Sky Masters

Date: 5/21/90

PENTAGON DECLARES PHILIPPINES

“IMMINENT DANGER” AREA

WASHINGTON (MAY 18) UPI — The Defense Department designated the Philippines Friday as an area of imminent danger for special pay purposes, which means US military and civilian employees will be getting slightly larger paychecks.

The Pentagon said it took the action because of the “current unstable conditions” in the Philippines, where three American servicemen have been killed in politically motivated attacks this month alone.

Imminent danger pay is an additional 15 percent of basic salary for American citizens who are department employees and $110 per month for all US military personnel.

Date: 5/22/90

“Well, first in my mind, the communist dream in the Philippines will always be there. The communist dream of taking over and dominating the country will always be there because you can’t kill an ideology.”

General Renato S. de Villa, Chief of Staff, Armed Forces of the Philippines, from Asia-Pacific Defense Forum, U.S. Pacific Command, Winter 1989-1990

Date: 11/2/90

“… Turmoil in China… combined with speculation about U.S. forces departures from the Philippines, have merged to Cause a new appreciation for U.S. regional security presence….. I believe there is a growing realization in the Pacific that U.S. presence cannot be taken for granted. If the U.S. presence is substantially reduced, many Pacific nations perceive the danger of other nations moving into the vacuum created by our departure, with a potential result of conflict and instability.”

Admiral Huntington Hardisty, U.S. Navy, Commander in Chief, U.S. Pacific Command, from Asia-Pacific Defense. Forum, U.S. Pacific Command, winter 1989-1990

Date: 11/6/90

MELEE MARS INAUGURATION OF AUTONOMY IN SOUTHERN PHILIPPINES

COTABATO (NOV 6) REUTER — Police punched and clubbed 17 Moslem students before dragging them off by their hair on Tuesday after they disrupted President Corazon Aquino’s inauguration of an autonomous government in the southern Philippines, witnesses said.

The students, members of an organization supporting Moslem rebels demanding a separate state on Mindanao island, chanted slogans against the autonomous government about 20 meters from where Aquino was speaking.

Manila has set up the autonomous government, dominated by Moslems, as a way to end separatist violence on Mindanao, the second-largest island in the Philippines.

The government, headed by former Moslem rebel commander Zacaria Candao, can pass its own laws, collect taxes and license fees, and set up a regional police force in the four predominantly Moslem provinces on Mindanao island it controls.

Manila would retain control of defense and foreign policy. — from U.S. Naval Institute Military Database Defense News.

Date: 14 January 1991

AIR FORCE TO CREATE TWO NEW COMPOSITE AIR WINGS BY 1993

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Air Force will develop by 1993 two composite tactical air wings that combine different types of aircraft in the same unit. The new wings will serve as prototypes for the possible reorganization of the service’s tactical force structure along more mission-oriented lines… [The composite air wings] would include aircraft that could perform attack, defensive, standoff jamming, and precision-strike missions. — from Aviation Week and Space

Technology magazine, p.26