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Show t military Situation in the Philippines. IJohn T. McCutcheon's Manila Letter in Chicago Recprd.) There are no more insurgents as fails fai-ls official recognition goes. It is now the custom to speak of native armed j oodies as "ladrones," "robbers" and1 'bandits." Nearly every day we hear Jf our soldiers encountering some band ot robbers, after which there is a fight ivhich ends in an American loss of one ar more and a "robber" loss of 100 or rnore killed. In brief, the military situation, as e hear it at headquarters, is about this: Lverything is quiet. There are a few of these bands of 'ladrones' or robbers that occasionally -Un into some of our troops out in the hills, but otherwise everything is quiet." ,sfist 'he official or headquarters view of the present state of the rebellion: rebel-lion: Everything quiet all r.he provinces prov-inces occupied by American troops-native troops-native municipal governments running in an the towns ot those provinces in which our troops are garrisoned only a few bands of "robbers" and "la-drones "la-drones still under arms, and they continuing con-tinuing the fighting because they find It easier to prey on the people than to work the mass of the peonle desirous of peace and only contrii'uting food and money to these bands because they fear them the insurgent organization disrupted beyond hone of OIr,in concentrating long enough to strengthen strength-en itself for a new and cohesive campaignports cam-paignports open and commerce resumedthe re-sumedthe enemy's ammunition prac-tically prac-tically exhausted, their arsenals captured cap-tured and the coasts guarded by gunboats gun-boats A guinaldo a fugftire so remotely remote-ly hidden that his influence is not ; to be feared. M I have endeavored to find out the I military situation in Luzon and the i southern islands as it exists today. The ! results obtained have been from my j own observation in the Camarines, Al-i Al-i bay, Leyte. Samar, Mindanao. Cavite, Manila, Tarlac and Pangasanan and j from reliable officers In Tayakas La-j La-j guna: Union, Ilocos. Abra and other I northern provinces, as wed as in Cebu j Nejjros and Panay. I find that the canvass hardly sus-; sus-; tains the optimistic reports to be had at headquarters In Manila. In other words, there is still a good deal of fighting fight-ing going on; there is a widespread, almost general, hatred of the Americans: Ameri-cans: there are approximately 20 000 , rifles still. in possession of the Filfpinos, hand there are numberless forces 'of armed men operating in manv dis- I tricts. ! That the irsurgent army as an organized or-ganized force holding definite limitations limita-tions of territory and maintaining an orderly and tangible formation is broken and disrupted there Is no doubt. Instead of knowing that the enemy holds certain towns and districts, and that a fight is necessary to possess those districts, our troops can now plan no movement or expedition with the certainty of making contact with an armed force. Reports which tell of the presence of large bodies of armed Filipinos in the vicinity of garrison towns frequently are brought in, but when a force of Americans goes out to find them they are gone that is, if the American force is a strong one. j But let a small body go out, and the I woods and hills will be found alive I with riflemen and bolomen. The Fili-j Fili-j pino method of warfare has changed ; from their old, defiant methods to a new and more insidious one, that is as i much if not more to be feared. J It will be remembered that Tarlac ! was taken without a shot, and that our troops occupied in turn all the provinces of the north with fewer than a dozen fights of any consequence. From that time on it became a fool race after the demoralized bands that i were leaving the. Tarlac lowlands. There was no established capital, ho l machinery of government, no .grand j army and half the cabinet surrendered j or were captured. Officially the revolution was crushed, j but General Concepcion, Aguinaldo's ; chief of staff, uttered a dissenting opin- The insurgents, or robbers, or laid la-id rones, still have between 15.000 and 20.000 rifles. I have no record of the number we have captured, but General Bell, one of the most active and successful suc-cessful officers operating on the islands, is-lands, admits that he has captured only about 400 altogether. I An official bulletin was once posted In Manila which detailed the surrender : of 800 arms and men at Bayombong. I have since learned that only forty rifles were really captured, while the j general who surrendered stated that j there were 800 in the province. In all the capture of arms there has been a very small proportion of Mausers. Mau-sers. Assuming 6,000 to be a very liberal lib-eral estimate of the rifles we have taken, tak-en, it is, therefore, seen that the Filipinos Fili-pinos still have nearly 20,000 in their possession. l Most of the military leaders of the : insurgents are still at liberty. Gen- j erals Tino, Macabulis, Mascardo and Alejandrino are still In the north, all of them with well armed forces. ' This sullen indifference is found pret-I pret-I ty generally through the towns held by our troops. The people don't like the ' Americans. We have found many of them who were believed to be honestly friendly, but time has proven that they were simulating. Some of our most promising local presidentes have been found guilty of the rankest trea'chery toward the Am-1 ericans..