The firing of Tomahawk missiles from Tacloban has exposed the following:
-US military activities are not restricted to EDCA sites and Balikatan exercises. What are US forces doing in an airport which is a civilian facility?
-Authorities claim the expansion of US military presence is to extend cooperation for humanitarian assistance and disaster relief. Firing of missiles is clearly not related to aid distribution.
-US forces used Tomahawk missiles in Iran and West Asia, the same deadly weapon fired from Visayas to Luzon. How many missiles are prepositioned in the Philippines? All missile systems – Typhon, NMESIS, HIMARS, Tomahawk – should be immediately removed since they endanger our communities and undermine our national security.
-Marcos Jr said the Philippines will not be dragged in conflicts involving the US. But this year’s Balikatan has further revealed the war posturing of the US and it has turned the Philippines into a war playground, training ground, and launching pad of its provocative military drills. US military transported military equipment from Mindanao to Luzon, delivered missiles from Clark to Cagayan before installing them in Batanes, and now it fired a Tomahawk missile from Leyte to Nueva Ecija. In other words, Marcos Jr has allowed the US to treat the whole country as its forward operating base.
-War exercises, especially the use of live fire missiles, displace residents, disrupt livelihoods, and destroy the environment. They also consume vast amounts of energy and other resources, which could have been used to provide subsidies to the public amid the global oil supply problem and oil price shock. The government is boosting the US war machine instead of addressing the basic needs of our people.
Bagong Alysansang Makabayan strongly denounces the firing of a Tomahawk missile, and calls for local, national, and global protests against the subservience of the Marcos Jr government and intensifying US military intervention and aggression in the Philippines and the Asia-Pacific.
We call on all Filipinos to unite and resist US militarism and fight for genuine sovereignty, freedom, and democracy.