By Adam Dempsey, Research Associate, UK Defence Forum

In an article in The Washington Times retired Admiral James A. Lyons suggests that with China's influence on the rise in the South China Sea, the United States should reinvigorate military ties with the Philippines. After the U.S. left the islands in 1991, China began laying claim to and occupying contested islands in the region. In 1995 China built a facility on Mischief Reef, a region recognised as within the Philippines' economic zone. According to Lyons, the Clinton administration's failure to effectively respond to China's illegal actions began fifteen years of regional policy inertia. Yet at the recent Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) meeting in Hanoi, Secretary of State Hilary Clinton signalled a change in U.S. policy. In a challenge to China's bilateral approach to addressing territorial claims, the Secretary of State emphasised that Washington wished to see disputes resolved through collaborative diplomacy. Yet in the case of the Philippines, Lyons suggests the United States should be doing more.

By Scott Stewart

On Aug. 23, Rolando Mendoza, a former senior police inspector with the Manila police department, boarded a tourist bus in downtown Manila and took control of the vehicle, holding the 25 occupants (tourists from Hong Kong and their Philippine guides) hostage. Mendoza, who was dressed in his police inspector's uniform, was armed with an M16-type rifle and at least one handgun.

According to the police, Mendoza had been discharged from the department after being charged with extortion. Mendoza claimed the charges were fabricated and had fought a protracted administrative and legal battle in his effort to be reinstated. Apparently, Mendoza's frustration over this process led to his plan to take the hostages. The fact that Mendoza entertained hope of regaining his police job by breaking the law and taking hostages speaks volumes about his mental state at the time of the incident.

After several hours of negotiation failed to convince Mendoza to surrender, communications broke down, Mendoza began to shoot hostages and police launched a clumsy and prolonged tactical operation to storm the bus. The operation lasted for more than an hour and left Mendoza and eight of the tourists dead at the end of a very public and protracted case of violence stemming from a workplace grievance.

Hostage-rescue operations are some of the most difficult and demanding tactical operations for police and military. To be successful, they require a great deal of training and planning and must be carefully executed. Because of this, hostage-rescue teams are among the most elite police and military units in the world. Since these teams are always training and learning, they pay close attention to operations like the one in Manila and study these operations carefully. They seek to adopt and incorporate tactics and techniques that work and learn from any mistakes that were made so they can avoid repeating them. Even in highly successful operations, there are always areas that can be improved upon and lessons that can be learned.

Indeed, in the Manila case, the events that unfolded provided a litany of lessons for hostage-rescue teams. The case will almost certainly be used in law enforcement and military classrooms across the globe for years as a textbook example of what not to do.