The Philippines: Counter-Insurgency Vs. Counter-Terrorism in Mindanao

Dolorfino recalled being led to the watchtower in the centre of the camp and confined. “So the meeting has been postponed”, Malik said, “but we cannot postpone the misencounters – I am losing face with my men! You are here risking your life, but the policymakers do not value your work”! The government party, twenty in all, was not permitted to leave Jabal Uhud until a definite date was set for the OIC tripartite meeting, due to review implementation of the Jakarta agreement, but repeatedly delayed.75

For two days, Jolo teetered on the brink of war. Some military hawks invoked the massacre of General Teodulfo Bautista and 35 of his men after he agreed to talk to MNLF Commander Usman Sali 30 years earlier.76 But Dolorfino insisted that he was never in real danger: “We weren’t hostages. My twelve security men weren’t disarmed, some were allowed to travel to town, and we had our mobile phones”.77

On 4 February, Manila guaranteed that tripartite talks would proceed in July, and Dolorfino’s party was free to go. But the pace of mistaken engagements increased. Five days after Ajibun’s nephew was shot, a scout ranger platoon fought about “40 ASG believed to be under Radullan Sahiron and Doctor Abu” two and a half km further up the slopes of Mount Tumantangis78 – the heart of Ajibun’s territory. The scout ranger commander was reported as saying, “the Abu Sayyaf ran to the MNLF area; it looks like the Abu Sayyaf were joined by the MNLF”.79 Dolorfino cautioned that “somebody is trying to get the AFP to attack the MNLF and start a confrontation again”, adding, “there is a need to put up a [formal] coordinating committee between the MNLF and AFP to prevent hostilities. There is a truce, and we signed a peace agreement with the rebels, but sporadic clashes still occur”.80 His warnings were in vain.

C. The April War
By March 2007, the AFP estimated it had killed 79 ASG and captured 28 in 61 incidents over the course of Oplan Ultimatum. This was achieved at the price of 28 AFP dead and 123 wounded. Remaining ASG strength was put at 432 men with 284 firearms. By these conventional counter-insurgency metrics, the extended operation had reduced ASG manpower by 20 percent.81

In addition to killing the group’s top two leaders, the AFP was closing in on the foreign jihadis. On 3 October 2006, Dulmatin’s wife, Istiada, was captured in a safe house in Patikul, just a kilometre from the site of Janjalani’s last battle a month before. Another Indonesian with the Patek group, Abu Samur alias Gufran, died together with five ASG, including Jundam Jamalul, alias Black Killer, in a maritime encounter off Panglima Sugala, Tawi-Tawi (60 km south west of Jolo) on 6 January 2007. And on 9 April, the AFP claimed to have narrowly missed Dulmatin, Patek and prominent ASG commander Isnilon Hapilon in a pre-dawn raid in Kanlibot, Talipao.82

Two days later, the tottering truce with the MNLF collapsed. ASG led by Radullan Sahiron were monitored near a satellite camp of Khaid Ajibun’s, under the command of Bitting Jalaidi. Working through the Ad Hoc Coordination Group and Peace Monitoring Group, the Philippine army commander and his MNLF counterpart pressured Ajibun to evacuate his forces and allow military operations to proceed. Five of Ajibun’s sub-commanders agreed to withdraw,83 and 70 MNLF fighters from Bitting’s camp in Talibang were taken by military trucks to Langpas, Indanan – site of another MNLF camp, Amilhamja.

However, Ajibun himself, and his lieutenant, Tahil Sali, were reluctant to abandon Camp Marang, which lies three km from Talibang, “quite far from where the ASG members were”, as Bitting pointed out.84 Ajibun also mistrusted AFP motives. After having being told that operations around Camp Marang would only last a few days at the start of Oplan Ultimatum, he had remained surrounded even after fighting shifted to Patikul, with his men unable to carry arms in areas through which they previously moved freely.

Ajibun phoned MNLF chairman Nur Misuari, under house arrest in Manila, for advice, and was told not to vacate the camp. AFP operations began anyway, and Ajibun’s men were drawn into the fighting. It is unclear if there were any ASG casualties, but two soldiers and two MNLF men were killed in a six-hour skirmish. A ceasefire monitor based on Jolo told Crisis Group: “If the withdrawal had been coordinated properly, it could have been done. This splitting up of the MNLF is what made a mess of it. The partial evacuation gave a signal to the military to begin operations – but it shouldn’t have been rushed”.85 If all MNLF forces had stayed in place, or if all had moved out, conflict could have been avoided. Instead, a domino effect took hold across Jolo.

In an MNLF command conference on 7 April 2007, Ustadz Habier Malik had assured Ajibun that he would retaliate if Camp Marang came under AFP attack. Accordingly, on the night of 13 April, Malik’s forces mortared the headquarters of the 11th Marine Battalion in Seit Lake, Panamao, killing a civilian. The next morning they attacked a marine patrol base seven km to the east, in Tayungan, and the army special forces headquarters sixteen km to the west, in Talipao. Two marines died and eight were wounded. Malik declared that he had had enough of misencounters. “We have been cooperating with you”, he told a government negotiator, “but our men are becoming collateral damage”.86