Douglas MacArthur
For us Filipinos the most famous quote ever uttered by the heroic General Douglas MacArthur would be without a doubt the “I shall return.”
Below is another quote to ponder:
There is no security in this life. There is only opportunity.
– Douglas MacArthur
Believe Me
Or Not!
A five-minute immersion exercise in Contemporary Philippine History
By
Jose Sison Luzadas
Lingayen, Pangasinan
IT WOULD HAVE BEEN HAVE BEEN DRAMATIC
GENERAL MAC ARTHUR IN THE BEACH OF LINGAYEN, JANUARY 9, 1945
Source Internet
In his sentimental visit to the Philippines in 1961 where he was asked to trace his triumphant return to start the liberation of Luzon in 1945 starting from Lingayen, General Douglas Mac Arthur received a grand homecoming, reminiscent of the adulation given by the people of New York in 1951 when President Harry Truman fired him as Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers.
If I were part of his entourage and Mac Arthur had asked me what is there pleasing to the ears of Filipinos like Claro M. Recto, Lorenzo Tanada, Luis Taruc and die-hard anti-American Filipino nationalists, I will suggest the following “MAKE-BELIEVE” speech to add drama and rhetoric he was already known for.
ooooOoooo
“Citizens and freedom loving people of the Philippines, I HAVE RETURNED FOR THE SECOND TIME, AND FOR A VERY SPECIAL REASON. I consider it more than an invitation of your government in inaugurating a highway named after me. It is for sentimental reason that I came to rectify an error in history long overdue for correction. With me are the Balangiga bells that were shanghaied by the US soldiers in the island of Samar a century ago in a mistaken belief that they were “priceless souvenirs of war.”
“You were with me in the battlefields of Bataan and Corregidor in 1941 and we were together again in mapping out operations after the Leyte and Lingayen invasion of 1944 and 1945 liberating the countryside facing death in defeating the same enemy. Because we have built a bond of brotherhood, camaraderie that encouraged and sustained mutual trust as allies and friends, I find no rationale keeping the bells in the state of Wyoming depriving the people of Balangiga of their cultural heritage.”
“When in the conduct of belligerency boils down to what is right and what is wrong, I find no justification for American soldiers of the 1st Infantry Division justifying them by the Articles of War of the Geneva Convention to pilfer and to keep any relic that belongs to the Balangiga Catholic Church.”
“Twenty-five years ago, I personally returned the sword that General Emilio Aguinaldo wore everyday until his capture in the jungles of Palanan. That sword was kept by my father General Arthur Mac Arthur for thee decades. In reminiscence to what General Ulysses Grant of the Union Army did by asking Confederate General Robert E. Lee at the Appomattox Courthouse to keep his sword, I did the same out of respect and admiration of a defeated brave enemy. THERE ARE NO WOUNDS THAT CANNOT BE HEALED BY TIME AND BY MEN OF GOODWILL.”
**************************************************************************************************
Had this make-believe speech been delivered in Lingayen to the delight of Filipinos to hear including die-hard nationalists, Douglas will be another most admired American like Governor Francis Burton Harrison.
Now you can download “The Idol to generation of Filipinos”