," said David Maxwell, a retired Army colonel who commanded the U.S. special operations force in the Philippines in 2006 and 2007.

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This account is based on interviews with U.S. military officials and Philippine National Police officers, including survivors of the raid, as well as on formal inquiries by Philippine authorities, including a Senate committee and the Justice Department.

The U.S. "apparently gives us access to information and resources that have assisted us in our local operations," the Senate panel concluded in March. "However the question is … who is driving the cart? Was the operation authored by Filipinos?"

Pentagon officials say the answer is clear: No Americans joined or issued orders to the assault team.

But the debacle marked an inglorious end to a little-known 13-year U.S. military advisory operation in the Philippines, an effort credited with improving its army and police and with reducing the number of insurgent groups.

At its height, five years ago, more than 600 U.S. special operations troops deployed to Muslim-dominated Mindanao, the second-largest island in the Philippines, according to Maj. Karolyn McEwen, a spokeswoman for U.S. Special Operations Command Pacific.

cComments

These deaths, regrettable though they are, are dwarfed by the 4,491 American troops killed in Iraq and tens of thousands of injuries, many necessitating lifetime support. So in terms of scale, it may take a Democrat to make a mistake, but it takes a Republican to really to really screw up. We...

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AT 7:26 AM SEPTEMBER 11, 2015

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The U.S. force kept a low profile, working out of a base called Camp Navarro in western Mindanao. The government in Manila has battled Islamic separatist groups and communist insurgents on Mindanao for decades.

The Americans avoided a direct role in the fighting. They instead trained police and army units, advised them on counter-terrorism operations and ferried them around, sometimes in aircraft flown by U.S. contractors.

Over time, the U.S. focus increasingly turned to trying to capture or kill Marwan, who was believed hiding in western Mindanao. He became "HV1," the highest value target in the Philippines.

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Zulkifli Abdhir, his real name, had been indicted in 2007 in U.S. District Court in the Northern District of California. The 16 charges included supplying bombs to Jemaah Islamiyah, a regional terrorist group that U.S. officials link to Al Qaeda, and Abu Sayyaf, a Philippine-based militant group that recently pledged allegiance to Islamic State.

Philippine authorities blamed Marwan for at least nine bombings since 2002 that left 46 people dead and 207 injured.

But helping them find the bomb maker proved maddening for the Americans. Security forces had launched nine unsuccessful operations against Marwan since 2006. But he got away each time.

His escapes raised suspicion that he was getting help from nearby Philippine soldiers, perhaps rebel fighters integrated into the army as part of reconciliation efforts.

When police received a promising tip in mid-2014 that Marwan was hiding in the remote area of Mamasapano,

the U.S. special operations task force helped track Marwan to a small house on stilts and began months of aerial surveillance.

U.S. military advisors supervised training of the police unit at a seaside resort and in the jungles of Mindanao before the raid. They also provided night-vision goggles, maps and a hand-held retinal scanner to confirm Marwan's identity.

On the night of the assault, some of the police officers fell behind in crossing rivers and trekking down dark jungle trails. Only a third of the assault team had reached Marwan's hut when the shooting started about 4 a.m.

Eager to get out, the team skipped the retinal scanner and cut off a finger instead, sticking it in a Ziploc bag.

But hundreds of Islamic fighters from other villages soon joined the battle. They pinned down the assault team and 350 other police officers who had deployed in the jungle to guard their escape.

"One by one we were getting hit and it slowed us down to carry the wounded," said a police officer who survived the battle. "As the day went on, we felt helpless."

U.S. advisors, relying on aerial video, helped some commandos "elude large enemy formations, thereby avoiding further casualties," a police investigation found.

But the attackers spotted scores of police officers hiding in chest-high corn near Marwan's hut and began raking the field with heavy machine gun and mortar fire. Most of the 44 dead were later found there.

After the 14-hour battle, a Black Hawk helicopter flown by Pentagon contractors landed and U.S. Army medics helped treat the wounded and collect the dead, U.S. officials said.

A few days later, Philippine police turned over the finger to an FBI agent in the city of General Santos on Mindanao. He rushed it off to the FBI laboratory in Quantico, Va.

The FBI had DNA from Rahmat Abdhir, a U.S. citizen who was arrested in Sunnyvale, Calif., in 2007 on charges of illegally sending $10,000, plus hand-held radios, Colt .45 magazines and other material to a designated terrorist — his older brother, Marwan — in the Philippines. Abdhir pleaded guilty to one count and is serving a 10-year sentence at the federal prison in Lompoc, Calif.

Two weeks later, the FBI issued its result: "After a thorough review of forensic data and information obtained from our Philippine law enforcement partners, the FBI has assessed that terrorism subject Zulkifli Abdhir, also known as Marwan … is deceased."

Times staff writer Cloud reported from Washington and special correspondent De Leon from Manila.