In inviting Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile to keynote its annual meeting, the Family Planning Organization of the Philippines (FPOP) was recognizing the unique role of the Ministry of National Defense in the National Population Program (BT, Nov. 25).

The Ministry’s population-related activities can be described as selective retroactive contraception.

Many people don’t know that Mr. Enrile’s ministry does in this area because military people minimize the extent to which their operations reduce the size and alter the quality of our population.

Implementors of traditional population programs will never know (and don’t seem to care) whether a child whose birth has been averted would have become another Ninoy Aquino, a Mel Mathay or a Cesar Climaco, a Luis Beltran or a Demy Dingcong.

In contrast, military men whose missions have population implications are selective: they limit treatment to only the criminal and subversive.

True to its traditions, the FPOP has been intelligent enough, honest enough, and courageous enough to acknowledge the military’s contribution to the crusade for population control.

Ruben Muego