Transcript for:
Camlon Rebellion in Sulu

welcome to the second rodri Hall Memorial lectures camon Rebellion 1948 to 1955 a forgotten Sulu Insurgency and the hidden legacies of World War II my name is Charlene deaz and I'm the head of programs for Filipino Heritage Library caml On's Rebellion 1948 to 1955 continues the story that Tom McKenna shared in last year's talk the unsung heroes of nanow it's another narrative filled with gripping action resourcefulness and Ingenuity political betrayal and piracy all the ingredients needed for a Hollywood movie but before we Embark in that journey I would like to thank Miss consell Paul McHugh and family for their generous support in making this lecture series possible each talk in the series promotes a uniquely Filipino experience of World War II and how the legacy of the war continues to be felt in present time equally importantly each talk activates an element of the Rodrick Hall collection of Filipinas Heritage Library a collection that Mr Hall built over the course of his lifetime now let's hear from some of rodri Hall's closest collaborators as they pay tribute to a dear [Music] friend [Music] bro described himself as a man with a mission and a man in a hurry his mission was to collect as many materials on the experiences of Filipinos during World War II and to place them in a library that would ensure that these are shared with today's generation as well as those in the future and he found this repository as well as partners with us in the filipin Heritage Library so in 2010 broad shipped his entire collection Lock Stock and barel of 700 volumes from his home in London to fhl in MTI through the years his collection has grown to more than 2,000 print and non print materials on World War II making the Roder call collection fhls Crown Jewel as such it is fhl Center piece literally and figuratively because we now revolve our collection Focus around the period immediately before during and right after World War II identified as the formative period of Philippine Nation to collect books and various other historical materials relating to the Philippines during that war and to make this more accessible to the general public he turned this collection over to the Filipinas Heritage Library where it now forms a major part of its Holdings as the rodri hall collection but Rod was not one to Simply donate books he wanted other people to use them and to research more on the war he wanted to add more materials and was constantly in search of new directions for the collection to this end he was able to negotiate digitization of numerous manuscripts in various collections around the Philippines he wanted to provide as many different perspectives as possible and when he learned of the large body of Works in Japanese aimed to acquire as much as possible for the collection why are you collecting Japanese Publications about the Battle of Philippines even though you do not understand Japanese language you said to me I always answer that this question like that I want next future generation to know what happened in Philippine during the Asia Pacific world and Philippines under Japanese Ru however you told me the real reason is that collecting Japanese books is to make peace of my mind and making Rec for my D Prim as a post World Japanese generation I promise you to try to make no more World Society and also to try not to create the kind of people such as you and your family horribly experienced in Philippine I think the Japanese should know the facts of this history I believe this is my mission as a Japanese [Music] [Music] oh oh my [Music] [Music] [Music] no current thinking on the previous Century with its many upheavals in Mars is that we all have an ethical obligation to remember that history but understandably not everyone takes up that burden because the memory of War especially for persons who witnessed it is painful the late Mr Rod Hall was deeply courageous in that sense of taking up an ethical burden he took pains to give World War II its proper m not just for himself but also for our country America and Japan whose materials he collected he helped strengthen our cultural memory in the hope of preventing the return of suffering and now with his passing we in turn at philipinas Heritage Library and AA Foundation have an oblig ation to make his legacy and his commemoration of History endure now let me introduce our speaker Thomas McKenna is an anthropologist who has lived and worked for years in bangung Moro communities in the Philippines and has spent decades writing and conducting research on their culture and history formerly associate professor of anthropology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham he has won writing and teaching Awards and has been invited to present his work on the moros at Oxford University the council and foreign relations and the John's Hopkins school of advanced International Studies among other forums he is the author of Moro Warrior from atano University press Muslim rulers and Rebels from ano press his forthcoming book man of menau about the life of Sultan Muhammad H Adel is a sequel to Morrow Warrior it should be published in the Philippines in early 2025 he lives with his wife in San Francisco ladies and Gentlemen please welcome Thomas McKenna good morning Tom good morning good morning faren good morning to everyone we're so thrilled that you could join fhl again for this return engagement um um last years unsung heroes of menau really was a remarkable exploration of an Overlook aspect of Philippine World War II history um and it was a big hit with our audience so what do you have in store for us this year well I have a a combination of the old and the new and thank you very much for that generous introduction uh it is a continuation of the last presentation because it starts in 1946 right after the war and it also features one of the key characters from last year's presentation Lieutenant Muhammad Adil but it also has some very new elements a new location Sulu rather than mind now and a new and fascinating main character the Title Character Kamon right it's a very um I won't delay the lecture anymore um so without further Ado I turn the floor over to Thomas MC thank you very much and and again good morning to everyone let me start in 1946 with the end of the second World War and the inauguration of the third Republic the Philippines became the first Asian country to break free of formal Western colonialism but breaks with the past are rarely clean ones and a great deal has been written about the Tangled and inequitable relationship between the new Philippine Republic and its former colonizer the United States especially in the first decade after the end of the war one well-known example of that entanglement is a Hu balaha or or Huck rebellion in central lzone there a communist inspired peasant fight fighting force of former World War II guerillas held territory less than a day's March from Manila and strongly challenged the new Republic now the Cold War was just getting underway and the Huck Rebellion quickly gained American attention in 1950 afraid of losing the Philippines as they had just lost China in their words American State Department officials hurried to help trust the Rebellion choosing as their agent Edward Lansdale there on the right an expert in covert operations now although he's often identified as a CIA agent Lansdale actually worked for an even more shadowy organization the office of policy coordination which was conducting the covert operations that the newly organized CIA was not yet allowed to do within four years Lansdale and his public partner in the Philippine government defense secretary Ron saisai had suppressed the Huck Rebellion through a combination of new military funding psychological warfare and programs for landless peasants my focus today however is on another less rown Insurgency cam lon's Rebellion it was fought at roughly the same time but on the opposite end of the Philippine archipelago C Lon was a to Farmer from the island of Holo in the Sulu archipelago contemporary news reports usually refer to him as Dr Kamon or Kamon the talug simply addressed him as Maas or Elder for brevity I'll I'll simply call him Kamon by 1950 he was already in his 60s he had fought the Japanese Army as a wtown Guerilla and now he had United a number of separate armed bands to fight the Philippine repu Philippine Republic His Rebel force was only a fraction of the size of the hook Army never numbering more than three or 400 Fighters but by 1948 he controlled more than a quarter of Holo Island and as we'll see for its size his Rebellion proved quite costly for the new government now the origins of Common's Rebellion are complex but some clear patterns stand out first is anti-japanese resistance on Holo and throughout Sulu during the war Sulu was a Japanese stronghold during the war more than 6,000 Japanese troops occupied the island of Holo wartime ENC ERS with t gorillas on Holo and tawi tawi were intense and brutal and as many as 3,000 Japanese soldiers may have died at the hands of those gorillas in the last year of the war that is a picture of talo gorillas on Holo uh greeting uh the American uh Invasion forces when they arrived well the war also brought a flood of American Guns in a development filled with irony the American Military which had insisted throughout the entire Colonial period that moros as well as most Filipinos be denied access to guns left the islands a washed and fire arms and ammunition when they returned quickly home at the end of the Pacific War in late 1945 now one of the very last American campaigns of the entire Pacific War was fought in menen and Sulu in the summer of 1945 so a disproportionate number of American weapons were simply abandoned in the southern Philippines uh then uh there is the legacy of antagonism between moros and Christian Filipinos in a manner similar to Indonesians or Malaysians some moros in early 1946 objected to the return to power of their old col colonizers after the defeat of the Japanese occupiers a Twist in mindo and Sulu however was that their American colonizers had themselves left after the defeating the Japanese but were then replaced by Christian Filipinos despite their own history of major atrocities against the moros American colonizers had been seen by moros as a buffer against political Domination by their old enemies the Filipinos from the north that enmity was not just a dim memory just 50 years earlier at the end of the 19th century at the very end of the 19th century thousands of Filipino soldiers under Spanish commanders had attacked mororo communities in menau burning fields and homes as they went so there were still people alive