The
following is a slightly edited version of information I gave to the Department
of Veterans Affairs for a claim for compensation due to service-connected PTSD
(post-traumatic stress disorder). The
main difference is that I have redacted three names of agents involved in the
investigation of me on suspicion of espionage and replaced those with
pseudonyms.
These incidents
took place during my tour of duty at Clark Air Base. The unit to which I was assigned for all
these incidents, with the exception of the first, was the Naval Security Group
Activity, Republic of the Philippines (NAVSECGRUACTREPPHIL), and the dates of
that assignment were 11 December 1987-16 January 1990. For the first incident listed below, my rank
was E-3 or Seaman. For the rest, my rank
was E-4 or Petty Officer Third Class.
October 1987
assassinations
These
incidents took place in the outskirts of Clark Air Base in Balibago, Angeles
City and in Dau, Mabalacat, both municipalities of Pampanga, Philippines. At the time, I was at Naval Technical
Training Center, Corry Station in Pensacola, Florida, but I had known since
reporting to NSGD Monterey that Clark Air Base was my ultimate duty station.
On 28 October
1987, five weeks before I reported to my command in the Philippines, four men
connected to Clark Air Base were separately assassinated in coordinated
operations, all within a mile of the base perimeter. As the first ever overt direct actions of the
Communist New Peoples Army (NPA) against American military personnel, the
murders sent out shock waves throughout the military community in-country as
well as those who had some connection to it through past or future service
there.
The four
victims were: USAF Sgt. Randy A. Davis,
30; USAF Airman 1st Class Steven M. Faust, 22; USAF Tech. Sgt. (retired)
Herculano Manganti, 60; and Filipino civilian businessman Joseph Porter. Porter was killed when he and his wife drove
upon the scene of Faust’s ambush and car crash.
A fifth man, USAF Capt. Raymond Pulsifer, II, 31, was fired upon while
driving in his car but escaped his attackers unharmed.
At the
time, I was attending Fleet Direct Support class at Naval Technical Training
Center, Corry Station in Pensacola, Florida.
From the time I reported to the Naval Security Group Detachment (NSGD),
Monterey at the Presidio of Monterey in California to attend the Defense
Language Institute (DLI), I knew my ultimate duty station would be in the
Philippines, specifically at Clark Air Base.
In fact, knowing that would be the case made me choose Vietnamese Basic
over Persian-Farsi, in part because my father, Robert C. Hamilton, Jr., an AT
(Aviation Electronic Technician), had also been stationed in the Philippines
during his active service with the Navy, though he was at Cubi Point Naval Air
Station instead.
A few days
after the assassinations, a spokesman for the NPA’s Alex Boncayao Brigade
claimed responsibility, but since that unit’s AO was confined to Metro Manila,
the claim was dismissed. On 23 November
1987, a spokesperson for the North West Pampanga Party Committee of the
Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) announced that NPA forces under its
authority had carried out the assassinations.
The
official atmosphere at the base and the command when I arrived in mid-December
1987 was gloomy, fearful, and often overcautious. The mood of the personnel, though less so in
all those qualities, carried an undercurrent of fear and suspicion of the local
population.
Curfews had
been instituted at all the U.S. bases; these remained in place the entire time
I was there. For the first few months,
American personnel were restricted to the outskirts of CAB, and even after this
was loosened, we were strongly cautioned that venturing beyond those bounds was
done at our own risk. Every other week,
sometimes every week, throughout my two years there, we were barraged with dire
warning of suspected imminent threats, which almost always proved false.
This siege
and/or barracks mentality was a constant feature of life during my entire tour
of duty at Clark Air Base. Among other
drawbacks, this fed into the prejudices and bigotry of too many Americans
assigned to the base, including those in my unit.
While at
Clark, I always drove without a seatbelt, particularly when doing so off-base,
so that I could more quickly escape my vehicle if I needed to. Not to mention I was hypervigilant whenever I
drove, always checking my rear view mirror and watching for signs of
danger. Both these continued long after
I left Clark, returning when I started driving again upon my family’s
relocation Stateside.
The fear
and paranoia fed by mishandling of information was suffocating and toxic.
