First word

THE situation has suddenly gotten more complex and menacing, not because President Duterte says so, but because our political vocabulary has suddenly morphed from “amnesty” to “destabilization.”

In a wink, we have been transported to the world of the spooks, the intelligence community. The language or lingo here is “CIA-ese,” says William Safire, the language maven. (See list of CIA-ese below.)





If you know a fraction of what I have learned (from books, reports, DVDS, etc.) about the world of intelligence and the games that spooks play, you will sit up straight when you hear President Duterte declare that there is a destabilization plot against his government that is targeted to unfold on September 21, 2018, the anniversary of Martial Law.

You will listen and you will study the mountain of information before you. Then you will watch the calendar and become enraged.

Destabilization a CIA coinage

Consider first this discovery that I found during my research:

The US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) coined the term “destabilization” or “destabilize,” as a euphemism for “overthrow.” A euphemism, as my Collins English dictionary defines it, is “an inoffensive word or phrase substituted for one considered offensive or hurtful.”

My authority on this is William Safire, lexicographer, author, presidential adviser and erstwhile New York Times columnist, and his indispensable lexicon, Political Dictionary (Random House, New York, 1978).

Safire shares plenty of information and inside knowledge — much of which is hair-raising but which nobody bothers to dispute.

Safire reports that the Director of Central Intelligence William Colby disclosed to a congressional committee in April 1974 that the CIA had spent $8 million in Chile between 1970 and 1973 in an effort to make it difficult for Marxist Salvador Allende Gossens to govern.

“The goal of the clandestine CIA activities,” wrote Seymour Hersh in the New York Times on September 8, 1974, “was to destabilize the Marxist government….”

Since the word was a freshly coined euphemism, and since it appeared to conflict with sworn testimony by Secretary of State Henry Kissinger that “the CIA had nothing to do with the coup” that overthrew Allende, the term was used with savagery and glee by critics of covert US activities.

Thereafter, the word was used in a positive sense early in the Carter administration. US ambassador to the UN Andrew Young discussed Cuban intervention in Africa as possibly proving to be a “stabilizing force.” As Cuban troop strength grew in Africa in 1978, critics of the Carter foreign policy used “stabilizing force” against Carter’s men, much as critics of Kissinger had used “destabilization” against him.

Over the years, the CIA coinage has found acceptance in the language.

Oxford now includes “destabilization, destabilize” (British, “destabilisation, destabilise”) in its dictionaries.

It considers “destabilization” a mass noun, and defines it as “the process of upsetting the stability of a region or system, especially of government.”

The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, the foremost American English dictionary, lists and defines “destabilize” as

1. To upset the stability or smooth functioning of a policy;

2. To undermine the power of a government or leader by subversive or terrorist acts.

“Destabilization” has become an obsessive part of Philippine political culture. Leaders and plotters, citizens and soldiery, even religious, talk freely of destabilization here.

From media meeting to dialogue

This brings us to the question then: Is there really a destabilization plot against the government of President Duterte?

I was not disappointed to see President Duterte’s meeting with the media shift to a dialogue between DU30 and his legal counsel, Salvador Panelo. They conversed about the reality of the threats of destabilization against the Duterte government.

Serendipitously, presidential communication could take place without the usual questioning by Palace journalists, who ask DU30 endlessly to comment on something Trillanes said or so-and-so has said. I was more interested in getting to the truth or falsity of the alleged destabilization plot against the government.

Duterte claimed that he had received validated information from a foreign intelligence group that confirms threats to destabilize the government or launch a coup.

Malacañang has named the Magdalo group led by Sen. Antonio Trillanes 4th as among those that have connived to oust the President from power.

Duterte accused Trillanes and his Magdalo party of coalescing with the “yellows” and the Liberal Party and the communist rebels (CPP-NPA) to remove him from the presidency by October.

He attested to the veracity of the intelligence information. He said he has asked the military to declassify the information given by the unnamed foreign power on the plot and the principal plotters, so that the Filipino people can become fully aware of the threat to their government.

Presidential spokesman Harry Roque Jr. said that the president had basis for the claim because he has access to privileged information, which may have led him to conclude that his enemies were out to overthrow him.

Roque took a shot at members of the LP who cannot “move on” and accept Duterte as president.

Duterte rounded it up by saying that the public should be wary that Trillanes, the LP and the communist rebels have combined in planning to remove him from office.

Proof from foreign intelligence

He suggested that there is incontrovertible proof on the plot from the intelligence report given him by ”a foreign power.”

Was the foreign power China, the US or Russia? Was it Israel, from where he had just rushed home to explode the news about destabilization. Anyone of these four countries, with their intelligence agencies, have the capability to secure the information. If they disclose what they know, it will be incontrovertible and actionable.

There may be no hole for the plotters to hide in.

The named groups now see what they are up against. They are scampering for cover and denials.

All have denied complicity in a destabilization plot. But all have persisted in their declared desire to remove Duterte from office.

Do they want to overthrow Duterte as president? They look ready to shut up on this.

Trillanes has finally left the Senate, resigned to the certainty that he must face trial in civil court, and face renewed court martial proceedings against him.

The LP senators talked at first about conducting a Senate inquiry into the revocation of the Trillanes amnesty. But now that the specter of a coup plot is leveled at them, they will quickly forget about it. The LP must choose whether to declare support for Trillanes, or declare support for the duly elected government.

The CPP-NPA has not made known it’s response. The front groups in Congress are especially apprehensive, because a misguided statement could cut them off from their lifeline to the public treasury.

The media will also be reassessing the situation, and review how they have reported this political crisis. They will see that the situation is more serious and complex than they at first believed. They themselves will wonder why Trillanes and the opposition and even Leila de Lima have such easy access to their front pages and channels with self-serving statements.

A member of the Catholic clergy has resorted to prayer, supplicating Providence that Duterte will get sick and die. Even the CBCP will cringe from this.

CIA glossary

This makes “CIA-ese” sound noble.

“CIA-ese,” says Safire, is spook speak, the language of the intelligence community. In 1976, a Senate select committee to study governmntal operations with respect to intelligent activities compiled a glossary of CIA–ese.

Surprisingly, the committee did not include the word “destabilization” or “destabilize” in the glossary, probably because they are too close to home. They look like “a skeleton in the CIA closet.”

Included in the glossary are:

1. Executive action – a euphemism for assassination, used by the CIA to describe a program aimed at overthrowing foreign leaders.

2. Plausible denial – a cover story to disclaim knowledge of an intelligence activity.

3. Plumbing – clandestine sting operations of CIA field stations, such as safehouses, unaccountable funds, investigative persons, surveillance teams.

4. Covert action – a clandestine activity to influence foreign governments.

5. Blowback – lies circulated by the CIA that are picked up by US correspondents abroad and sent back to the US as the truth.

There is more on the list.

I think the local Catholic Church should submit “assassination by prayer” for inclusion in the CIA glossary. Maybe by this, the CIA could be induced to take local priests seriously.

yenmakabenta@yahoo.com