in 1945 who remembered uh those incursions at the end of the last century speaking of legacies let me talk for just a minute about the history of the term Morrow a term that I use here in this presentation and that I've als also used in the title of my last book moral Warrior the Spaniards first gave that name to the Muslim peoples of the Southern Philippines when trying while trying unsuccessfully to conquer them it was the same name that they had given to their more familiar Muslim enemies from morania and Morocco the term Moro eventually became an epithet among Christian Filipinos to them it meant savage or pirate and it was also of course long considered an insult by Philippine Muslims to be called aoro but in a bold symbolic shift Philippine Muslim separatist during the late 1960s transformed the term moral into a positive symbol of Collective identity and they formalize the term by adding the prefix banga which means people or nation in this presentation I use the shorter term uh form Moro instead of the more formal form bangam Moro to refer to indigenous Philippine Muslims so back to Comm loone Comm loon's misgivings about continued rule by Outsiders after the defeat of the Japanese caused him to take up arms again against a new uh what he considered to be a new um interloper from 1948 to 1951 camelon Rebellion made few waves in the National Consciousness Polo as you see there was very far from Manila but that State of Affairs changed quickly in 1951 in late 51 the Philippine military sent its most elite counter Insurgency team the Nita unit to solve the common problem once and for all this was the same unit that had terrorized Huck Fighters and civilians in Central lzone and had recently been deployed in Korea this picture here is a picture of the Nita unit on patrol in Korea well on a foot patrol deep into the swasa forest on Holo the unit was ambushed by camon Fighters When the Last Blade fell the much feared nanita unit had been annihilated with only a few soldiers escaping to tell the tale camon had finally gained the full attention of Defense secretary maai saisai and his American adviser Edward Lansdale seen there on the left maai ordered an allout assault on kin's refuge and committed two infantry battalions and two Sherman tanks to the task but maai and lonz were so eager for a quick end to the rebellion in the South they were still dealing with the hux in the North that they also secretly offered camon incentives to surrender and the rebel leader soon agreed to them in August 1952 he met maaii on beach in northeastern Holo and turned in a few dozen Rusty rifles and you can see them uh there on picture on the left but the formal surrender turned out to be little more than a photo op when kon's promised concessions which included a 20,000 peso payment to him as well as funding for a pilgrimage to mecca for himself and some of his followers when that had not been delivered in two weeks he quickly restarted his Revolt in response maai redoubled his efforts he sent artillery fighter planes Navy ships and Philippine Marines to reinforce the troops already in Holo he had Edward Landsdale approved the use of American Napal against the Rebels the same American Napal later in Vietnam and Lansdale some of you may know was also a key architect of that disastrous war in Vietnam but despite the overwhelming Force now raid against camon the conflict quickly stal made it the military killed or captured scores of rebels but at least as many government soldiers as Rebels were killed or wounded in each encounter in addition five of the 30 fighter planes used in the campaign were were downed by Small Arms fire from kon's Fighters well mizai quietly initiated negoti negotiations once again and two months later tomon surrendered for a second time this time there would be no ceremony on the beach there would be a trial on a Navy ship anchored in Holo Harbor in that trial common and 22 of his top lieutenants who had been called common Outlaws and bandits in every single government report and news Artic newspaper article written about them we convicted of the most political of crimes rebellion and they were sentenced to life terms in prison however concessions had once again secretly been made instead of being transported to multin Lupa in November of 1952 Kamon and his men were granted conditional pardons by President Corino and exiled to nearby ta to the second largest island in the suu archipel I haven't discovered what Kon did um while in Exile and in fact uh there are indications I'm sorry and and it's not even certain that he actually went to tawi tawi but there are indications that he spent at least part of his time strengthening his alliances throughout the Sulu archipelago and especially with the pirate networks of the Southern Polo Coast after a year and a half in Exile Kamon quietly escaped to return to Eastern Holo and launch his final armed Revolt the third government campaign against tomon was the largest of all and the with the participation of all five military branches what was now called the Holo task force included Philippine Navy Patrol boats and 5,000 troops in all nevertheless the conflict soon stalemated again and this time remained stalemated for more than a year and a half within just a few months of the revived Rebellion the casualty rate among Junior Military Officers in Holo was the highest in the country and many of them were doing whatever they could to be transferred off the island well there was one Young Junior officer who was very pleased to be transferred to the island in early 1954 Lieutenant Muhammad adio was a Morrow a member of the M denau nobility and an officer in the Philippine constabulary which is the fifth was the fifth branch of the Philippine military Lieutenant odil had been a teenage Guerilla officer in World War II now he was called to Holo with other Mor OPC officers to join the hunt for camone and he relished the opportunity much much of the information in this presentation and in my forthcoming book is based on the oral history of his life that Muhammad Adil generously shared with me over more than 10 years many of the pictures you were seeing including this one are also from his collection and I am grateful to his family for letting me share them with you today for the first months after his arrival in Holo Lieutenant adel's platoon was always at the Forefront of the hunt for klom but despite his best effort he could never make contact with the Enemy even though he could sometimes hear them nearby in the jungle he eventually realized that kon's Fighters were avoiding his unit because they did not want to attack fellow moros his soldiers all mouns refused to wear the helmets issued them wearing their traditional Tu bows instead even odil wore his helmet only in Camp like seen here uh not in the field those colorful Tu bows mark them as moros even in the dense jungle although klin's Rebellion is mostly forgotten now in 1955 it made the news and even garnered International attention here is a cover article about Kon from the June 1955 issue of harmer Harper's magazine a popular American periodical the title which you see there in red on the bottom is uh the landlock pirate of the Pacific it's a catchy TI but but quite inaccurate tomin was neither a pirate uh nor was he landlocked it's quite hard to be landlocked on a small island but the focus on piracy was not far off the mark because International piracy centered in Holo had recently started up again after a very long Hiatus that Resurgence was made possible by Surplus American military equipment left in the southern Philippines particularly powerful Diesel engines that could be attached to light boats to create very fast motor launches thanks to the automatic weapons and diesel engines left behind by the US military psea Pirates could now raid farther travel faster and carry more Firepower than ever before just a historical reminder here that c rating is an ancient practice in the Philippines and in fact it used to be practiced all over the Philippines reciprocally by Raiders based throughout the archipelago so prior to Spanish colonialism there were talic pirates and bisayan Pirates as well as Hulu Pirates and they all raided one another but Spanish colonizers disarmed the territories that they controlled without providing adequate protection against raids from the sea so Sulu Pirates became the Vikings of Island Southeast Asia making seasonal raids against poorly defended Coastal communities and carrying away people in plunder those raids didn't end until the introduction of steam powered gunes by gunboats by the Spaniards in the 1840s now the first major pirate raid since the start of the Japanese war was launched from Holo in late March of 1954 to attack the town of soraa in British North B Borneo now Sava it took place just as camon escaped Exile and resumed his rebellion and it is very unlikely that the timing was coincidental according to Muhammad AEL who was a Former Intelligence officer some of kon's many lieutenants had moved into International piracy to support his new Rebellion on March 29th 1954 more than 50 Hollow based pirates in two black launches attacked sen Pora at death lobbing grenades and firing automatic weapons they overwhelmed the local police force and killed two con constables and a British officer one of the constables who was killed in that in that Skirmish is a the tall soldier right there closest to us wearing the turban Sergeant Singh Sergeant Singh was a valiant uh fought valant but was killed by the Pirates while defending the town and um his death was mourn for uh very long time afterwards there were there were newspaper articles about his death death 20 years after this incident the Pirates um then emptied the town's bank and Armory and looted stores before speeding off into the night with their in with their boats filled with gold cash guns and cigarettes more raids followed against towns bordering the celab SE in sui in cantan in the south and in mindo and they garnered more International attention well the Philippine government was now faced with growing diplomatic pressure and deteriorating International press and they were forced to act the government dedicated even more military resources to Holo creating a separate Naval task force focused on fighting piracy that Force included the Navy's first aircraft car which you see here it was a repurposed American LST that could carry a patrol helicopter to spot pirate boats at Sea well helicopters coupled with Ong Ground Intelligence helped greatly in finding pirate boats but what was still needed was a small highly mobile unit able to stop and search suspected Pirates boats returning to Holo Lieutenant ail and