Slain Iran general one of the best — Locsin

MANILA, Philippines — Iran’s top military commander Qasem Soleimani, who was killed in an airstrike by the United States at Baghdad’s international airport on Friday, was not a terrorist, the Philippines’ top diplomat said over the weekend.

Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. said Soleimani, one of the most powerful figures in the Islamic Republic and one of Iran’s highest-ranking, was a “great” general who would not have liked being called a martyr.

“He was a soldier not a terrorist. He was a general, possibly one of the best in modern times, and never lost a battle so far as I know,” Locsin said on Twitter yesterday.

Soleimani, who was major general of the Quds force – a division responsible for extraterritorial military and clandestine operations – was listed as a known terrorist by the US for leading militant groups that killed hundreds of Americans.

“Soldiers must honor soldiers if they are to be honored when their time comes,” Locsin said.

“He was a soldier and soldiers die as he did, in battle, by assassination by any means to stop his brilliance from carrying the day, day in, day out on any battlefield. Honor the enemy, honor yourself,” he added.

Locsin’s tweets did not sit well with Twitter users, who criticized the foreign affairs secretary for glorifying a “terrorist kingpin.”

“A totally embarrassing statement by Mr. Locsin, glorifying the terrorist kingpin. So providing a military assistance to terrorist Hezbollah merits a title ‘best of our times’ wow!” a Twitter user said.

Another user criticized how Locsin had never talked the same way about victims of drug-related killings.

“Heard a lot of stories about families who can’t mourn their loved ones because they have no money to get the bodies to the morgues. Here he is crying like Sisa for a general who’ll be venerated like a martyr by known terrorists,” the tweet read, alluding to a character in national hero Jose Rizal’s novel who went insane.

US President Donald Trump earlier said the airstrike was carried out “to stop a war” as Soleimani “was plotting imminent and sinister attacks on American diplomats and military personnel, but we caught him in the act and terminated him.”

The US Defense Department blamed Soleimani for the deaths of hundreds of Americans, and said he was behind recent attacks on coalition bases in Iraq, including one on Dec. 27 that killed an American defense contractor.

Iran vowed to seek revenge and “harsh retaliation” on the US for the death of Soleimani.