U.S. MILITARY READINESS BOOSTED IN PHILIPPINES

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000807470018-0
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 12, 2012
• Sequence Number: 18
• Publication Date: February 25, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/01/12 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000807470018-0
EA
WASHINGTON POST
25 February 1986
U.S. Military Readiness
Boosted in Phili pp ines
J By George C. Wilson
W..hingtnn Post Staff Writer
The U.S. military in the Philip-
pines has been put on a "higher
state of readiness" in case the re-
bellion against President Ferdinand
Marcos jeopardizes Clark Air Base
or the huge naval base at Subic Bay,
Adm. William J. Crowe Jr., chair-
man of the joint Chiefs of Staff, said
last night.
"It's more of a heightened aware-
ness" rather than an emergency
reaction to the political crisis en-
gulfing the Philippines, Crowe said
in an interview. "We haven't seen
any sign of a problem" in terms of
anyone attempting to storm the
bases or cut off communications.
Crowe said he was "optimistic"
that U.S. interests will not be dis-
rupted by the turmoil. He and other
Pentagon leaders believe that only
the communist New People's Army
fighting a guerrilla war rather than
the opposing political factions led by
Marcos and Corazon Aquino pose a
threat to the U.S. bases in the Phil-
ippines, which are the largest in the
world outside the United States.
Crowe said he was taking a "wait-
and-see" posture about what would
happen in the Philippines in the
next few days but indicated he felt
the worst of the crisis had passed.
The State Department has been
working on plans to extract Marcos .
from the Philippines, sources said,
either by flying him out of the coun-
try on a U.S. plane or rendezvous-
ing with him after the Philippine
leader flies out of the country in his
own plane.
As precautionary measures, U.S.
forces in the Philippines have
posted more guards around the
bases and canceled leaves of service
men and women, Pentagon officials
said. They denied that U.S. forces
had been put on a high state of alert
for fear the bases would be at-
tacked.
"We have not seen any real
threat to the bases," said Crowe,
adding that the American military
presence in the Philippines had not
even become "a heavy part of the
dialogue" in the recent elections.
Although Clark Field and Subic
Bay remained calm, several law-
makers renewed demands that the
Pentagon look for alternative loca-
tions. "We can't assume we'll be
able to stay there forever," Sen. Jim
Sasser (D-Tenn.), ranking Demo-
crat on the Senate Appropriations
subcommittee on military construc-
tion, said yesterday.
Sasser stressed in an interview
that he was not opposed to main-
taining U.S. military presence in
the Philippines but felt that the cur-
rent turmoil there demands an in-
surance policy in the form of con-
tingency plans.
"The Pentagon says there's no
alternative to those bases," Sasser
said. "But there's got to be an al-
ternative if we're told to move out
of them." He said he will press the
Pentagon to deliver its study of al-
ternatives to the Philippines bases
by March 1.
Crowe said that the Pentagon will
deliver the report, but added that
alternatives to the present bases in
the Philippines have been studied
for years. The bottom line, the ad-
miral said, is that it "would be dif-
ficult and expensive" to put U.S.
ships and planes somewhere else in
the Pacific.
Crowe, who until five months ago
was the senior U.S. commander in
the Pacific, said that the increasing
Soviet naval presence at Camranh
Bay in Vietnam makes the U.S. air
and naval presence in the Philip-
pines more crucial than ever.
The Central Intelligence Agency
recently drew up two tstl s- of coun-
tries that were of vital importance
to the strategic interests o the
United gates, sources said. One
list ranked the nations in order of
their strategic location a seconcL
list ranked them in order of political
instability. he Philippines, sources
said, ranked first on both lists.
While calling the situation in the
Philippines "still dicey," Crowe said
he was "fundamentally optimistic"
about both the short-term and long-
term prospects for the stability of
the nation as well as the American
presence there.
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/01/12 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000807470018-0