his handpicked soldiers filled that role when they received intelligence that a pirate boat with a crew of 29 had recently left Holo from Mong Bay to raid across the border he took 20 of his best men in two boats and went to sea to try to intercept after six days in open boats on the celab sea with no pirate spotted and all of his men desperately seasick he ended the mission two days lat later however he received new intelligence that the pirate boat have been spotted re-entering the Sulu archipelago he quickly rounded up what Troopers he could this time choosing them for seaworthiness um rather than fighting ability he could find only eight of them eight local Troopers all of whom had reached a mandatory retirement age but they were all men of the sea back out on the sea they went nine men in a small wooden boat hunting for 29 Pirates and finally they found them when Lieutenant odil hailed the suspect boat and demanded to search it the Pirates responded with a furious burst of automatic gunfire hitting one of odal's men a 60-year-old private in the forehead but the constabulary boat had a 50 caliber machine gun and when Odio was able to maneuver it he gained a Firepower Advantage after a firefight that lasted more than an hour the pirate ship of the pirate boat finally ran ran itself ground on a tiny Island in Mong Bay it was the first successful interdiction of a pirate boat in the post-war period and Lieutenant odil became an overnight national hero the Secretary of National Defense himself flu flew audio to Manila on his own plane for press interviews major newspapers ran stories crediting him with breaking the backbone of piracy in shulu he received the military Merit medal for G Tre in action which you see here and he earned an eventual promotion to cap back in Holo after his head time in Manila ail pursued kon's lieutenants even more energetically in one six week Peri six- week period in April and May of 1955 he was responsible for killing or capturing six of those lieutenants in response kon's followers targeted AAL ambushing ambushing him in his Jeep in his boat at his camp and even in his home he sent his wife and daughters back to kotata for safety see here on this slide these are some of the individ individual Rebels and Pirates Who were captured uh by Lieutenant ail uh the um the folks on the left seated are uh had U had been on a pirate raid uh to uh Indonesia and you'll notice that there's a woman among them so not all Pirates were male well kon's lieutenants were falling one by one but Kon himself remained secure and free in eastern Holo he was moving constantly never staying more than one night in a village and he still had more than 100 armed men with him but finally a full 18 months after he' escaped Exile and restarted his Rebellion the military task force managed to surround camon the rebel Chieftain and his remaining Fighters had gathered at kot on the southernmost a ruined fort on a rocky null just 300 yards from the sea on the southernmost tip of Eastern Holo they were surrounded on three sides by more than 1500 soldiers and just off the beach Naval gunboats patrolled the bay to prevent their escape Captain Adil now Captain ail who now commanded a PC company was back on the front lines of The Siege with his men to tighten the news the general directing The Siege ordered his soldiers to construct sagili 12 foot lengths of bamboo fence that they then moved at night to draw the circle tighter around the rocky null the next afternoon he ordered a 1H hour AR arery barrage that pulverized the hill When the Smoke cleared an armored car climbed the null but found only one shattered body the soldiers surrounding the null spent a sleepless night awaiting Common's attack but when Dawn broke they discovered that he and his men had slipped through their lines by crawling under Armored Cars silently killing a dozen soldiers and two officers as they went comeon Last Stand had become kon's last breakout mamun who who had shrapnel in his arm from the shelling of kot C was tired and he surrendered one month later for the third and final time once again he did so after negotiations initiated by the Philippine government once again there were secret inducements including cash payments for his surrender despite the government's claim that it was entirely conditional but this time he was tried and convicted in a civilian Court sentenced to life in prison and sent to montin Lupa well to gauge klin's career I think it's useful to compare him with Gano one of the last and most famous of all Native American resistance leaders Jano and jum was an extraordinarily famous um individual um in in the United States when I when I went to college which was a few years ago um almost every uh almost every college dorm room had a poster of Gano Jano was a a um a chera Apache leader in Southern Arizona he also fought a powerful government for 10 years without ever being defeated he also voluntarily surrendered three times the last time in 1886 and he was also finally sent to prison away from home far from home all the way to Florida gono eluded capture for nearly a decade in the vast expanse of the Sierra Madre Mountains on the US Mexico border Kon did the same thing but on a small island Jano famous Kamon as been mostly forgotten unfortunately both men however at heart were simply trying to live unmolested in their ancestral homelands now there's a fascinating Koda to Common story I'd like to share with you in 1967 a dozen years after receiving his life sentence klon now A Very Old Man as you can see there came to the attention of a young scholar political act activist and up lecturer nor misari mwari who liked Kon was a t from Polo became determined to free him from prison so that he could die at home on the island of Holo misari was able to get a message directly to Ferdinand Marcos on his birthday which read in part klon is dying this man has already paid for his crime within hours he received a phone call from the presidential Palace telling him that Kon would be be released the next day Kon was able to return home to die and nor misuari went on to found the National Liberation Front and become Marcus's principal political Nemesis over the next decade it is striking in retrospect that despite intervening in the fate of common Ferdinand Marcus did not learn the lesson of klon that invading the morrow Homeland with military force would lead only to an extreme extremely costly quagar well there's an even more fascinating Coda to the story of PC Captain Muhammad AAL it tells of how later in his life the military hero of the young Philippine Republic was transformed by maral law and the military invasion of his homeland of cotabato into a brigadier general in the National Liberation Front you see him there with nor misari but that story we'll have to wait for a future presentation thank you all very much for listening thank you Tom and what a way to end the presentation with a teaser like that leaving us for a part three I'm I'm sorry well we forgive you as long as we're able to take you up on the offer my pleasure let's open the floor for questions our first question and I I apologize if I say the name incorrectly because it's unusual to me I think it's Gil Jones uh who asks what is celan's Legacy that enables today's society to prosper and how did he pull people to join his Uprising well that's a good question let me um see if I can talk first about his legacy um so we think so Comm Lon was convicted of the same exact political crime as Luis taruk he was convicted of the the head of the hook Bop uh the hook the hooks um he was con convicted of the convicted of the crime of rebellion but he was a very different sort of Rebel than Luis taruko he was not educated he was not an ideologue like taroo he he's also different from leaders of the of the later moral separatist movement who are also mostly um very well educated and ALS also ideolog C was a man of tradition uh a traditional leader but with one with extraordinary leadership skills so I think the best way to think about him is as a link between the past and the present um a link between uh early anti-colonial resistance uh in mind Sulu and the modern movement for Bank samuro autonomy so in that sense I think he's a a unifying and an inspiring figure for bankor used today and when asking about uh how he gained followers in in his day I think it's the same reason he was a unifying and inspiring figure figure for youth then and that's how he was able to attract them as followers yes um I will ask I'll I'll follow up about the youth uh question later uh because it is fascinating to me that technically camelon was a senior citizen so you know how do you bridge that Gap and inspire uh young people to join but let me go now to the second uh pre-registration question this is from Michael Eric Boro and he asks does the C did camalon Rebellion gain support from the suu sultanate and other Muslim polies on Mainland mind now um I don't um thank you for that question um I don't really know the answer uh to that question you um in 1950 uh the new Sultan Sultan kiram the first um sort of ascended to the the throne and um but the sudar sultan had been in um um pretty U difficult shape for for years before that mostly because of a a very um uh very complex um dispute about who should be Sultan uh and who was the real sultan uh but uh kiram the first was officially recognized by the Phil Philippine government in 1962 and um that was an important recognition that that they hadn't given before so I'm I don't know that um uh he he would have been a strong supporter of Cam Loom I I um I don't know the answer to that this is a um again this was a time also you thinking about M now that um uh key Philippine politicians uh Philippine Muslim politicians like Sal pendatun were were really gaining power and influence in Manila and so again they um they were pretty committed to the Philippine Republic for their part at at the time that changed for good reason uh and um but at the time uh they were committed to the Philippine Republic so I don't think they would have been strong supporters either thank you for that um I just want to read a comment uh from the webinar chat that I I really caught my attention it's from this is isn't a question uh but it's from Cesar formenta Jr who wrote without camon we have no mindo State University the establishment of MSU was because of Cam's demand and that is one of the legacies of camelon to us which is extraordinary um yeah I didn't know that that's very interesting yeah right I read that I thought wow that's that's really incredible so thank you Cesar for sharing that um with the audience and last our last pre question um I think of it more as