There’s no getting around the fact that the discovery of Chinese military uniforms inside a raided Pogo hub in Porac, Pampanga invokes a riveting cloak-and-dagger tale of subterfuge.

And, given the secrecy and intrigue in any cloak and dagger tale, it does immediately require an in-depth investigation to reveal whatever secrets there are, if only to assuage us that nothing is threatening our national security.            

Still, given a national security setting punctuated by a pronounced tension with China, the discovery of at least six sets of camouflage uniforms bearing insignias of China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and the Chinese People’s Armed Police Force (CAPF) should customarily give us cloak-and-dagger chills.

(Idiomatically, “cloak and dagger” may be applied to any situation where someone is trying to conduct something secretly, with the “cloak” being a metaphor for hiding something from others and the “dagger” being a symbol of danger and violence.)

Military officials, however, are downplaying the shrill alarms raised so far following the discovery of the uniforms on the premises of the most notorious illegal POGO (Philippine offshore gaming operator) Lucky South 99 Outsourcing Inc., where the authorities are still scouring through a complex of 40 or so buildings.

"The Chinese military uniforms are likely used as props in illicit online transactions. The limited number of PLA uniforms found suggests they are more indicative of use in deceptive activities rather than any preparation for an invasion," said the military’s spokesperson, Col. Francel Padilla.

Excusing the military uniforms as props is acceptable since the Lucky South 99 hub is by far the worst among 300 or so illegal POGOs engaged in kidnapping, harassment, torture, and other crimes.

Besides the uniforms, other items found in the ongoing search of the 10-hectare offshore gaming hub included handcuffs, pellet guns, baseball bats, electric rods, identification cards, suspected methamphetamine or shabu, cash, jewelry and Rolex watches, safes, as well as scam paraphernalia, including a number of smartphones and SIM cards.

It is highly probable, therefore, that the uniforms were used to intimidate or harass the offshore gaming hub’s mostly Chinese or foreign employees. A point that a puzzled senator inadvertently uncovered after pointing out that the uniforms would be recognizable only to mainland Chinese nationals. 

Nevertheless, the uniforms do raise the unsettling point that POGOs are definitely employing large numbers of either demobilized or veteran PLA servicemen among its thousands of Chinese and foreign workers.

At their peak in 2020, POGOs employed more than 300,000 Chinese workers, but the pandemic, higher taxes and an enforcement blitz forced many to decamp elsewhere.

While employing jobless ex-PLA members in Pogos may be dismissed as a normal business practice, the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission (PAOCC) nonetheless considers possible “the most extreme explanation that there could indeed be (Chinese) military personnel conducting whatever third-party activities inside Lucky South 99.”

“Third-party” activities obviously refer to the lingering suspicions that some Pogo outfits in recent months have been doing either mercenary surveillance or espionage work in behalf of China. Suspicions, which aren’t allayed by the fact that some Pogos are unnervingly located near key military camps.

A former resort island called Island Cove in Kawit, Cavite, for instance, has been retrofitted into a barracks-style POGO site after being sold by the Remulla family in 2018. The site is perilously close to Sangley Point, a key Philippine Navy base.

Defense officials, in fact, time and again have demanded the banning of these POGO hubs near military camps.

Still, the military believes POGOs have yet to reach the point where they will threaten national security, according to Commodore Roy Vincent Trinidad, naval spokesperson for the West Philippine Sea.

Despite his cautionary tone, however, Trinidad said the POGOs’ “deep” involvement in incidents beyond “common crimes” must be seriously looked into.

In short, the military establishment is saying that they are closely following Pogo incidents so as to prepare “necessary contingency measures” in the meanwhile that Pogos haven’t finally exited the scene.