The Philippines Marcos Seizes the Offensive

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Ferdinand Marcos may be down and he may be out, but he is hardly ready to be consigned to the history books just yet. Last week the ousted President of the Philippines and his supporters sought to seize the offensive by both word and deed. From his exile in Hawaii, Marcos in an interview with TIME boldly charged a direct American role in a "conspiracy for a coup d'etat" that he claimed was quashed by loyal forces before he fled the Philippines on Feb. 26. In interviews with a Manila radio station, the former dictator also reversed his calls of just a week earlier to support President Corazon Aquino and exhorted followers to agitate against the new government. Coming after three days of mounting antigovernment activity in the Manila area, the broadcast aroused speculation that Marcos himself was playing a role in the events.

At his modestly furnished beachfront home in Honolulu, Marcos had a two- hour interview with TIME. During the session he indicated that he is rapidly regaining confidence as he emerges from a period of isolation and depression that followed his expulsion from power. While qualifying his remarks with expressions of gratitude to his American hosts for granting him asylum, the former leader insisted that he had intelligence reports indicating that "some Americans had helped in the preparation of the coup." He continued: "We cannot confirm it, but it included plans to assassinate both the First Lady and me."

Marcos charged that the U.S. State Department had dispatched a "special team" to the Philippines as early as last December to help some groups in the Philippines prepare a coup attempt. He said the plotters' preparations included the importing of equipment and arms through the intercession of Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile. Marcos claimed that the coup was discovered just before the Feb. 7 election, and "we planted several of our officers inside, so we got all the details." It was subsequently aborted, he said, "because we immediately dispersed all the units that were commanded by their people." On Feb. 22, Enrile and his vice chief of staff, General Fidel Ramos, barricaded themselves inside the defense ministry and threw their support to the Aquino camp.

The Reagan Administration vigorously denied that it had played any part in the coup. A U.S. State Department official, responding to the charge that the U.S. and Enrile had plotted to overthrow Marcos, unleashed a single expletive that he later softened to "Balderdash!"

Warming to his anti-American theme, Marcos repeated charges that U.S. officials in Manila deceived him about his destination when they persuaded him to leave the presidential Malacanang Palace. He thought he was headed for his home province of Ilocos Norte, only to find himself being taken first to Guam and then to Hawaii instead.