an allegorical question um and I hope you're not taken too off guard by it but it is from chitana diako who says what does this teach us about standing our ground in the west Philippine Sea well I um that the what's going on in the west Philippines Sea is a very a fascinating very complex topic but I am not at all qualified to speak about it but I think I will take it as an allegorical allegorical question and um I think uh it's uh I think we can say uh pretty safely the Common's rebellion was the real David and Goliath story so in that sense uh it it can serve as an inspiration uh for uh the D David and Goliath U conflict going on in the uh West suus thank you thank you so much uh Tom I'm going to jump now to our Q&A box in zoom and it is filling up rapidly so uh the first question is from I apologize if I say this incorrectly uh myara Lati who says what are the reasons behind cam lon's Revolt is the is his identity based is it identity based as a moral or in the name of the talug people that's that's a very good question I I um as I I mentioned in the in the talk the the reasons for the Revolt are complex and um uh in in fact um Muhammad ail um in in his explanation included such things as the fact that Kon was was quite upset at U very local um government officials for various reasons uh who were not uh who were not uh uh Filipinos Christian Filipinos who were also taug but who had been appointed by Christian Filipino so there were there were uh you can think of it as sort of nested reasons there were he had very specific uh problems but he had more General problems with the fact that that um uh that that he was being molested in various ways uh in his homeland uh including attempts to uh to uh try him for things that he had done during uh during the war that um were um had question questionable legality but I think in general uh he was fighting as a uh as a a taug a tsug warrior a t traditional leader uh on the island of Holo and um and not uh not uh more not so much more generally as a A Morrow although again as I said you know the the the feelings he was having uh the misgivings he was having about um having been brought into the Philippine Republic were very similar to misgivings um uh that others were having uh other moros we're having elsewhere in mindu thank you Tom that was a very comprehensive answer to uh complex question on identity um Ivy tan would like to know was hon a part of the Guerilla unit of Wendel fertig during World War II very specific knowledge there oh very good question only in the most uh General uh sense um Wendel fertig um uh formally and theoretically was um uh in control of all the gorillas in mow and Sulu right I uh I I doubt that that the Kon had ever heard that name or knew who Wendel fertig was but if you looked at a if you looked at a u a list of of um a map of a command structure uh Wendel fertig would have been at the top yes of U of uh the formal gorillas of U of of the suu archipelago I think in relation to this question now is a good time um to bring in the issue of a younger generation because we mentioned earlier that Calon was in his 60s when the Rebellion started so um I I am assuming here that most of the people who joined him were his uh fellow soldiers from World War II um which meant they were also I guess more elderly uh older soldiers um was camlan able to inspire um younger younger members of of the region to join him in his in his Rebellion uh yes he was so he had you know he had um he had veterans of World War II with him and again it wasn't they weren't that old because they um he was he was an old gorilla Old World War II gorilla already and uh but I would guess that most of his fellow gorillas were much younger than him and so they weren't that old but I think he also was able to attract um even younger um U uh men uh who were um who had come of age after the war uh he was as I said he was inspiring um and and um uh you know and he uh he was able to to bring people together and uh Inspire young men to join him now we should all it should also be noted that many many of camon f kon's fighters were killed and so there was a there's really it was a generation of um young men in um in eastern Holo who were decimate and that and that um that that was noticeable many children grew up without fathers uh in that in that in that part of uh poo so it was a it's you know worthwhile to remember that it was a tragedy as well yes of course um it is such a dramatic story that we do tend to focus on um some of the numbers that you mentioned like three to 400 people in the Rebellion versus an army of 5,000 um strong it's just it's um it's really truly a David and Goliath story um but since we brought up the topic of um the former World War Two gorillas that joined klan's fight um this brings up the question of um Lieutenant Adel actually who has also appeared quite a bit in our webinar chat and people are curious to learn myself included um what it must have been like for Adel if you could speak for the family um because because you are quite close to them um what was it like for lieutenant Ado to be Tas um and to accept the task of of of having to capture camlan when you mentioned in the presentation that uh camlan himself did not want to engage a fellow Morrow um so at one point they were they were compatriots against uh the Japanese in World War too but now Adil is representing the Philippine government actually uh trying to capture camelon could you explain more about that Dynamic I absolutely and in fact I can the reason I can explain it is because um Muhammad Adil and I and I I usually call him Sultan Adil because the last title he held um in his life was as a sultan of cotabato so um Sultan Adil and I uh uh talked quite a bit about that because it was it was such an interesting uh topic and an interesting time for him um uh Lieutenant Adil the young Lieutenant ail really admired uh kon's prowess and he wanted to learn the secrets of his success he also wanted to test himself against kamlon he wanted to fight cam loon face to face and he was very disappointed that he never had that opportunity um I forgot to mention I apologize for this that the last picture I showed of K Lon at at his surrender was taken by uh Muhammad Adil I is my favorite picture of Kamon because it shows him as this combination of both Fierce and vulnerable it's a really wonderful picture and um and Muhammad Adil took that picture when he went to visit Kam Lun in jail to ask him about the secrets of his uh of his prowess and how he was able to fight the military for so long um so that was that was sort of one U one side of his thinking um you know that klon was the enemy he uh he was a highly he was a respected enemy U but uh he he wanted to he wanted to to uh conquer him uh defeat him uh but later in his Tour of Duty of Sulu uh after kon's capture odil became closer to local twig leaders um after he killed or captured enough of adel's lieutenants they they began coming to him to surrender voluntarily surrendering to him he got to know that and um he got to know various local leaders and and gradually he was able to see the bigger picture of uh what was going on in Holo and in retrospect he called The Campaign uh the multiple campaigns against uh U Kamon he referred to them as a sad Affair that it was a sad undertaking um he had mixed feelings about Kon uh he um you know he he said I I really admire him and he's a marvelous Warrior but he's also a criminal because he had uh he had come and did you know did commit some crimes uh there were murders that that he pretty clearly committed and robberies and so forth and adio didn't like that side but he did admire the um he did really admire the U the warrior side of him and he also disliked what he started to see as the Crusade overtones of this massive military response to klin's Rebellion he you know he he basically told me here's man who's just trying to live in his homeland you know unmolested in the way he always has and somehow he is attracted you know this huge um um uh U and and very um uh you know just a a uh an over response on the part of the military uh to get him and he said in some senses it it felt like a it felt like a crusade and he did not like that aspect so mixed feelings but he had a very very nuanced uh approach to Common and and what common stood for that's really wonderful to hear because uh the whole topic today is very um multi-layered and nuance and even I myself feeling a little bit anxious about it so that was a wonderful answer to the question um from herard raldo who has really participated so wonderfully in the chat thank you sir for that um the question is can we assume that camon and and his followers had help from relatives in nearby Borneo that's a very good question I don't know I um I don't know uh of any specific cases of that uh but um those who are familiar with the history of Sulu the Sulu sultanate and also the history of migration um know that that uh there's a great deal of movement of people back and forth between Sulu and uh and and sabba and uh so he he may have had relatives there uh who may have helped him but I don't know the any specifics about that and since we are on the topic of piracy already um one of my favorite parts of the presentation um an anonymous attendee um is referencing the female pirate in the photo that you highlighted and they would like to know was there any document pertaining to her identity as well as her role or rank in the piracy group that may be beyond the scope of your knowledge but it can't hurt to ask unfortunately there was not any uh any identifying information and I um this was a this was part of a report that uh uh that Sultan Adil shared with me and um and I copied it and um and uh unfortunately I didn't look at it carefully enough to notice the woman in the picture until uh Sultan Adil had had already passed away and I'm I'm very regretful that I wasn't able to ask him about uh about the woman in the picture and um so I don't I don't know any details about yes it it is hard to recover uh details like that um after certain time periods uh a few more questions from Anonymous attendees um one person says do you have any plans to write about camalon I am now reading Morrow Warrior but I think celan's Rebellion is more compelling uh well I um I like them both um but I um thank you very much um uh for your uh thoughts on on that yes I am writing by kamone uh right now in this in in this forthcoming book called um uh uh called of menau it will include this the story of the of Kamon and the campaign against him and and Lieutenant odal's uh participation in that campaign Manda mind now is a book about Muhammad Adil taking him from the end of the war uh