Because I
was so friendly with Filipinos in spite of the situation, I received a great
deal of animosity from many of my shipmates.
Several of them bullied me over it and ridiculed me as “half-Filipino”,
something which in other circumstances I would have taken pride in. I am happy to point out, however, that these
represented a minority.
The apex of
this bullying was probably my frocking to Petty Officer Third Class. “Tagging” is a traditional form of welcoming
a new petty officer by tapping their new insignia with the knuckles of one’s
fist, like fist-bumping. Several persons
in the unit used the occasion to hit me in the arm on my insignia as hard as
they could. By late afternoon, my entire
left arm was dark purple except for a few small white patches. When the CDO came into our snack bar and saw
that, he went ballistic and ordered me not to let anyone else “tag” me. Fortunately, there was no permanent damage.
Local civil conflict,
spring 1988
This series
of events took place mostly in Angeles City, Pampanga.
As well as
being highly interested in national Philippines politics (the February 1986 Revolution
occurred during my time in boot camp at Naval Training Center San Diego and the
largest coup attempt to date against the Aquino administration had taken place
28 August 1987), I was also interested in news local to the immediate vicinity
of C.A.B.
This is how
I learned of the organization in February 1988 of right-wing vigilante squads
in San Fernando and Mabalacat, both in Pampanga, known respectively as the
Angelito Simbulan Brigade and the Faustino Sabile Brigade. These were organized to counter the NPA’s
local Mariano Garcia Brigade, which was then based in Angeles City.
Angeles
City bordered Clark Air Base on the south while Mabalacat bordered the base on
the east. From the beginning of May
through the tenth of June, open warfare between the groups listed above broke
out. The fighting led to at least fifty
reported deaths (and possibly as many as a hundred), mostly in Angeles City. It ended after wives of combatants from both
sides marched barefoot through the center of downtown Angeles demanding a
ceasefire on or just after 10 June, meaning that the conflict lasted around six
weeks.
Most
personnel on base were oblivious, but since I kept myself well-informed, I was
aware at the time. It was not until the
first week of July that our command received a heads-up about the upsurge at
morning muster, when the information was relayed as if the situation was still
going on. This did little to give me
confidence in the accuracy of the security warnings we were frequently given; in
fact, I found it rather disturbing.
NIS Investigation,
1989
This took
place at Clark Air Base, Phillipines, Subic Bay Naval Station, Philippines, and
U.S. Embassy, Manila, Philippines. I was
a Petty Officer Third Class (E-4) assigned to Naval Security Group Activity,
Republic of the Philippines, 11 December 1987-16 Janaury 1990.
At the
beginning of the first or second week of July 1989, the week before I was to
leave for duty aboard the aircraft carrier of a task force sailing out of Subic
Bay, I had my clearances pulled and was reassigned to duty at the BEQ. Wednesday or Thursday that week, my security
clearances were restored and I was readmitted to regular duty at our command’s
secure facility, though I was told I would be undergoing a JAGMAN
investigation.
At the end
of the work day that Friday, however, I was ordered to report to our command’s
security officer, who told me that my clearance was being pulled again because
I had just come under an entirely separate security investigation by the Naval
Investigative Service (NIS). I was not
informed at the time what the nature of the investigation was.
It turned
out that I was being investigated on suspicion of espionage. NIS received an accusation from a Navy
associate of mine during my stateside training who had come to Clark on leave
from another overseas duty station.
Several weeks into the investigation after a search of my room in the
barracks, suspicion of homosexual activity was added.
The
intensive field work of the investigation lasted nearly four months. Every single Filipino I was friends with was
interviewed, and there were quite a lot as I knew not only workers on base, but
was a member of the local Jaycees, Rotary Club, and Toastmasters, as locals I
had met working with the charitable outreach committee of the base’s Holy
Family Parish. That was in addition to
nearly every single member of our command, including several who had been at Clark
when I arrived but had transferred elsewhere, plus even more friends and
acquaintances stateside than had been interviewed for my security clearance.
I also
volunteered for extensive psychological testing which took two or three days,
that showed, among other things, that I was likely not gay.
Besides
having my room searched twice, I travelled to Subic Bay Naval Station for my
initial interrogation that lasted four days.
