‘Non-combatants’ killed in Mt. Province ambush

CAMP AQUINO, Tarlac — The Armed Forces’ Northern Luzon Command (Nolcom) condemned yesterday the massacre of eight non-combat personnel in Mt. Province last Monday while the New People’s Army’s (NPA) Leonardo Pacsi Command hailed the attack as a work straight from Sun Tzu’s The Art of War.

Maj. Gen. Romeo Dominguez, Nolcom commanding officer, lambasted the NPA for not distinguishing between soldiers and non-combatants.

"This definitely shows the NPA’s terrorist nature," he said. "These terrorists masquerading as communist revolutionaries do not distinguish who are the non-combatants from regular soldiers."

Dominguez said the victims — TSgt. It-tang, Sgt. Valdez, Cpls. Maniig, Renora, Baldado and Ruiz, and Pfcs Arguson and Log-an — were sent to Bontoc to retrieve the body of Cpl. Ryan Palangchao who died in a vehicular accident. They were able to bring Palangchao’s body to Barangay Tucucan in his hometown.

The eight victims were en route back to Fort Magsaysay in Nueva Ecija aboard a military truck when the communist guerrillas ambushed them.

Domingo said two other men aboard the truck managed to escape unhurt.

On the other hand, the NPA, through its official news organ Ang Bayan, said its string of successful attacks against military outposts and convoys have proven the effectiveness of Chinese philosopher Sun Tzu’s The Art of War, so much so that the armed movement will keep on utilizing it as a handbook for rebel commanders fighting superior government forces.

The Art of War, a military treatise written in 500 B.C., champions surprise attacks and offense at the enemy’s weak, undefended points.

Ang Bayan called for more offensives against the military’s weak points, or places where security is thin.