to his um to the end of the century and um it will include quite a number of uh of interesting um uh Adventures uh and it will also include very prominently uh how it happened that he went from being a national hero of the Philippine Republic to a brigadier general in the morome National Liberation Front that sounds wonderful um this is a very interesting question to me it's when we think of the context that the hook rebellion was going on simultaneously um this question is asking given his Morrow Roots why is celan's rebellion mostly forgotten even by most other Morrow armed groups well I I um that's a good question that I've asked myself uh numerous times I think um part of the reason is that uh in the um it was be I think partly was because moros Philippine Muslims were largely forgotten in the first Decades of the New Republic uh there very little attention was paid to them by um by the uh government officials of the new Republic very little attention was paid to them by newspapers unless they did things like Comm Lon did now there are various reasons for that and there various understandable reasons uh moros had played a very prominent uh had gotten actually uh more than their serve attention under American colonialism even under the Commonwealth uh but when the Philippine Republic started moros were um for uh let's say for almost 15 years were um uh pretty much ignored by the government and uh and I think that that the the U the fact that common um you know even though he drew such a you know uh so many resources from the government and his his Rebellion lasted so long it was still relatively small compared to the Huck Rebellion the Huck rebellion was right next door to Manila the Huck Rebellion had the the the Spectre of Communism attached to it uh Commons did not and I think that all of that so Huck Rebellion got a tremendous amount of attention and Comm loon's Rebellion got relatively little at the time and then was quickly forgotten which is why honestly Tom I I feel that these lectures and how um through rodri Hall the rodri hall collection we're trying to uncover these hidden legacies um it really shows the significance of the work that you're doing and how we're able to spread uh this kind of awareness we're very grateful for that to be here we have a question from Frank Lopez who's also been contributing a lot to the chat thank you so much for that uh before I ask his question he actually has a note that you might find interesting he says a female pirate um is mentioned by gosh I hope I get this right schofer schner USMC diary escape from the Daval Pino Colony it may not be the same woman of course but it's just you get the impression that there weren't that many female pirates at well thank you very much for that that is a great tidbit a great story um I'll be sure to send you the chat box later so you can read through the comments it really is um a great conversation that's going on over um but Frank's actual question in the Q&A box is um are there any notes referring to Commodore Ramon a Al karat uh yes he was um I'm not sure it's the same person oh I I I don't know what um the question was referring to there was um I'm trying to remember the name of the person who was leading the Nita unit um um at the time that they were ambushed who was heading up the Nita un at the time there the name that name sounds familiar but I I'm sorry I don't um I I can't uh speak uh specifically about that if the name I don't know that name we understand it's a it's a it's a big history um Jesus Terry adevoso asks uh what exactly was Colonel lansdale's role in Mindanao I know he was concentrating on issues affecting the Philippines mainly in Manila and Lon and even then was getting involved in Vietnam so if you have I guess any more details and how he contributed to um forgot the phrase uh to the strategy against K long yeah just a few more details he um again he was advising mide and um particularly when he was defense secretary and so in those early years 51 52 uh he was clearly very active in um in advising msai in all of his military decisions including uh the the early efforts against uh early efforts against K so he was clearly involved in the decision to send the Nita unit there and as I mentioned he was involved in um he approved the use of American Napal against um camon I don't have any uh information that it was ever actually used but use was approved then I think it was 1954 uh that he left left the Philippines and went to Vietnam and did not uh did not return to to the Philippines for a number of years so he was out of the picture uh by I think 1954 so he wasn't there for the final uh campaign the 1954 55 campaign against K the campaigns really are extraordinary the way they were uh escalating it I mean in my your presentation truly plays like a Hollywood action War film uh so it's just it is very very compelling um Adrien asks is camon regarded as a hero within certain segments of the Sulu sultanate and Mainland mindal due to his resistance efforts against the Philippine government during the mid 20th century so I guess his his standing and Legacy within the region yeah I think I think that's similar to the question I was we I was talking about before and that I don't uh I don't think that I don't know for certain but I don't if we're talking about this the St sulon in the early 1950s and leading uh moral figures political figures in in elsewhere in early 1950s I don't think they thought of Kamon as a hero I thought I think Kon uh because he was he was rebelling against the Philippine Republic that they had uh they were uh invested in uh uh at the moment they were trying to fit into this new Republic trying to figure out how they would fit in and uh they they were not interested in Rebellion against the Republic uh at the moment and um and so they would not have considered him a hero they would have considered him a an outlier an outlaw a rebel uh Kamon was um a man of the people and uh his his support came from um came from Ordinary People not from um uh high level politics policians or assults yeah um I I would just like to mention a note uh from Earl fronda who put this in the chat uh he he points out because we were wondering about the leader of the Nita unit earlier he says my gosh I hope I'm saying this correctly Napoleon Napoleon uh valeriano was if I remember correctly the CEO of the Nita unit but I'm not sure if he was on hold at that time yeah thank you yeah valeriano Napoleon valano is a very interesting man he was very close uh friend drinking buddy Confidant of Edward Lansdale and actually um followed Edward went with Edward lale to Vietnam and then was actually involved in the Bay of Pigs invasion uh in Cuba in in 1960 whenever that was uh so he's a very very interesting character of the period and he was the founder and led the Nita unit for those early years in uh uh in central lone by the he got a promotion though and he went on to um command a larger unit and I think the the leadership of the Nita unit I think went to an officer named Alcantara and I think he was the officer leading the Nita unit or commanding the Nita unit when they went to H I'd have to double check that all right uh we have another another question from rasmia who says thank you very much for the lecture sir as a Morrow I am quite confused with the use of the term pirate um with the piracy mentioned earlier as a common practice in Southeast Asia similar be similar to the quote piratical unquote acts of the 1950s um you see it is difficult it is just difficult to equate or see ask kamlon who is like a hero to us in Sulu liken to the term Pirates or piracy well that's a very very good question and an important question and um Let me let me address it in sort of a more general term something I've been thinking about um let's yeah the term pirate is a is a problematic term in certain circumstances right but in other C circumstances it doesn't seem to be so my question back to the audience is why is it that some Pirates are considered to be just fine and other Pirates are considered to be very different so why is it that European pirates for example are always get the always get the uh the Hollywood treatment right why is it so the Vikings the Vikings were pirates right there have been countless films right talking about the Vikings oh they're adventurers they're explorers they're this and that they were pirates they did they plundered and raped and stole people just like any other Pirates uh but you can go to Scandinavia today and there are ton there are multiple museums focused on Pirates the Vikings have gotten this great you know gotten this really uh um easy right uh reputation uh even though they were pirates and then let's look at the Pirates of the Caribbean right they get the Disney treatment right uh you know so and you know in the United States they're children's parties right with pirate themes that they're the Pirates are considered rap scallions and Rogues and but in fact they were pirates they they they robbed and they plundered and they uh and they stole people away and and so forth so my only take is you know piracy I think is a problematic term but I I don't have a problem using it but I just think that every all Pirates should be created equal and uh and be and be uh talked about in the same way and I don't think it's fair that uh European Pirates get the get the Hollywood treatment and uh Sulu Pirates or barbery pirates from uh from from Morocco uh are are called you uh Savages and and villains and and horrible people and the Vikings get a get a free pass so that's my that's my rant for the day but your your question is is very good and I uh I take your point that um uh that associating common with piracy uh I I I can see as a problem um you we can call it by another name we can call it C rating but the fact is that he was uh he was supported by uh uh by uh by pirates for uh uh by SE Raiders for a period of time in the 1950s in fact Tom um the tail end of your answer neatly dovet tales with a comment that just came in the chat from Francis Ed Vilan noeva who says I think the politically correct term for this tradition is rating uh as they operated for human slave trade economy which was quite common during the prehispanic period And even well into the Spanish period of the Philippines so um even that the term piracy now it really has entered the public imagination uh precisely because of Hollywood portrayals uh that you discussed I think my reaction to when I first saw that component in your presentation was I can use that for marketing because I knew right away that it's a term that would that would grip the imagination but it is deeply problematic and we greatly appreciate the