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With the help of continuing U.S. economic aid totaling nearly $3 billion, the Philippines have come a long way in 15 years. Agricultural output has increased some 200%, manufacturing output 300% ; per capita income has reached $200, highest in Asia after Japan, and Malaya. Along with freedom, the U.S. bestowed a heritage of universal suffrage, broad education, a free but noisy press, and a working knowledge of democratic processes.
But the luxury villas and big U.S. cars of modern Manila contrast sharply with the subsistence existence of the peasants in many rural parts of the islands, and Philippine politics have become almost synonymous with corruption.
Deepening Shadows. For MacArthur, the sentimental journey was an unqualified success. Everywhere he went, he was saluted and hymned, feted and flattered. War veterans showered him with souvenirs, sang Let Me Call You Sweetheart to him. Housewives fought through police lines for his autograph.
Looking out upon a crowd swelling Manila's Luneta park one afternoon, the old soldier's eyes misted. "Even as I hail you," he said, "I must say farewell. For such is the nature of my visit: to greet once again those with whom I have stood ... in building and defending on these shores a citadel of freedom and liberty. For I must admit, with a sense of sadness, that the deepening shadows of life cast doubt upon my ability to pledge again, 'I shall return.' "