This was followed by two separate one-day interrogations by NIS at
Clark, then in the first week of October 1989, there was another trip to Subic
in which I was polygraphed four times over two days. At the end of the final polygraph, the expert
was satisfied that I had been truthful in my professions of innocence. For these tests, incidentally, only the
accusations of espionage for the USSR and collaboration with the NPA were
covered.
I
cooperated fully with the investigation, even to the extent of telling all of
my Filipino friends and associates to likewise cooperate and answer all the
questions investigators asked about me truthfully. I did not inform them what I was being
investigated about; I just told them that answering questions truthfully would
only help me.
The chief
investigating agent was John Smith (a pseudonym; I do remember his actual name). The polygraph expert was Alejandro Jones
(another pseudonym for a name I also remember).
After the
polygraph sessions in the first week in October, Special Agent Smith and
Special Agent Standon reported their findings to NIS headquarters stateside,
Tanton’s that the suspicions were unfounded and Bedoya’s that the polygraph
results backed that up.
While
waiting to hear back from NIS headquarters in Quantico, my commanding officer
told me that he was recommending that I be barred from reenlistment because he
suspected I was either gay or bisexual.
Since at the time my EAOS date was close, he had chosen not to process
me for administrative separation.
Two days
before I shipped back stateside to process out out of the Navy, Special Agent Smith
called to inform me that NIS HQ wanted he and Special Agent Jones to polygraph
me again and ask about homosexual activity.
Since I was about to DEROS and already knew I was RE-4 (though I
continued on active then inactive reserve), I declined.
As a result
of my leaving the service while the investigation was still open, Special Agent
Smith turned the file over to the FBI at the U.S. Embassy in Manila. This was because three weeks after my EAOS, I
had returned to the Philippines to work for an American NGO under the U.S.
Refugee Program. The FBI didn’t care
about homosexual activity, so that was no longer an issue, and after reviewing
Special Agent Smith’s reports and Special Agent Jones’ findings ruled the
suspicions unfounded.
I believe
the FBI agent I met with was Special Agent Michel Kowalski, another pseudonym
(Special Agent Smith was there), in the Manila embassy in March or April
1990. Janowitz told me that my case was
the biggest thing he had worked on since the Walker family investigation of
1985.
I did not
get back the items seized during the two searches of my barracks room until the
first week of October 1990. I know this
because I travelled from Manila to Subic for that purpose in the midst of the
nationwide labor strike of the six American bases by the Federation of Filipino
Civilian Employees Associations taking place at that time.
From the
beginning of the investigation in July through the polygraph tests in October,
my emotional life was dominated by intense anxiety punctuated with acute panic
attacks, and the only relief I had was when I was either drunk or asleep, the
latter of which was generally only achieved by the former. Even after the polygraphs, I felt an constant
undercurrent of anxiety knowing that NIS HQ still had to rule on the
disposition of my case. I was also
suicidal, but I couldn’t even take that escape route because it would have been
the same thing as an admission of guilt (and a false one).
The rage
didn’t start until about a year after I’d left the Navy. There was plenty in the Philippines upon
which to focus that rage, but none of them were the source, even though I told
myself they were. I know this because
the reasons I gave myself for the rage kept changing. Once I returned to the States for good with
my new family, the rage found other targets, other reasons for existence. Fortunately, most of this rage focused on
political, social, and human and civil rights activism. I figured if I couldn’t escape it, I might as
well use it for something good.
I made very
few friendships after our return. I felt
unable to connect anything or anyone like I had before. I felt dissociated from others, particularly
civilians. Even with other vets, there
was the investigation. After my divorce,
I made some attempts to restart a personal life but eventually gave it up and
became a virtual hermit.
For seven
years, from 2000 to 2007, I almost never went anywhere outside of my home and
work. In the fall of 2007, I began
attending Dalton State College. On the
one hand, I felt my rage lessen quite a bit; on the other hand, while being
around so many relatively positive people greatly enhanced my overall mood, it
was so overwhelming that I was at times suicidal.