nuanced answer to the question right and I think that I think the problematic part of it again is that not all Pirates are treated the same way and I think they should all you know and that and that's uh so I think that's unfortunate and and I am perfectly fine with the term uh C Raiders although I I I do think that they are um they're they're synonyms yeah yes um Frank Lopez adds Manila Publications branded camon as the notorious Bandit camon so again it it emphasizes that uh that depiction of him and I'm absolutely right absolutely right he was always called a bandit and an outlaw um and that was done all throughout the all throughout the American Colonial period every time um every time the the um Americans were uh fought the moros moro Uprising they were always termed as uh Bandits and outlaws it's a way to delegitimize um opposition exactly um so moving on to the next topic um perita asks in your opinion what led to Cameron's continued resistance what would account for the transformation of his causes uh did these efforts Come From Below or were initiated from the top Elites of the morrow Community I'm sorry could you repeat just the first sentence I missed that I was looking at the chat yeah just uh in your opinion what led to caml On's continued resistance I think it's because you mentioned there were the three or the third was the final but the um the surrenders um was there more behind the story of not being that's a again that's I think one of the reasons his his um his Rebellion lasted so long is because he surrendered uh uh three times rather than once the same thing with Gano uh fighting an armed Rebellion Rebellion on a small island is very difficult right there are very few places to hide um uh surrendering surrendering uh so that you can fight um surrendering with terms which commin always did with concessions so that he could fight another day is actually good strategy for Rebel for Rebel on a small island and I think um I think that that his his um his surrenders were very strategic I think local people understood that that his surrenders were strategic and I'll even add that even in his final surrender the final time he surrendered he had um part of the negotiation was that he would receive parole rather than uh part of the concession was that he would receive parole rather than go to jail and so he didn't uh surrender with the intent of going to jail he thought he would be paroled and would maybe be able to fight yet again um but uh it and the case actually went to the Supreme Court he sued uh the Philippine government because they went back on their concessions and they were able to win the case by saying he did not that that that the PE was based on certain conditions he did not fulfill those conditions so he had to stay in jail so that that's another very interesting Coda to the story that even in his final surrender um he had negotiated uh what he thought was an agreement that would keep him out of jail extraordinary I I would never have thought that he would sue the government um again amazing he may have been uneducated but he was a very sophisticated um uh Rebel in his way um an anonymous attendee asks did you ever have the chance to talk with his son who joined the military about his exploits with C St no I I have not um I um I I I would like to do that have the opportunity to do that um another question this is a bit Technical and I'm I'm going to struggle with these names uh the question is oh my gosh Captain Kaling Galan khuang is a captain of the United States armed forces of the Far East or the USA ffe from Lulu and a relative of Appo camon do you have any research about him I do not um I certainly know about the USAF the United States armed forces Far East uh I talked about in my previous presentation um uh I think that's that's really interesting um information I don't have any um I don't have any uh uh particular information about that there are some um uh there are some good uh uh sources though to uh to look for that there's a um uh a book called uh among the bravest which is about Sulu uh Sulu gorilla fighters in World War II and then um hold on a second I'll get the other book um we'll be back shortly thank you ated and then this book which some of you may know uh which is a book by a gorilla days in the Philippine South by Cesar Po and uh and uh and Ricardo Jose uh has a very good section on uh the Guerilla the World War II Guerilla movement in uh in the Sulu in Sulu including H and ta ta that I would um recommend reading to see if you can um find that name Tom your timing is actually perfect because one of the questions in our chat asks will there be a bibliography listed I'm certainly happy to do that yes thank you for for providing one but I can also say that fhl has compiled together a book list uh from the rodri hall collection uh with related topics to Pan's Rebellion so you can learn more about that and we will show the QR code for that book list at the end of the talk so please visit us here in the library and learn more from our resources um the book that was just mentioned in fact I was told by our head librarian is available at the fhl rod Hall collection so if it's not included in the book list that I just mentioned we'll be sure to put it there thank you Cil for letting me know and Tom we still have quite a few questions how are you doing I'm fine thank you okay um um so these are so this question is interesting possibly a little controversial but an anonymous attendee uh wants to know uh in what ways did camalon most influence misari oh I I that's a good question I don't I think you probably in the most General way it it seemed that um it seemed that uh this is this information is from um Miss's official biography I can't remember the name of the U of the biographer but the in that biography it said that Kam that that misari did not know about Comm Lon until he was asked by a professor at up to write a paper about him and so then he did research and found out found out more about him it's a little surprising that even you know that would have been in in the 60s that he didn't know more about Kon and I'm not sure that's actually the case but um but but you take the biographer at his words so maybe uh Missi just knew a little bit about him and then learn much more and that it was that research that inspired him to um uh to try to free klun from jail which he was he successfully did um oh what was the what was the rest of the question actually I think I've heard yeah so uh oh so then I would say just in the most General sense that as I mentioned earlier that U kamlon is an inspiration it's a David and Goliath story kamlon is an is an early Rebel who is a link between the past and the present um and um I think inspired likely inspired Missi that way um since we are speaking about camon later days there is a question from uh arus raposas who says um would you know how C on spent his later days did your research were you able to touch upon that uh if you mean later days after leaving prison that's how I understood the question yes my uh my sense is I don't know for sure my sense is that he he really that misari was not exaggerated he really was dying and that he only had a very short time to live he was able to get to return to Holo and he uh he died in his home community in Holo but I don't know how long you live I see uh this is not a question but it's a fascinating comment it's a good comment um an anonymous attendee says this lecture is very timely as we are currently celebrating bangang Moro History Month this March so it really is um it's perfect I've seen a number of comments where people are hoping that this Zoom will be available on YouTube um and the answer is yes all of fhl lectures are available on YouTube uh we upload a cleaner copy of the lecture usually one to two weeks after the lecture itself so you will be able to view this and hopefully you can also use it for as a teaching resource perhaps um in the future um all right let me get back to our still lengthy question list um this may have already been asked but I'll will ask it anyway in case there is a a Nuance that we can work on an anonymous tendy is taking us back to World War II and the question is how did camon get along uh with fatig if not fair T any other Americans that he came into contact with and what did he take from his Guerilla days uh in order to lead the Rebellion so maybe in terms of strategy or in terms of even the weapons because the Americans ironically Left Behind uh weapons that the rebellion was able to use that would be good to know uh unfortunately I I don't have the answer to either of those questions my sense is that uh camon had relatively uh little or no contact with Americans uh during the war they were relatively until the very end of the war until the American invasion of Holo uh there were relatively few Americans unlike in minda now where there were where there were significant number number of Americans um who were who were um left U left in menau after the uh after the American surrender who remained in menau free after the American surrender there are relatively few in Holo and um so I don't um my sense is that he did not have a lot of he had no direct contact with fertig and uh and and I I I would be surprised if he had significant contact with any Americans uh except that the end of the world I see um this is not from uh the Q&A box but I just listening to you I recalled um because we're back in World War II I recalled that incredible story from last year about the Battle of tamparan which was really just um for those who are not familiar this is the carabal uh the carabal suicide bomb in essence um is there a similar story uh here in camon rebellion of course there was the final uh the final stand and The Noose that was tightening but um you could tell us more about that or are there any other like really remarkable conflicts that jump out at you from that time uh well it's that's a very good question thank you uh the um you know this was a this was a true Guerilla War fought in a fought in a jungle primarily and um the the bottle of topron was unusual because it was a rare case of a Mass massed Attack uh uh against Japanese troops uh that's that was rare that's rare in all gorilla um conflicts uh you know frontal attacks uh but there but there were some really interesting um uh examples of U uh very different types of attacks uh in the in the comp common in common Bellion let me just tell you about one uh that that Sultan Adil told me so in 19 early 1955 was part of the last campaign uh the the Philippine military had set up various camps uh in in eastern Holo again trying to uh pin Kamon down and uh so Sultan AAL tells the story of one