The tragic Mamasapano operation (mounted during the term of Philippine President Benigno Simeon ‘BS’ Aquino III) in which 44 Special Action Force officers were massacred by elements of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front was not a military operation. It was a police operation gone wrong. This fact, however, did not stop Opposition “activists” from making a statistical comparison between it and the recent war to liberate Marawi City of Islamic terrorists and drawing stupid conclusions from the exercise.
A meme is being circulated by the Facebook “activist” group Silent No More PH (SNM) to spark “debate” around a cherry-picked set of statistics comparing Mamasapano and Marawi.
| SUPPORT INDEPENDENT SOCIAL COMMENTARY! Subscribe to our Substack community GRP Insider to receive by email our in-depth free weekly newsletter. Opt into a paid subscription and you'll get premium insider briefs and insights from us. Subscribe to our Substack newsletter, GRP Insider! Learn more |
The geniuses behind SNM are likely to be basketball fans seeing that this is an exercise sufficiently dumbed down for that level of discourse. But there are four facts about the two operations that were conveniently left out of the cherry basket:
(1) The police and the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) worked in close coordination in Marawi City.
(2) The AFP were left out of the loop in the planning and execution of the Mamasapano operation.
(3) Key government officials in Malacanang were all generally on-board and committed to seeing the Marawi War through to completion.
(4) In the case of Mamasapano, divisions at the top of the command chain (both on the military and in Malacanang) directly contributed to unnecessary casualties to the deployed police teams. Most notable of all was the communications blackout between then President BS Aquino himself and then Department of Interior Secretary Mar Roxas to whom the Philippine Police reported.
Just on these four facts alone, any idiotic call to a “debate” on comparisons between Mamasapano and Marawi is effectively revealed as fallacious before any further fact is brought to bear.
Even if we discount the above flawed-by-design chain of command of the Mamasapano encounter, the nature of operations on the ground don’t make for an apples-to-apples comparison between the two. Marawi City was a complex attack operation against an enemy that was deeply dug into defensive positions. It was reported later that they made use of ratholes and trenches that made the AFP’s push into the city all the more dangerous.
It is also actually quite ironic that SNM would suggest that the longer time it took to complete the Marawi War made its execution inferior in nature to the Mamasapano operation which, according to its meme took only one day to complete (in contrast to the five months of fighting in Marawi). Perhaps Marawi could have been taken a lot faster (and involved less military casualties) if, rather than send ground troops to liberate the city in door-to-door street fighting, the AFP had, instead, made more use of artillery and aerial bombardment (like the US did in the “liberation” of Manila in World War II). But, of course, that too would’ve raised eyebrows of disapproval amongst these high-horsed guardians of ethical behaviour. One really can’t win in a “debate” with idiots.
A similar meme this time comparing the Zamboanga siege of 2013 to Marawi published by SNM was also meant to spark the same sort of moronic “debate”.
In the case of the Zamboanga siege, the forces of the enemy, the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) led by Nur Misuari, weren’t as deeply-entrenched within the city as the Maute-led Islamic State forces were in Marawi. And, again, there really is no comparing the two-bit banditry of the MNLF with the bigger potential threat to national — and regional — security of the enemy in Marawi City.
Ultimately, all SNM really achieves by engaging in these quaint social media stunts is disrespect the valour of Filipino soldiers who fought and died in these conflicts. To the people behind SNM, they are all just artefacts to be sacrificed to the gods of their partisan agenda.
benign0 is the Webmaster of GetRealPhilippines.com.
Ah, the flawed and dishonest argument between two completely different and complex events that are oversimplified into two columns of numbers, bravo Silent No More, Cocoy Dayao should lead your group in the next Senate session so you can lay down your garbage memes.
even using simple math, mamasapano still looks like a massacre
marawi had 1.1 soldiers dead per day
if mamasapano occured everyday a total of 6600 soldiers would be dead by the end of the conflict
even the zamboanga siege had 1.25 dead soldiers per day
more money spent means more effective ordinance. you cant fight a war effectively on a shoestring budget. the guerillas, though looking poor, are funded by their mother extremist group, which is rich in the first place (oil, baby). there are a lot of reports that the terrorist sport better arms than our boys.
funny self-proclaimed “data scientists” boasting astrophysics degrees dont point it out. seriously, f these guys
Ignorance it can be. People behind silentnomore .ph already been revealed and this are paid people to put back this power thirsty yellowtards into power. Shame on you no respect to the soldiers who risk their lives for our country. Our brave soldiers and police who fought for our peace. Never compare the stupidity of the operation of mamasapano massacre , because that case is done by the mind of an idiot president who cares nothing but himself.
Ignore snm. They’re idiots.
“Ideas are more powerful than guns. We don’t let people have guns. Why have we let them have ideas.” – From Joseph Stalin, Soviet Union Dictator.
Those idiot YellowTards are comparing a small scale Mamapasano operation, to an entrenched enemy, trained in Urban Warfare in Marawi City. Mamapasano massacre was a stealth operation to capture an Islamic terrorist.
The Zamboanga siege was in an area, where civilian casualties, were not taken into consideration.
In the Mamapasano operation, a corrupt suspended Police, by the name of Alan Purisima, the sidekick of Aquino was involved. He was not supposed, to be in that command, because of graft and corruption cases, were pending against him. And he was suspended.
Aquino, Purisima and Roxas, did nothing to rescue those trapped SAF Police, being slaughtered by those Islamic Militants. All they would had done : is to order reinforcements, on all sides , in the form of Helicopter Borne Reinforcement Troops, to help/rescue those trapped SAF. It is just a cruel way for these idiots: Aquino, Mar Roxas and that corrupt Police, Purisima, to do nothing and let those brave men die.
The Zamboanga siege , is easy, because all they have to do, is to send an overwhelming force to defeat an enemy.
In the Marawi City case; there was a full scale war. The enemy had built sniper tunnels; used houses and buildings, as sniper covers. They have powerful sniper rifles, with large amount of ammunition. They have IEDs… Besides, they used civilians as covers. The enemy was well trained by the foreign ISIS militant fighters, in urban warfare tactics to fight against the AFP.
It was like the Battle of Manila, during the liberation of Manila, in World War II. The Japanese Imperial Army , was dug in; used buildings and other covers, to snipe at the forces of the Americans and Filipino guerrillas. Manila , became one of the most destroyed City in World War II. Filipino civilians , were indiscriminately massacred by the Japanese forces.
This was the reason, Gen. Yamashita, the commanding General, of the Japanese forces, was hanged in Los Banos, Laguna in a military trial.
Those YellowTards, WhiteTards, or AquinoTards, are trying to distort the situations, to insert the heroism of Aquino, Mar Roxas and Purisima; and to cover their insensitivity and incompetence !
Now this clumsy meme by SNM is like spraying perfume on a piece of yellow dung, in the hope of proving “the love is still there” for this disgraced incompetent “leader.”
Quite the opposite – anyone with half a brain can see through the fake conclusions being waved around here and only be left with one reaction: total disgust over how Yellow brains operate.
Probably a more intellectually honest apples-to-apples appraisal of both operations would be through a comparison based on kill ratio as the parameter: number of terrorists killed per casualty on the government side.
I do recall some tactical errors in Duerte’s Marawi campaign – like the death of 11 soldiers through inaccurate bombing/friendly fire, which more closely resembles the Mamasapano blunder. Analyses along these lines will be better received by the general public.
How much time he gains who does not look to see what his neighbour says or does or thinks, but only at what he does himself, to make it just and holy.