None of
this even begins to cover the shame and humiliation I felt from having my
sexuality outed against my will. I’m not
gay, but I’ve known I’m bisexual since I was fifteen. However, at the time I had never even come
close to having sex with another man and still thought of myself as completely
straight. So, even though the command
handled the issue with extreme discretion, I still had to face and deal with my
true sexuality against my will.
September 1989
assassinations
This took
place in Tambo, Santo Domingo II, Capas, Tarlac, Philippines.
On 26
September 1989, retired Air Force officers Donald Buchner, 44, and William
Thompson, 45, both working for Ford Aerospace under contract to the Defense
Department at a USAF communications facility in Capas, Tarlac, were ambushed at
a road block five miles outside Camp O’Donnell and shot 69 times. The NPA was identified almost immediately as
the culprit, with later information indicating it was the Mariano Garcia
Brigade.
Later
investigation by Filipino authorities uncovered information that the two victims
had been specifically targeted. At the
time, however, many of us suspected the real target was the bus from Clark Air
base ferrying personnel from the U.S. Naval
Radio Transmitter Facility, also at Camp O’Donnell, back to the Navy BEQ at
Clark Air Base. The passengers were our
barracks-mates. The driver of the bus saw
the road block and became suspicious, turning the bus around to return to Camp
O’Donnell and passing the car driven by Buchner and Thompson traveling in the
opposite direction as he did so.
December 1989
attempted coup d’etat
The events
themselves took place primarily in Makati, Metro Manila, but they affected all American military facilities in the
Philippines.
On 1
December, the Reform the Armed Forces Movement (RAM) and the Soldiers of the
Filipino People (SFP) launched the largest uprising by military rebels during
the Aquino administration. RAM,
originally organized in 1980, was the primary military component of the February
1986 Revolution (and the August 1987 rebellion) and the SFP was the
organization of military supporters of former president Ferdinand Marcos.
The
rebellion lasted through 9 December, with most of the fighting taking place in
the Metro Manila town of Makati, and nearly brought down the government. The most embarrassing factor for the U.S. was
that the rebels had used a joint military exercise with U.S. forces as cover
for their organizing, for a change maintaining OPSEC so that the rising came as
a complete surprise to our military as well as the Philippine government.
Needless to
say, all American bases were on lock-down for the entire nine days, with
limited civilian personnel allowed on base and most military personnel who
lived off-base remaining home the entire time.
At the BEQ, which had been my duty station since having my security
clearance pulled earlier in July, we worked regular hours during the day and
stood watch every evening and night.
13 May 1990
assassinations
The
location of this incident was Dau, Mabalacat, Pampanga, Philippines.
Since my
EAOS date was 27 January 1990, this falls outside my active service (though I
was in the active reserve). However,
there are aspects which may connect it to my time of service in the Navy at
Clark as well as possibly being the first sign of post-traumatic stress
disorder.
On this
occasion, Airman John H. Raven, 21, and Airman James C. Green, 22, were
assassinated sparrow-style by elements of the NPA in front of the Holiday Lodge
and Drive Inn in barangay Dau of Mablacat municipality just outside the base at
about 1530 hours. The two victims were
participating in military exercises at Clark with their unit, the 8th Tactical
Fighter Wing out of Kunsan Air Base in South Korea. A third man, Airman 1st Class Ronald Moore,
23, escaped the incident unhurt.
The murders
happened just an hour and a half after I had caught the bus back to Manila at
the stop on Dau Access Road (to MacArthur Highway) a couple of hundred meters away.
I had
arrived in the vicinity in late afternoon that Friday, 11 May, immediately
proceeding to my fiance’s family’s home in purok Gasdam, barangay Dau. From there we headed out to her place of
employment at Cheers Entertainment Complex just outside what was then
Friendship Gate on the south side of the base’s perimeter. As we approached within two or three blocks
of the club, the feeling of being under surveillance came over me suddenly and
overwhelmingly.
One night
when I was at Cheers during my NIS investigation, I had experienced the same
feeling of being naked and exposed and under scrutiny, the first time I had
ever had that feeling in my life. One of
my one-day interrogations by Special Agent Smithcame the next week, and my first
question before we even started was whether I’d been under surveillance by NIS
at Cheers that particular evening. He
initially waved the question aside, but later in the session confirmed that
that had indeed been the case. In that
situation, given that I was under NIS investigation, coming under covert
surveillance (I never saw them; my awareness of it came solely from the creepy
feeling down my spine), was not unexpected.