morning in one of those camps uh it was pre-dawn and the soldiers were gathering on the parade ground uh for uh for morning R and and um uh a um a man one of Camlin ordered told one of his men to go to go there in uniform uh in in a Philippine Army uniform carrying a um an army issued rifle uh the man walked to the center of the uh the center of the parade ground knelt down and began shooting and uh and shooting all around him uh it was still quite dark uh the Panic soldiers uh picked up their own guns and started shooting from where they thought the the firing was coming from and of course started hitting each other when uh when when finally the shooting un ended um they found 10 dead soldiers on the ground none of them uh was camelon man who man who had escaped this was a this was a an extraordinary uh example of um psychological warfare right K LOM was trying to send a message to these soldiers that there was nowhere safe on Holo for them no matter how you know how well protected their Camp was and how many of them there were there was still going to be nowhere safe for them on Holo and it's a quite a remarkable story it it really is um because psychological warfare we hear of it a lot being told usually from the other side right I think you well you didn't use the term in the talk but um I was thinking the dirty tricks of um the other side so um it's it's an incredible story in that um in that sense and this was an example of psychological warfare I that was uh superior to the uh to the dirty tricks uh used by um by Edward Lansdale in the Huck rebellion and some of you may know about some of those yeah yes um so there is this is a actually a personal question a bit of a light question before we go back to more serious topics but um our audience would like to know um if you will be V visiting the Philippines anytime perhaps we can have an on-site talk here instead of a webinar oh well thank you for that question yeah I hope to be um uh I hope to visit the Philippines in uh next fall in um September October oh September October okay we will we will keep that in mind um another question we have here is from myara who says what was the legacy of camon in terms of the Morrow's quest for self-determination was his Rebellion the continued expression of the Morrow's political resistance against colonizers well I think it was yes and that's a very good question in other words um if we're talking about continuity right um the the most recent colonizer that had been that that uh that kamun had experienced were the Japanese occupiers foreigners coming to occupy his Island and um when those when those occupiers left and were replaced by other Outsiders these are of course much more local Outsiders uh an government um for various reasons we I've talked about before uh he he continued to fight yes our next question is from um Nevil I think the name is pronounced nil opar uh this one may be a little bit tricky but it says in major rebellions Rebel groups often resort to coercion in pursuit of their demands what specific grievances do these Rebel groups typically have and have there been instances where the Philippine government has responded positively to their requests um not quite sure how to answer that I I'd rather speak specifically about Comm Lun rather than Philippine groups in general um uh clearly um so I should say first that in terms of uh coercion uh coercion used by uh Rebels um I have not heard of any examples of that with kamlon uh the the um the local population really did seem to support him now he did have um he did have conflicts with other political leaders in obviously in Holo and and even in eastern Holo and U there was uh and those those sometimes turned violent but in terms of support from uh from Ordinary People villagers uh that seemed to come very voluntarily and did not require coercion on his part uh and in terms of um uh uh demands made by uh to the government uh well you know he um uh what he was able to do was get was get concessions from the government when he surrendered yeah and um and I don't uh Kon again he was a uh he was a very traditional sort of Rebel he did not have a list of you know A 10-point List of Demands uh he wasn't trying to um uh do anything more than simply say you know leave me alone in I want to live the way I I used to live and uh I I don't want to uh this new government interfering in my uh in my home territory it it wasn't um it wasn't a very a clearly articulated set of Demands um it was simply uh go away leave me alone and in relation to that we have an anonymous attendee who asks um was there any kill onsite order for camlan or what was the policy surrounding him was it really just capture surrender or something more than that no I think there probably was a kill on site order I mean they were um they were not U footing around right you know the uh the this was a this was a very bloody conflict you know and and if you think about the the the artillery barrage uh that happened and um uh uh and and the high body counts on both sides I I'm sure um uh I'm sure there was an order to kill Kon on site the problem was they never saw him yes it's hard to kill someone on site if if you never see him the elusiveness of um of K in the stories you told he was always just always manag to get away um this this reminds me of the part in the presentation oh no wait um it it was one of the one of the three engagements that I wanted to bring up but I'm blanking out as well I think I need to recharge with coffee um while I try to remember that question um let me turn again to the chat box this is a nice um a nice plea uh which is um in relation to uh you visiting um Manila there is a nice plea that says please also visit Zamboanga City if you can I'd love to I I I almost certainly will yes and a new question has just come in that says okay this is a bit long I I will have to read it um uh good morning good morning maam Charlene and Sir Tom thank you for the presentation um the question for sir Tom is based on your research has kamlon any comments on the engagements of the fighting prowess of the nent Philippine Marines at that time and the person asking is um CDR Mark Fondo he is a naval historian and Senior Shrine curator of the PFT Korean War Memorial Hall Museum uh I I don't other than um well I really don't um you know this was um this was a very challenging campaign for the Philippine military uh you know and let's take Lieutenant AIO for example he was I mean he's somewhat unusual example because uh camon would never engage with him because he was a fellow Morrow um but he really tried to find camon and and um and he and and adio was very very successful against Common's lieutenants uh so uh but it was still a very very difficult uh uh campaign and I I will give you the you know again the example of the the Nita unit uh it's a it's it's an extreme example but uh a very telling one that U this was a this was a uh unit that um was was decorated and and much feared unit and they did not farewell on the island of H that actually I've always wondered about that um why was the Nichi unit chosen as the first unit um to try to subdue camon because they were an extremely Elite unit um how did camlan in other words get on the government's radar that this is the unit and that name Tom can you please tell us about that name the Nita sounds like an endearment like a it's it's a very very romantic sounding name for a unit that is basically hardcore you know um well the The Story Goes that nanita was actually the name of Colonel valeriano former girlfriend uh or girlfriend at the time the unit form so he named it in her honor and um that's that's the story I've I've heard and I think it's a good one and I also think it's accurate and uh the you know again I think that uh that uh both Makai and Lansdale wanted a quick end to this uh to this Rebel and so they they they thought to themselves what's the best way to do that we'll take the most successful uh most elite unit we have in our other Rebellion send them down there and make quick work of it and it um obviously turn out that way yeah yeah yes it it it literally had the opposite effect because um if camlan was hoping to stay under the radar if you annihilate a unit like that you're you're not going to stay under the radar yeah that's true as well the question that I blanked out earlier um I remember it now I was very curious about um the surrender that you described the very first surrender where they had a photo op and um camlan soldiers were actually I think in your description you said they were giving up rusty guns I was wondering if there was um any reason behind that because their their weapons should have been more advanced given what was left behind by the Americans well that that's then you've answered the question that they they didn't want to give up their good weapons they they only gave up the rusty old decrepit weapons uh it's a it's not a dirty trick but it's a a clever trick that's that's used by that's been used by other gorilla groups and and by uh and particularly by um by moral Fighters more than once that um you know when when you're asked to surrender your guns uh you you don't give up your your best guns first you give up the the ones you don't really want or need and uh I I think in some sense Comm knew that this was a uh never going to be a real suround and uh so he wasn't going to uh give up anything until he got the concessions that he had negotiated for and when those were not forthcoming immediately he then went back to the hills I see um so really it was a symbolic surrender but it does it does give the sense that he didn't have much faith that um the government would uphold their end of the bargain and yes I yeah I think that's a I think he had a sense that uh it was yeah it was not just a symbolic surrender it was a it was a staged um I think farce is maybe too strong a word that the newspaper used but it was a fake surrender on on both sides I think uh the government never intended to fulfill the concessions and Kamon never intended to actually surrender unless he got all the concessions he asked for and even then he may not have surrendered for long that that's actually there was a a very astute observation earlier um in the chat I I apologize that I can't remember the specific person but I I believe they pointed out and you um may agree or disagree Tom um they pointed out that the pattern of surrender failing to meet concessions restarting um that since it repeated itself it may have become um a kind of model for how um conflicts later on um would happen so it feels like there was that element of distrust um that we could already see in these early in these early encounters would continue