You CAN KILL the insurgents but not the insurgency-that lesson of guerrilla movements is being relearned in the southern Philippines where the government is trying to end a four-decade Muslim rebellion. For over a year now on a string of islands in the Philippines' troubled south, several thousand government troops, supported by U.S. Special Forces in non-combat roles, have been trying to wipe out the Abu Sayyaf, one of Asia's most violent Muslim militant groups. While several Abu Sayyaf commanders have been killed in military strikes on their camps as part of an offensive called Operation Ultimatum, an estimated 300 militants out of a peak force of about 1,000 are still on the loose in the impoverished hinterlands of Jolo and Basilan islands.
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