- It is doubtful whether they hated the Spaniards as much as they hate the Americans. Between them and the Spaniards there were some instincts and ties in common. Intermarriage was quite frequent. fre-quent. Long association had grafted into the native character many of the habits and likes of the Spaniards. With the-Americans it is different.' There isn't an impulse that is common to the two races. We may mean Well, but they don't understand our ways. Neither do we understand theirs. When patience and forbearance wculd be immensely im-mensely effective, the American methods meth-ods hurry and irritate the people. When we first came they thought the Americans were going to suppplant I their religion with Protestantism; la-I la-I ter 'they thought that the Americans were going to reinstate the hated friars fri-ars in the parishes: now It's hard to tell what they think. Perhaps they've come to the conclusion that religion cuts little figure either way. for they have been unspeakably shocked to see j the American theatre running full blast during the holy week, with good attendance at-tendance from our local circles. We send out big expeditions to capture cap-ture the insurgents, and when we have captured them we release them. One day cur soldiers wade streams, climb J mountains, suffer from hunger, sleep in the mud all to catch some insur-gerts. insur-gerts. The next day all the insurgents are released. It's no wonder the natives don't understand American methods. We have been here nearly two years, but I don't know of an American soldier sol-dier or officer who can speak a single native dialect. Furthermore, no one is making an effort to gain the one acquirement ac-quirement which would be so inestimably inestim-ably valuable in bringing about a better bet-ter understanding between the, Americans Amer-icans and Filipinos. Summarizing the present military sit-uation, sit-uation, we must acknowledge the existence ex-istence of many strong armed forces operating in nearly every province. These forces, while apparently acting independently of any central direction, are too big to be called robber bands. Many of them are under the command of men who have been well knowa ag insurgent leaders since the very first day of fighting. i As for the mass of the people not sympathizing with them and helping them financially, there are only ttfo many evidences that they do. It is said . that In every town occu- , pied by our troops and regulated by i native officials who have been installed j at our direction, there is a separate I and secret organization run in the interests in-terests of the Filipino cause; The bulk of the taxes are collected by the latter organization and are undoubtedly given ungrudgingly to the" insurgent cause. . Even the presidentes whom we have installed have turned out badly, and in j many instances it has been proved that the people of the town deliberately selected se-lected men who they knew could be relied re-lied upon to exercise "their .positions to the benefit of the fighting men out in the hills or barrios. Of the ninety-five '. presidentes appointed ap-pointed in one military district in the north of Luzon,. .the. officer who has charge of the municipal government admitted that not a single one could be trtlsted. And yet this is not a Tagalo district. In another district the general gen-eral commanding told me that of the fifty-five local presidents that we have appointed there were only three whom he could trust. In the vicinity of Paniqui and Bau- J tista. on the railroad, there are twenty- I two presidentes under arrest, one of S whom is likely to be sentenced to death, j When Colonel Smith routed GeneTal Macabulos he found letters from our I own presidentes giving the general f news of the movement, together with s the number of Americans in the com- 'j mand thr.t was to attack him. There j have been many similar letters found ;j at various times which have implicated 1 local officials, and examples of double J dealing are so frequent and common that one is led to regard nearly all of i our attempts to enlist native aid as fruitless and vain. ' It seems to me that the existence of ? these conditions in the towns which j- have had an opportunity to judge of the h benefits of American occupation at s least disproves the official contention J that the people are not in sympathy with the insurrection. "a |