uh throughout history well whenever there are yeah I I think that's fair Whenever there are negotiated surrenders and and the surrenders are not are conditional and and are particularly when there are concessions to go along with them uh they're always going to be um uh you know they're always going to be um incomplete surrenders until the concessions are made and again the other side of it is that again it's difficult to carry out a rebellion on an island and so uh surrendering um for concessions can be part of a strategy to actually continue the Rebellion you're you're surrendering you're taking a break in order to be able to fight another day um a question just uh rapid just came in in just now in response to to what you just said um from Thelma Padero and she is asking what in general were celan's conditions or concessions for him to surrender I I do remember in the talk you mentioned um a payment as well as um a pilgrimage trip for camalon and some of his um compatriots but did these concessions remain the same or were there other concessions that came in well I think know the so the concessions the generally would be you know uh monetary payments uh for for various things monetary payments to his followers um uh the uh ability to stay out of jail would be a very very important concession and uh and I think at one point common was Al what part of the concession was that criminal cases that were pending against him for uh for murder and other cases that they be dropped and so um so wouldn't have to uh be tried for those as well so Tom please don't kill me but I'm going to bring up the topic of piracy for one last time because a question has come in and it is um it is interesting in its economic aspect so an anonymous attendee asks would you say that piracy or C rating was mainly how C La financed the Rebellion you know I don't know um the answer to that uh it was um Muhammad adil's um uh very informed opinion that that it was a significant U part of financing the Rebellion it makes sense because the the uh uh piracy was uh you know was a u could be very lucrative but also uh you know this was also the time of uh what is called smuggling which is also a problematic term but barter trade kind of uh um undocumented uh trading uh in the in the Sulu SE and celab SE and that that could have also been uh partly uh financed his Rebellion as well um we are actually running out of time so we will end the Q&A portion with um with a comment and one question and I'm very pleased to say that our comment is from I'm very certain this is Marie Marie valo who gave a wonderful talk on dauntless um back in January for fhl thank you Marie for joining us this morning um and her comment is this Alejandra Suarez was the recognized Guerilla leader of Polo and Sulu he reported to Fair TIG on minda now and Suarez is the person who would have dealt with camalon activ So yeah thank you very much for that I'm I'm really glad she brought that up because Alejandro Suarez was a very very interesting man he was actually mcin denan by birth uh and he had uh he was a uh he was adopted by uh by Spanish uh parents and um uh he spoke fluent M nowan he was a he was a someone who could um communicate beautifully between also between moros and and non- moros and he was also a very very um uh very skilled uh military leader uh he was he was actually in the in the American Military the USAF before the war and then became a gorilla leader and he was in charge of all the gorillas on uh in Sulu and I'm sure that commone uh knew him at least knew of him and probably almost certainly had met him thank you Tom so our final question is um a little bit beyond the scope of the talk um but it is about Lieutenant Adel so this this would be um it's a little bit tricky but this would be interesting for you and it has to do with um ael's very complicated relationship both with the government and also the mnlf um and the question is uh was Lieutenant Ado still active in the military um when he joined the mnlf and perhaps what were uh the reasons for his Revolt uh no he was not active in the military when he joined the MLF uh he certainly still had many uh many friends in former comrades in the military and it was a very very difficult uh decision for him um and the reason U that he was not in the military he might have reached been had reached retirement age by then but the reason he wasn't in the military earlier is that um Ferdinand Marcos had actually um U taken away his commission uh for for political reasons and U and that sort of started the ball rolling uh in terms of uh of was then Lieutenant Colonel ail uh trying to understand what his place was going to be in uh uh now in in uh Visa the military in the Republic he spent a great many years uh trying to have get his commission back and he eventually did after Marcos left office and I think that will be uh that story will be continued in your book um it will that will be coming out hopefully next year and uh there have been many questions actually in the chat about when your book will be coming out so uh for those people who are asking Tom is hoping to uh that it will be finished and it'll be ready by I'm writing as fast as I can we appreciate it and we hope that you'll be able to launch the book with us as well um and perhaps do a Philippine tour so it has to be Manila uh Zamboanga City Sulu you have to visit everybody at this point um because the audence I'm looking forward to that very much thank you this brings us to the end of our Q&A and you have now survived uh another somewhat gruelling session from our um our astute audience um so thank you for the discussion and of course thank you to your thank you to the audience for your participation as well uh the q&as are very very rich for that and a big thank you for all those very wonderful questions yes they really are um sometimes I'm I get a little worried but uh the audience always comes through um but before I end this section I'd like to give a big shout out to um our member from the Minden now Development Authority who also participated quite a bit uh in the chat and in the the Q&A ask box we really appreciate all of your contributions today um Tom any final words no I just uh just to thank everyone again for the very thoughtful questions and U and informative questions and uh to say that I I look forward to um uh to coming back to talk to you some more about uh about Sultan Adil and uh and I I'm uh working hard on the book so that it will be out U by early next year thank you Tom and thank you to everyone else for joining us and this is the book list that I mentioned earlier uh that we have prepared uh if you would like to learn more about celan's rebellion and other related um other related topics so the book list is bitly bit D bit. lefh l-mor and of course if you want to access a broader book list from the rodri hall archive we also have the QR code and bitly code for that um at the bottom of the page if you enjoy today's free talk please follow fhl social media Pages for updates as well as the aala foundation and the aala museum you can find us on Facebook X Instagram and YouTube the Ayala Museum and Filipinas Heritage Library are open to visitors and researchers to book a visit or to learn about our upcoming programs go to aalam museum.org and philipinas library.org doph again thank you everyone for joining us this morning as always please stay safe and stay healthy we hope to see you on March 23rd for the conclusion of the second rodri Hall Memorial [Music] lectures [Music] bro described himself as a man with a mission and a man in a hurry this mission was to collect as many materials on the experiences of Filipinos during World War II and to place them in a library that would ensure that these are shared with today's generation as well as those in the future and he found this repository as well as partners with us in the filipin Heritage Library so in 2010 broad shipped his entire collection Lock Stock and barel of 700 volumes from his home in London to fhl in maati through the years his collection has grown to more than 2,000 print and non print materials on World War II making the Roder call collection fh's Crown Jewel as such it is fhl Center piece literally and figuratively because we now revolve our collection Focus around the period immediately before during and right after World War II identified as the formative period of philippin nation to collect books and various other historical materials relating to the Philippines during that war and to make this more accessible to the general public he turned this collection over to the Filipinas Heritage Library where it now forms a major part of its Holdings as the rodri hall collection but Rod was not one to Simply donate books he wanted other people to use them and to research more on the war he wanted to add more materials and was constantly in search of new directions for the collection to this end he was able to negotiate digitization of numerous manuscripts in various collections around the Philippines he wanted to provide as many different perspectives as possible and when he learned of the large body of Works in Japanese aimed to acquire as much as possible for the collection why are you collecting Japanese Publications about the Battle of Philippines even though you do not understand Japanese language you said to me I always answer that this question like that I want next future generation to know what happened in Philipp during the Asia Pacific world and Philippines and Japanese rule however you told me the real reason is that collecting Japanese books is to make peace of my mind and making Rec for my this PR as a postor Japanese generation I promise you to try to make no more World Society and also to try not to create the kind of people such as you and your family horribly experienced in philippin I think the Japanese should know the facts of this history I believe this is my mission as a Japanese [Music] [Music] oh oh mighty [Music] no thinking on the previous century and its many upheavals in Wars is that we all have an ethical obligation to remember that history but understandably not everyone takes up that burden because the memory of War especially for persons who witnessed it is painful the late Mr Rod Hall was deeply courageous in that sense of taking up an ethical burden he took pains to give World War II its proper warning not just for himself but also for our country America and Japan whose materials he collected he helped strengthen our Cal memory in the hope of preventing the return of suffering and now with his passing we in turn at philipinas Heritage slavy and a foundation have an o ation to make his legacy and his commemoration of History endure