SEND MARCOS PACKING

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000606120036-9
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 2, 2010
• Sequence Number: 36
• Publication Date: December 18, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Approved For Release 2010/09/02 : CIA-RDP90-00552R000606120036-9
9_1 ARTICLE WALL STREET JOURNAL
""''' 18 December 1985
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By Aw m a Sctn.aenrem Ja, softheadedly rejected a few years back. In- Khomeini and the Sandi
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There is a certain grim irony in the vac- stead, one finds the Reagan administration But what can we effectively do to -help
illations of the Reagan administration as it pursuing the same policy toward the Philp . the democratic alternative the Phili confronts the decomposing Marcos regime ippines that the Carter administration pur- pines? cre SeUL o In
In the Philippines. Only five years ago dur- sued toward Iran and Nicaragua. London e o er a e v in
ing the presidential campaign, Mr. Reagan Ronald Reagan. like Jimmy Carter, be- praise o covert action. y this he he meant
and his neoconservative intellectuals. con. -Van with an effort to reform a disintegrat- ara for guerrilla ban hi An-
our President Carter for abandoning ing regime by fulsome rhetorical blandish- ?ola. Ca lip Afghan_
our great "friends" the shah of Iran and ment. This is the famous policy of "con- the h of covert ac inn c ~~ cAct
al
Anastasio Somoza and In consequence structive engagement" with repressive has had Its enduring rtur,nh. L .
"losing" Iran and Nicaragua. The implica- governments. Vice President George Bush Inv ad for political rather than for military
tion was that a stronger president would declared that he loved President Marcos ends-not to c common sts unto su
have pursued tougher policies and that for his "adherence to democratic princi-
these policies could easily have preserved, ples." President Reagan said in' last year's late 1940s
those wonderful friends of the U.S. presidential campaign that the choice was There is not much the U.S. can do to
A conservative administration In Wash- between Mr. Marcos and "a large commu- control the destiny of the Philippines. The
ington, the argument ran, would never nisi movement to take over the. Philip- moderate opposition, though it has finally
have undermined pro-American regimes pines." Mr. Marcos naturally interpreted agreed on a ticket in the presidential elec-
by insistence on human rights, social re- such tender words not as a signal to tion, has not shown much unity of purpose
forms, a peaceful transition to democratic change his ways but as a license to Inten- so far. But it does enjoy widespread popu-
government and other such sentimental sify his course of domestic plunder and re- lar support. The U.S. should distance itself
nonsense. It would have given these pression. even more unequivocally from the Marcos
friends of America unconditional support But the more his men have harassed disaster and do what it discreetly can to
and would have done whatever was neces- and murdered political opponents, the help democratic Filipinos make a strong
sary to rescue them. If only there had been more money they have stolen from their showing in the elections that the regime at
a Republican president, the shah and So- country, the stronger the opposition has be- this very moment is planning to rig against
moza would still be In power, and their come. As disintegration continues, the them.
countries would still be in the Western Reagan administration, like the Carter ad- Exploited Favor and Aid
camp. ministration before it, is changing its
By No Means Clear course. Now we are urging on Mr. Marcos I trust we will not be diverted from a
the need for human rights, social reform realistic course by talk about how much
This line of argument raised questions, and a peaceful transition to democratic the U.S. "owes" to Mr. Marcos. Talk about
then and now. Assuming for the moment government. Mr. Reagan today is duplicat- sentimentality! Mr. Marcos has never sac-
that it might have been in the national in, ing in the Philippines the policy for which rificed his own interests to help the U.S.,
terest of the U.S. to preserve thieving des- he so righteously denounced Mr. Carter in anymore than the shah and Somoza did be-
pots in Iran and Nicaragua, it is by no the cases of Iran and Nicaragua. fore him. Like the shah and Somoza, Mr.
means clear that it lay within U.S. power He is doing so because he has no more Marcos has systematically exploited the
to do so. Rhetorical assistance will not do real choice in 1985 than Mr. Carter had in favor and aid of the U.S. to-amass personal
it. Mr. Carter tried that, congratulating the 1979: He is learning now what Mr. Carter power and wealth. Rep. Stephen Solarz's
shah in 1977 on "the admiration and love learned then: that there is no virtue in House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on
which your people give to you" and prais- tying the U.S. to a despotic regime doomed Asian and Pacific Affairs is documenting
ing Somoza as late as 1979 for his progress to collapse. The course of unconditional this point in its current hearings. As The
on human rights. Military assistance will commitment to unpopular despots is not Economist crisply puts it, "The only aid
not do it. The U.S. sold $19.5 billion in arms likely, in the absence of military interven- (or 'rent for a base') that should be given
to Iran from 1972 to 1979, and Somoza's Na- tion, to save the despots-and it is quite to people like Mr. Marcos is a one-way
tional Guard never languished from lack of certain to alienate the inevitable successor ticket to an anti-assassin-guarded holiday
weapons. regime and in the meantime to strengthen resort."
We always overrate the capacity of the Marxist revolutionaries. It has taken the Reagan administration
U.S. to shape the destiny of other coun- Can reform pressure salvage the situa- a long time to learn the lesson the Carter
tries. The balance of internal forces gener- tion? The best hope in the Philippines administration learned so Painfully about
ally decides the future of nations. If Presi- would be the orderly transfer of power to the unprofitability of trying to prop up
dent Carter had never opened his mouth on. the moderate opposition. So the U.S. is doomed despots. As the Reagan people be-
the subject of human rights, the shah and calling on Mr. Marcos, as President Carter gin to learn the lesson in the Philippines,
Somoza would have fallen all the same. It called on the shah and Somoza, to do one hopes that they will apply it in other
seems most doubtful that any U.S. policy things that, if he carries them out, will de- parts of the world.
short of military occupation could have stroy the bases of his power. It would be There is every indication that Gen. Au-
saved them. And one wonders whether it foolish to count on Mr. Marcos to collabo- gusto Pinochet in Chile stands today about
serves long-term -American interests for rate In bringing about his own downfall. where Mr. Marcos stood in, say, 1983. Con-
the U.S. to intervene militarily in other His interest lies not in strengthening the structive engagement will not reform Gen.
countries in order to protect hated regimes moderate opposition but in destroying it. Pinochet any more than it did Mr. Marcos.
against the wrath of their own people. His hope lies in polarizing the nation so Effusive words will only encourage him in
These questions remain speculative in that he can present himself as the only al- a course of repression. Let us move to di-
relation to Iran and Nicaragua. But the ternative to communist takeover. vorce the U.S. from the brutal dictator in
Reaganite assumption that there was an Mr. Reagan, like Mr. Carter before Chile before the situation is hopelessly rad-
easy alternative to the Carter policy now him, is impaled on a dilemma. The longer icalized and while there is still time for a
comes to the test in the Philippines. For he waits in the vain expectation that Mr. democratic alternative to emerge.
Ferdinand Marcos is in the same position Marcos will voluntarily undertake reforms
today that the shah and Somoza were in and relinquish power, the more radicalized Mr. Schlesinger is Albert Schweitzer
during the late 1970x. This surel is the --- - pro
y the situation will become and theTesP jet yor the humanities a the City Uni-
time for those brave solutions that, accord- likely it Is that the moderate opposition versity of New York and a winner of Pulit-
ing to neoconservative myth, Mr. Carter so will inherit. Mr. Carter waited too long in zer Prizes in history and biography.
Iran ative, Nicaragua. Tlie d been alte
native, such as it may y have have been, , melted
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Approved For Release 2010/09/02 : CIA-RDP90-00552R000606120036-9