Closer Than Brothers: Manhood at the Philippine Military Academy by Alfred W. McCoy

Closer Than Brothers: Manhood at the Philippine Military Academy Reviews

• 
  Michael Gerald

  In the 1980s, the Philippines (specifically Metropolitan Manila) was rocked by 9 coup attempts by a faction in the military. I remember the bloodiest of these, the one in December of 1989, when I was seven years old. One of my earliest recollections then was the sight of a coup dive-bomber attacking the government TV station which was (and still is) near our house in Quezon City.
  
  "Closer than Brothers: Manhood at the Philippine Military Academy" by the noted historian and political scientist Alfred McCoy of the University of Wisconsin (Madison) is a comparative historical analysis of two classes of the Philippine Military Academy (PMA), the country's equivalent of the US Military Academy at West Point. The book is required reading for my Theories of Comparative Politics course in graduate school and studies the class of 1940, the Academy's first graduating class and whose members fought the Japanese invasion; and the class of 1971, the class that figured prominently in the several coup attempts in the 1980s.
  
  McCoy's research puzzle is this: What makes a military disobey civilian authority and try to remove it? And what makes it do the opposite, to obey and respect it? In the case of the Philippine military, McCoy found that the answer lies in the socialization of the Filipino officer corps and the experience during service and churned out a book that is a guide on the military's role in the Philippines and Asia.
  
  The Philippine Military Academy was established in 1935 as part of the National Defense Act, the first law made by the Philippine Commonwealth (the ten-year preparatory period before independence) under President Manuel Quezon. The Commonwealth created the PMA to train Filipino officers for its military to defend against foreign invasion. However, the government also recognized the danger of creating a professional force with arms that can defend against invasion, but can also turn its guns against the government and seize power.
  
  To prevent the politicization of the military, the PMA (just like its US counterpart) instilled in its cadets a respect for civilian authority through discipline and curriculum, while the informal bonds created through hazing, hardship, and camaraderie served to instill a more lasting solidarity among its members.
  
  The class of 1940 was inculcated with the values of honor, professionalism, and respect for civilian authority over the military. Just more than a year after their graduation, the members of class 1940 were in the frontlines fighting the Japanese invasion. Though the integrity of some was compromised by collaboration (voluntary or not), most of those who survived a hellhole prisoner of war camp continued the struggle as resistance fighters and assisted in the defeat of the Japanese and the liberation of the Philippines in 1945. They also served the Philippine republic after the restoration of independence in 1946. Though many also felt the pressure of politicization (and a few succumbed to it) from politicians and the patronage system, most resisted and remained apolitical and professional.
  
  The members of class of 1971, on the other hand, were politicized from their cadet days through political events in the Philippines and the world and brutalized by martial law, when they became instruments of state repression. Having tasted power over life and death, the class of 1971 (and other classes during martial law) was stripped of its apolitical mandate and became convinced that it was an agent of change through violence.
  
  The first manifestation of the bid of the class to effect change and seize power was during the People Power Revolution in February of 1986 that drove the dictator Ferdinand Marcos out of power. Some people might forget it, but People Power was not a brain child of Corazon Aquino. It started as a coup plot by the Reform the Armed Forces Movement (RAM), the faction led by PMA class 1971 baron Gregorio "Gringo" Honasan and coddled by the wily Defense Minister (and co-author of martial law) Juan Ponce Enrile. But the plot was discovered through leaks and Marcos sent troops and tanks to crush the plotters who were then holed up in Camp Crame (the headquarters of the Constabulary, which is the Philippine National Police today). But a call from General Fidel Ramos, then Constabulary chief (and later Philippine President) who defected to the rebels, to Manila archbishop Jaime Cardinal Sin led the latter to issue an appeal through Catholic Radio Veritas for the people to go to the Epifanio De Los Santos Avenue (EDSA) to block the troops and tanks of Marcos from reaching the rebel soldiers. More defections followed, the US withdrew support from Marcos, and the world watched as the miracle of people power unfolded and unseated a dictator.
  
  But the success of People Power emboldened the right-wing members of RAM to flex its muscles to try to overthrow the government of Aquino and prevent justice to prevail against the torturers and executioners of martial law, many of whom were members of RAM. So they launched several coup attempts against the Aquino regime, but all failed due to tactical incompetence.
  
  But the coup attempts failed also because MAJORITY of the Armed Forces of the Philippines did not (and still do not) agree to removing a democratically elected government through a military coup. It is perhaps a testament that the socialization and discipline among officers (and ordinary soldiers) is still strong and a recognition that launching coups not only damages the economy and destroys democracy. It is also a testament to the failures of the very idea that Honasan, Kapunan, et al (and later, Trillanes) and to the prevailing concept that democracy must be continually improved.