Establishment The New People's Army was established on March 29, 1969, following the split of the old Communist Party (
Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas-1930) into
Lava and Guerrero factions. The 1960s saw a resurgence in radical ideology following the establishment of
Kabataang Makabayan and the emerging popularity of
Mao Zedong Thought as an advancement of ideological
Marxism-Leninism. In 1966, Jose Maria Sison, under the
nom de guerre Amado Guerrero, wrote
Rectify Errors and Rebuild the Party!, a treatise which criticized the old Lavaite leadership and emphasized the need to follow Mao Zedong Thought to foster re-establishment. The conflict continued until December 26, 1968, when the Communist Party of the Philippines was formally re-established along Maoist lines, and the entire issue was termed the
First Great Rectification Movement. After re-establishing the CPP, Guerrero set about establishing the People's Army. KM cadres in
Tarlac had contacted Guerrero and linked him with
Bernabe Buscayno, a former member of the older
Hukbong Mapagpalaya ng Bayan. Relations were established and the New People's Army was formally founded on March 29, in continuity with the previous Hukbalahap. At the time, the NPA had only 60 armed fighters.
Initial activities The NPA was immediately tasked with the role of implementing the CPP's program for a People's Democratic Revolution. In the ''Declaration of the New People's Army'', Amado Guerrero outlined the following as its main tasks: • The New People's Army Must Engage in Party Rebuilding. • The New People's Army Must Carry Out Agrarian Revolution, Build Rural Bases, and Advance the Armed Struggle. • The New People's Army Must Build the National United Front. The NPA quickly spread alongside organizational work of the CPP. By 1972, it had established 735 barrio organizing committees and 60 barrio revolutionary committees, governing an estimated 400,000 people all over the country. The CPP used the NPA to establish barrio organizing and revolutionary committees, which served as instruments in administering the people's revolutionary government. Barrio organizing committees were established to lower land rent, eliminate usury, and ensure the "annihilation of enemy troops and the elimination of landlord despots, enemy spies, and such bad elements as cattle rustlers, extortionists, robbers, murderers, arsonists, and the like." Problems in discipline also emerged during this time, as well as deterioration of the NPA's ability to conduct mass work. These ideological and organizational shortcomings, coupled with the
Corazon Aquino administration's counter-insurgency program,
Oplan Lambat Bitag, managed to severely harm the NPA and the CPP as a whole. In 1989, the NPA assassinated
U.S. Army Colonel James "Nick" Rowe, founder of the U.S. Army
Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape (SERE) course. Colonel Rowe was part of a military assistance program to the Philippine Army. The NPA asserts that this made him a legitimate military target.
Second Great Rectification Movement By 1991, the CPP central committee had assessed the mistakes of the previous decade and carried out the
Second Great Rectification Movement from 1992 until declaring a success in 1998. The Second Great Rectification Movement, however, saw splits in the CPP ranks, with rejectionists such as
Filemon Lagman,
Romulo Kintanar,
Etta Rosales, and others leaving the CPP and forming their own groups based on ideological differences. The
Alex Boncayao Brigade, notorious for its partisan activities, left the CPP with Lagman and formed the
Revolutionary Proletarian Army. In 1998, the GRP and NDFP signed the Comprehensive Agreement on Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law (CAHRIHL), which establishes rules of engagement for both parties in accordance with international rules of war. The NPA, as a signatory to CAHRIHL, is bound to international agreements stated in the
Geneva Convention and thus follows rules set for prisoners of war, command-detonated explosives, and similar rules of engagement. Since then, rejectionists have been met with reprisals. Lagman was ambushed in the
University of the Philippines in 2001 by gunmen and slain. The NPA has admitted to killing Kintanar in 2003.
Post-Rectification and Decline (1998–2026) The CPP declared the Second Great Rectification Movement as having been "conclusively won" in 1998. Since then, it has re-affirmed that the CPP is in absolute command of the NPA, outlining that its most pressing task is to "defeat and destroy the US-created and US-supported reactionary
Armed Forces of the Philippines." Since then, it continued to wage a protracted people's war through the use of
guerrilla tactics. In 2002, President
Gloria Macapagal Arroyo requested the United States Department of State to declare the CPP-NPA as a foreign terrorist group, which was granted on August 2. By 2017, the NPA strength had surpassed the previous 2005 peak by 3%, and in 2018, the Central Committee claimed to operate 110 guerrilla fronts. == Ideology and policies ==