Antonio Bautista Air Base


Antonio Bautista Air Base is a Military Airbase located on Puerto Princesa, Palawan. The base shares a single, 9,000 foot long runway with Puerto Princesa Airport.

World War II

On December 14, 1944, occupying Japanese soldiers herded 150 American POWs who were building the air strip on Palawan Island into air raid trenches, doused them with gasoline, set them afire, then machine-gunned and bayoneted them to death. Among them was , the Palawan POWs’ senior officer, who was from Janesville, Wisconsin with the 192nd Tank Battalion. Only eleven men escaped the “Palawan Massacre” to be rescued by guerrillas. The story of their ordeal persuaded General Douglas MacArthur that the rumored order for the retreating Japanese to “kill all” prisoners was being implemented, thus his rush to liberate the Philippines.
US Army Air Forces units based here included:
It is one of the nine air bases eyed for the priority development programs of the Philippine Air Force. The PAF planned to construct Two additional hangars at Antonio Bautista Air Base in Puerto Princesa to store relief supplies and accommodate additional air assets, including long-range patrol aircraft to be stationed there in the future.
On March 18, 2016 the USA and Philippines signed a deal to allow US forces to use 5 bases in the country as a counter to the Chinese deployments in the Spratly Islands, including Antonio Bautista Air Base.
A new Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief warehouse is expected to be built at the airbase.