In light of
this and given the fact that on this later occasion such surveillance was totally
unexpected, I looked ahead, looked back, then darted across the street in
between two oncoming jeepneys. I recall
thinking that as I tried to drag Grace with me and she dug her heels in that it
was better she did that since she would be safer that way, given known sparrow
unit MO. When I got to the other side of
the street, I was facing the tall chainlink fence of the base perimeter. I turned around expecting to be shot at
point-blank range, but there was no one there.
Either my swift evasive action had ruined their plans or else everything
had been entirely in my head.
Ten minutes
later, Grace is clocking in to work and I’m sitting in Cheer’s terrace
restaurant section with USAF and civilian friends I made when I was at Clark in
the Navy. I’d’ve needed a razor sharp
katana to slice through the tension.
Stark fear was apparent on everyone’s faces. When I asked, they told me there were highly
credible warnings of NPA action against four targeted individuals that
weekend. Civilian NGOs, even if
connected to USG assets, didn’t get such warnings. I told them I didn’t think any of us had
anything to worry about, at the same time saying to myself, “Oh, that’s what
that was about in the street”.
The next
day, my about-to-be in-laws kept me in Gasdam and on Bonifacio Street all day,
and when it came time for Grace to go to work Saturday night, her father drove
us rather than letting us take the jeepney as usual.
Sunday
afternoon when they dropped me off at the above-mentioned bus stop, the vendors
and sari-sari owners made me sit down in their covered area and gave me free
San Miguel beer in order to keep me inside and out of sight as much as possible. They
barely let me go out to urinate one time.
Their actions were unsolicited and they refused my offers of payment. When
my bus arrived, a couple of them and their assistants surrounded me tightly
until I boarded the bus and chased away vendors that came to my window until
the bus pulled out.
This was
two weekends before my wedding. Airmen
Raven and Green were not among the four initially targeted by the NPA, whose
plans had been disrupted by the arrest of the original team leader that Friday
afternoon (whose name, oddly enough, I still remember; it was printed in more
than one newspaper). I did not learn of
their deaths until I saw the newspaper the next morning.
If I was,
in fact, one of those originally targeted, the reason or justification for that
could only have come from my time at Clark, possibly stemming from rumors of
which I was aware that arose in the wake of the NIS investigation.
Natural disasters
These were
not part of my claim, but the four worst natural disasters of the 20th century hit
the Philippines while I was there.
On 24
October 1988, Typhoon Unsang/Ruby hit Central Luzon, where Clark Air Base, Subic
Naval Station, Cubi Naval Air Station, and Camp O’Donnell were located. It was the seoncd worst typhoon to hit that
region in the 20th century and the worst to hit the country since 1970.
On 6
November 1988, Typhoon Yoning/Skip hit Central Luzon less than two weeks
later. This typhoon was even stronger
than Unsang, but since the earlier typhoon had destroyed so much, there wasn’t
much left for Yoning to destroy. The
remaining trees were strong enough to withstand it, and the less sturdy
buildings were already collapsed.
On 16 July
1990, an 8.0 level earthquake hit the main island of Luzon. Its epicenter
was Rizal, Nueva Ecija, but it shook the entire region from the Cordilleras into the Southern Tagalog region. I was out at the Refugee Processing Center in
Morong, Bataan, at the time. It was not
only strong, it shook for nearly two full minutes. The mountain city of Baguio was especially
hard hit, and it shook Metro Manila hard and destroyed many buildings.
A week
later, at almost the exact same time of time, an aftershock hit the same region
and I got to experience a small taste of what being on the 12th floor of a
swaying building was like.
On 15 June
1991, the centuries-dormant Mount Pinatubo exploded in the biggest volcanic
eruption of the 20th century on the entire planet. That same day, Typhoon Diding/Yunya made
landfall in Manila. In addition to those,
several earthquakes shook the city the whole weekend and into the following
week. Things were much worse for our
relatives in Mabalacat, much closer to the volcano; there the ground shook
continually.
