The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1900-07-16
NEED MORE TROOPS.
AMERICANS REQUIRE 100000 MEN
IN THE PHILIPPINES.
LkWT0N'S JUDGMENT UPHELD.
PRESENT FORCE CANNOT GARRI-
son THE ISLANDS.

Serious Fighting Inevitable I'm Min
danao and the suIu ISIands-AgIi-
pays Fierce Attack With Women
BOIomcn, Swordsmen and Rihc-
mcn-Archbishop ChnppeIle on the
Friars-The FiIipinos, He Says,
owe Them All They Possess.
(Corre spondenoe of the Associated Press.)
Manila, June 12-"More soldiers" is the
demand " hich is coming to Gen. MacAr-
thur from every department of the ISL
ands. Recent events have worked to vim
dicate Gen. Lawtons judgment that 100,
900 troops will be needed to establish
American sovereignty over the Philippines.
Until they attempted to hold provinces
of two or three hundred thousand hostile
people with a regiment or two, the Ameri-
can commanders hardly realized the size
of the Philippine Islands. The present
force is not large enough to garrison more
than half the i'm cor ant towns and in some
of the most important islands, among
them Cebu, Panay, Samar, Leyte and the
great Mohammedan empire of Mindaneo,
only the commercial ports are occupied.
The Moros are a cloud on the horizon.
officers best acquainted with conditions
in Mindanao and the Suu islands tell the
Associated Press correspondent that they
consider serious fighting there inevitable
If it comes, the two regiments scatter
ed in small garrisons, some of them hun
dreds of miles apart, along the coast of
Mlndanao, an island nearly as large as
Luzon, may have serious work. The Mo-
ros are fighters, by nature, do not fear
death, have many guns though of anti
quated makes, but do the best execution
by lying in the thick jungles and cut
ting down soldiers who pass through with
terrible knives and spears.
Gen Young, who is holding seven of
the most mountainous provinces of Luzon
with four regiments, expects severe work
during the rainy season. Hundreds of
Filipinos have been slain, bur much of
the work has been like brushing away
mosquitoes which swarm down upon a new
spot.
Gen. Tinio has a nomadic command
whose warriors can hide their guns and
become amigos" is it suits their interests.
AS few of them wear uniforms and the
people combine to shield them from detec-
tion. the Americans are greatly hand-
capped.
Aglipay's Fight.
Aglipay, the priest who has proclaimed
himself Archbishop of the Philippines is
in che field as a general. His forces at
tackled Capt. Dodd of the Third Cavalry
at Batoc. More than 200 Filipinos were
slain. Aglipay commanded in person, and
there is an unconfrmed report that he
was among the killed. His followers
fought with the reckiessness of Moham-
medan fanatics
They approached the Americans in three
lines, with an advance guard of women
arranged with the expectation that the
Americana would not fire upon them
Behind the women was a line of bolomen
and others armed only with wooden
swords, no more dangerous than police
mems clubs, and behind the bolomen the
rifiemen. Happily. the women threw
themselves fiat upon the ground and
sought shelter at the first fire so that few
of them were injured. The soldiers
thought they were men dressed in wo-
mems clothes.
The onslaught of the bolomen was like
the descent of the Mahdi fanatics upon
Kitcheners squad at Kharaoum. They
kept coming on faster than the solderes
could Shoot them down. until they were
so close that our cavalrymen had not
time to fire and load. but went through
them with dubbed carbines
Gen. Young has evidence that the
priests of the region have been sending
church contributions to Agupay Two
prominent priests are in Jail charged with
aiding che insurreetion and will be tried
by military commission. Surveillance is
being eX Xercised over the finances of some
of the larger parishes.
Tinio and Aglipay are reported to be
enemies. a condition which will benefit
the Americans. Some of the American
generals think that the insurrection could
be materially crippled by banishing the
Filipino leaders 10 some island. where
they could not give moral and financial
support to the rebellion.
ChappeIIe and the Frinrs.
Archbishop Chappelle has taken no un-
certain stand on the question of the friars
which the Filipino people regard as the
keynote of all their troubles. The Arch
bishop has expressed his opinion freely
to many officers and civilians with whom
ne has talked although he declines to
give any formal interviews for publica-
tion.
His conclusions. summarized. are these:
That the F'ilipinos owe to the monastc
brotherhoods all the education and civil
ization they possess; that it would be a
great injustice to the friars to expel them
from the field wherein they have worked
for centuries or to deprive them OF the
estates which they have acquired honest
ly and have administered TO the public
good; that 1t would be impossible to re-
place them with other priests, because
there is no other clerical force acquainted
with the country and the languages of
the people, and the Filipino priests are
not competent to hold any bR the sub
ordinate positions in the church; that the
opposition to the friars is an artificial
propaganda fostered by the insurgents
and by the Filipino priests who are
themselves leaders in the insurrection and
are using IT TO obtain control of the
church in the islands