By Adolfo Quizon Paglinawan

 

Part 13: Is it worth saving a weak, incompetent and utterly corrupt president?

The “disinformation” alert against one of my memes said: “The AFP strongly encourages the public to rely solely on verified government sources for accurate and responsible information on defense and security matters. We remain firmly committed to transparency, truth, and the proactive countering of disinformation that may mislead the public or undermine confidence in our institutions.”

It added “FACT: The Mi-17 acquisition project was cancelled during the administration of former President Rodrigo Roa Duterte through a letter of termination signed by former Secretary of National Defense Delfin N. Lorenzana.”

Please read the fine prints and tell the full story.

Granting for the sake of argument that former Secretary Delfin Lorenzana wrote a letter intending  to terminate, I wish to express given four months into the Marcos administration, the defense officer-in-charge himself categorically said and I quote “the contract has not been officially canceled”  and in fact, was undergoing review. 

The Philippines News Agency  of the Philippine government reported on October 20, 2022, an admission by Defense Officer-in-Charge, Senior Undersecretary Jose Faustino Jr., that the deal “has not been officially canceled”.

Let me ask the military gurus – does a unilateral letter of notice of termination automatically cancel a bilateral contract? In fact, the Department of National Defense confirmed that “a contract termination review committee has already been formed to process it.” It is too much for you to understand that the contract is only deemed cancelled, when such process has been completed?

Would relying on two government sources – the DND and PNA, not meet your fact-checking standards? You just relied on newspaper and media reports. I relied on a direct statement from your boss. Are you saying Faustino was lying?

For the education of our military factcheckers, these distinctions are urgent and important because this was not just an over-the-counter procurement from Sovtechnoexport LLC, a Russian state-owned military equipment exporter and arms manufacturer, but underwent a step-by-step government-to-government negotiations facilitated by diplomatic channels.

Suffice it to say, on the same day, Aljazeera quoted Russian Ambassador Marat Pavlov corroborating Faustino that the Philippine government had not yet officially notified Moscow of any decision to cancel the purchase agreement, and a Russian company would continue to manufacture the Mi-17 helicopters that had been ordered. He added that the Philippine government should honor a $215m deal to buy the 16 military helicopters, while acknowledging an initial payment and citing that Filipino pilots had already undergone Russian training.

One of the completed Mi-17s had been ready for delivery since June, Pavlov added “but, unfortunately, it was not accepted by your government.”

As an aside, earlier in March, Arsenio Andolong, DND spokesman, said  the defense department was in fact acquiring 16 Mi-17 helicopters, but the 17th unit was a freebie: “It’s plus one; that’s part of their [Russian] obligation.”

Malacañang policy clutter

The same PNA report quoted President Ferdinand Marcos as saying “The deal with Russia was for some heavy-lift helicopters and now we have secured an alternative supply from the United States through the manufacturer Poland. In any case, mayroon na tayong kapalit (we now have a replacement).”

But Marcos obviously did not know what he was talking about. What he was referring to was former President Rodrigo Duterte’s second deal amounting to P32 billion deal to purchase 32 additional Blackhawk helicopters from Poland-based aerospace manufacturer PZL Mielec, signed on February 2022.

Blackhawks, however, are not heavy-lift helicopters, and the order he was talking about was intended to augment the first contract for16 Blackhawks that have been ordered a year earlier to finally decommission the Air Force’s old fleet of Huey helicopters, following a crash in Bukidnon that killed 7 passengers, including PAF, Army, and CAFGU personnel.

What is not being exposed here was that the “cancellation” was lobbied by our Ambassador to the Washington DC, Jose Manuel Babes Romualdez, who is a second cousin of the Bongbong Marcos, warning a possible sanction by the Americans under the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CATSA), a US law prohibiting countries from purchasing Russian military weapons and equipment.

This argument begs the question and runs oblique because ASEAN nations, especially Vietnam, Myanmar, Laos and Malaysia have historically bought significant arms from Russia due to attractive pricing, with Vietnam being heavily reliant on Russian equipment. Secondly, the Philippine contract for the Russian helicopters were signed in November 2021, or three months before Russia crossed the Ukrainian border in late February 2022. Thirdly, Russia’s war is against Ukraine and not the United States.

To this day, the entry of the US and NATO in the war in Ukraine, remains to be the Americans’ most costly faux pas during Joe Biden’s term.

Donald Trump himself said “If I were president, there will no war in Ukraine.” In fact Trump has decided to stop funding and sending arms for Ukraine’s war, and has started working with Valdimir Putin for peace in Ukraine.

Ambassador Romualdez was obviously enticed not by our national interest but subservience to the Americans.

What was damning is that two days before Faustino and Pavlov’s disclosure,  the Defense Post reported the US has provided $100 million in foreign military funding to the Philippines as compensation to scrap the helicopter deal with Russia. US Ambassador to Manila Mary Kay Carlson said that the Philippine military can use the funding “as they wish”.

Why would the United States race the ante, if the Russian helicopter has already been terminated?

The AFP’s seesaw propaganda, selectively pitting Duterte with Marcos will not work with me, and so with Romualdez and Carlson’s shopping preferences. It is evident that the US was pushing Marcos’ hands to kill the deal.

What matters now

What is important now is where are the heavy-lift helicopters?

Our country needs this equipment to bolster our humanitarian assistance and disaster response (HADR) capability especially in the light of severe weather conditions and trillions of pesos wasted in ghost, substandard and delayed flood-control projects of the Marcos administration.

