With the
presently warming ties between Manila and Beijing, there is a tendency to look
at Washington as distant, weakening strategic ally of the Philippines. Nothing
can be further from the truth.
Port visits,
exercises, choppers
As recent as last
month, the nuclear-powered US aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan and its
accompanying ships arrived in Manila for a routine port call after patrolling
the South China Sea. While the US declares that port calls are a ‘direct
reflection of the longstanding relationship between the US and the Philippines,’
it is also a direct projection of US military hegemony over the Philippines and
the entire Indo-Pacific.
The treaty
partners have also undertaken Balikatan military exercises with an expanded number
of personnel since 2018. Joint military exercises are useful not only to
actually train US and Filipino military personnel, but more importantly, it is
used a showcase to the world by both treaty partners that despite overtures
from Beijing and Moscow, the strategic alliance remains well and strong.
Most dramatic
is Mr. Duterte’s decision to allow the purchase of US Blackhawk helicopters
despite months of speeches assailing US interventionism in the Philippines and
outrightly rejecting US military equipment purchases as a matter of policy.
All of these expanded
activities are surprising given the very strong rhetoric of Mr. Duterte on
US-PH relations. It can only be surmised that pro-Washington defense officials
have convinced the President to finally relent and reconsider.
Free and Open
Indo-Pacific (FOIP)
Under the administration
of US President Donald Trump, the Indo-Pacific is the US military’s priority
theater, in which its seeks to employ effective deterrence against regional
threats, engage partners and allies as force multipliers, and lead the
implementation of a rules-based order in region.
As such, the
Philippines finds itself in a tug-of-war between two geopolitical giants: China
and the United States, in which both powers seek to employ different methods to
place the Philippines in its metaphorical safe harbors.
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With the very
equivocal foreign policy pronouncements of Mr. Duterte, both powers cannot be
assured that the Philippines will ultimately pick a side in the geopolitical
fray. And this is very evident in the Philippine government’s cherry-picking relations
with both regional powers: development cooperation with Beijing and military cooperation
with Washington.
Forward operating
bases raises regional tensions
However,
Washington has a first-mover advantage as it military influence stretches as
far north as Korea down to Singapore, in what is called the first island chain.
The Philippines is included in this chain, after Manila signed the Enhanced Defense
Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) which allowed the US to establish forward
operating bases (FOB) in the country despite the Philippine constitution
prohibiting the establishment of foreign military bases.
And here lies
the precarious situation of the Philippines. With increasing trade tensions between
Beijing and Washington, it is within the realm of possibility that their dispute
escalates to the level of military provocation, such that the FOBs in the
Philippines may be equipped with military equipment and materiel within the missile
defense framework of the US Department of Defense.
This does not
only render the Philippines vulnerable to acts of aggression from US
adversaries, but also makes Manila responsible for the expected presence of
non-nuclear conventional weapons which may have the same lethality as nuclear
weapons.
Way forward
Nonetheless, the way forward is not to choose between two competing regional powers determined to dominate the Indo-Pacific.
Regional groupings and individual states have been undertaking their own independent assessments for the future of the region. The ASEAN, as put forward by Jakarta, has adopted the ASEAN Outlook on the Indo-Pacific, which seeks to provide a unified vision and strategy for the ASEAN states after US President Trump proposed the FOIP strategy in 2017.
This is an international undertaking which the Manila can find common cause, if it is indeed serious about pursuing an independent foreign policy. This initiative raises the profile of ASEAN states as a contending force in the region, which should not be dominated by Beijing nor Washington.
More importantly, by participating in this mechanism, Mr. Duterte can raise his profile as one of the region’s peace-builders, and secure his legacy to the nation and the world.