The Blackhawks and the Hueys are not designed for these operations. Last November, six of our airmen perished when their Huey crashed. Capt. Paulie B. Dumagan, 2nd Lt. Royce Louis, Sgt. Yves Sijub, Sgt. John Christopher Golfo, Airman First Class Ericson Merico, and Airman Ameer Khaidar Apionwould not have died in vain, if they were already flying an Mi-17, the first delivery was already ready five months before.

Some Blackhawks also had to make emergency landings short of their destination because of severe weather conditions brought about by the onslaught of Typhoon Tino.

The fear of CATSA sanction is political leading to a bad policy.

Has the Russian deal been officially canceled, once and for all? Did we win the argument to refund the P1.9 billion that gave as downpayment?

What happened to the “gift” of the United States of $100 million dollars just to scrap the Russian deal?

If we are instead buying the US Chinooks, where are the Chinooks?

US bought Mi-17s

If the Chinooks were fitted more for our needs, why did the US buy 63 Russian helicopters for Afghan military in 2013?

To outfit Afghanistan security forces with new helicopters, the Pentagon bypassed American companies and turned instead to Moscow for dozens of Russian Mi-17 rotorcrafts at a cost of more than $1 billion.

Senior Pentagon officials assured skeptical members of Congress that the Defense Department had made the right call. They repeatedly cited a top-secret 2010 study they said named the Mi-17 as the superior choice.

The move was a bittersweet victory for the program’s opponents, as the Pentagon finally capitulated, but cutting only 15 of 78  of what it ordered from Russia.

Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, the Senate’s No. 2 GOP leader and one of the most vocal critics of the contract, said the Department of Defense “repeatedly and disingenuously” used the study to prove the necessity of buying Mi-17s.

“So why are we buying Russian helicopters when there are American manufacturers that can meet that very same requirement?” Cornyn asked. “Makes no sense whatsoever and the Department of Defense has steadfastly refused to cooperate with reasonable inquiries into why in the world they continue to persist along this pathway.”

In 2012, Frank Kendall, the Pentagon’s top acquisition official, and policy chief James Miller pointed to the study in a written response to questions posed by Cornyn. Just a few weeks after the secret study was completed, Army Secretary John McHugh wrote in a 2011 memo “that the Mi-17 stands apart” when compared with other helicopters.

The Pentagon denied it misled the US Congress. A senior department official said the study was focused on long-term requirements and not the immediate needs of the Afghan military, which were best met by the Mi-17. Also, U.S. commanders in Afghanistan wanted the Mi-17 because it is durable, easy-to-operate.

Overall, 63 Mi-17s have been acquired through the 2011 contract. It was awarded without competition to Russia’s arms export agency, Rosoboroexport (another name for Sovtechnoexport).

Afghanistan’s mountainous terrain demands a helicopter capable of operating in the most rugged conditions at altitudes well in excess of 15,000 feet. The Mi-17 met all these requirements, U.S. military officials told lawmakers in correspondence and in testimony.

But so could the heavyweight Chinook. This helicopter made by Boeing is larger than its Russian counterpart, carries up to 26,000-pound payload, which is twice as much as the Mi-17, and can operate at nearly the same high altitude.

Surplus Chinooks vs brand-new Mi-17s?

At that time in 2013, Boeing executives informed congressional staff during a meeting held in late September that the cost of a refurbished surplus CH-47D for military use would be in the $12 million to $14 million range.

As my meme pointed out, I was even told by my friend at the Pentagon that a used CH47D military model today would cost about $40 million, but he did not qualify that U.S. military has concluded its auctions of these models. While the aircrafts are in operation, they are available only on the secondary market through specialized private commercial operators and aviation brokers who only purchased surplus military airframes for civilian use.

So now, let me fact-check myself.

The U.S. military has largely retired the older CH-47D Chinook, replacing them with the modernized CH47F and MH47G models, which feature digital cockpits, better engines, and improved airframes for heavy-lift and special operations, though the legacy ‘D’ models served valiantly and some were upgraded, marking the end of an era for that specific variant. 

In the brand-new markets what is now selling if the “F-version” of the CH-47.

The price tag of the new Chinooks is, however,  nowhere the budget the Philippines contracted each Russian Mi-17 @$13 million. Germany bought CH47Fs in 2023 for $141 million each; United Kingdom in 2004  for $135 million each and the United Arab Emirates in 2025 for $220 million each.

Given this parameter, our 16 plus 1 Russian heavy-lift helicopters total contract price of P215 million will only be able to afford not even two Chinooks.

Conclusion

I thought the Armed Forces of the Philippines is professional?

Why is it allowing Philippine and US politics, much more the fear factor regarding CATSA sanctions, to rule over better judgment to provide good equipment, even by proven Pentagon standards, for heavy-lifting by our air force for our specific needs and the demands of our national interest?

Unless of course, the AFP is being run by the Americans, and I am not referring to Romeo Brawner Jr. whose roots belong to a Buffalo soldier deserter.

Yet isn’t off-tangent that while Donald Trump panders to Valdimir Putin and Russia for peace in Ukraine, and to Xi Jinping and China for stability in Southeast Asia, we are defaulting on a good opportunity to give better service to our men in uniform?

So, if you are a commonsensical defense purchasing officer, will you allow Romualdez and Carlson’s champagne taste to overrule our modernization program, just because we only have budget for beer?

So, tell us – Is the contract for the Russians officially terminated?

Because if not, do not let the American military arms complex dictate to you what is good or not good for the Philippines.

Let Marcos claim the legacy by reviving the 16+1 Russian heavy-lift helicopter deal, because anyway the mainstream media already said that Duterte killed it, and the military factcheckers confirmed it.

That is how a sober and wise mind should deal resolving this controversy.

That is when we can feel that the defense community is truly protecting Filipinos and not foreign interests.

To be continued.

   

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