With Assist From America, Philippines Is Standing Up to China — but for How Long?

The Philippines is defying China’s grip on the South China Sea with a powerful assist from American forces despite doubts about the depth and duration of the American commitment.When three small Philippine air force T-50 fighter planes took off Tuesday to prove their right to enter what the Chinese say is their air space, two huge American Air Force B1 bombers were flying with them. The mission, over a fish-rich shoal 120 miles off the Philippine west coast, angered the Chinese, who promised as always to defend their own “rights and interests.”The close coordination between Washington and Manila on defense against China represents a distinct improvement over frayed relations and the corruption that decimated the Philippine armed forces before the election of the Philippine president, Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., nearly three years ago.Now, though, Filipinos are wondering how long the relationship will endure. The deepest immediate concern is that President Trump may “strike a deal with China that will compromise our mutual defense agreements,” a longtime Philippine foreign affairs and military analyst, Roland Simbulan, told the Sun.A shift in American policy, with emphasis on trade and tariffs on China, he warned, might force the Philippines to buy missiles that Washington has deployed while building new military facilities designated for American forces to use as tensions grow still more serious.“The Philippine government has realized that it should build up its own national external defense capability by using its military-to-military relations with other countries,” Mr. Simbulan said. “The eternal capability must be credible.”The Philippines, however, has had very little credibility as a military power beyond the 8,000 or so islands that form the nation. The armed forces of the Philippines have been deployed for years fighting Muslim and Communist rebels while quavering in the presence of the Chinese, who have driven off Philippine vessels with powerful water cannons while turning islands into air strips that no one dares confront with more than shows of force.“I do not think China will attack the Philippines in a single operation to take the Philippines,” a retired American Army colonel, David Maxwell, told the Sun, but the Chinese might attack if they “decide to invade Taiwan,” just 155 miles north of the northern tip of the Philippines.The reason, he said, would be that the Philippines is “key to supporting U.S. operations in the Indo-Pacom,” the vast region watched over by the American Indo-Pacific Command in Hawaii. China, according to this logic, “must neutralize the Philippines — prevent the U.S. from operating for it — in order to successfully take Taiwan.”For now, though, the Chinese are sticking to less kinetic ways to exercise their power over the South China Sea, much of which the Philippines calls the West Philippine Sea. Chinese coast guard vessels routinely fire huge water cannons at Philippine boats, blocking them from getting near ancient fishing grounds while building up strength in the middle of the sea.“Filipino fishermen have been deprived of their livelihood, and the country is deprived of access to offshore natural gas,” Mr. Simbulan, chairman of the Philippines’s Center for People’s Empowerment in Governance, said. “Our coast guard is also continuously harassed by Chinese coast guard illegally entering Philippine territory.”There is “a chance of war,” he warned, “because of China’s hegemonic provocations.” The Philippines’s “defensive actions may start a war provoked by China.”Colonel Maxwell, the vice president of the Center for Asia Pacific Strategy, agrees. Mr. Marcos “is trying to improve Philippine defense capabilities,” he told the Sun, “but it will never be able to defend itself against a Chinese attack.” The Philippines, he said, “will be dependent on the U.S. to contribute to its defense.”He was uncertain, though, about the depth of Mr. Trump’s commitment. “Will Trump come to the defense of the Philippines,” he asked rhetorically. “Who knows?” He said he was confident that Mr. Trump’s “military advisers and national security professionals will recommend defending U.S. interest in the Philippines.”

With Assist From America, Philippines Is Standing Up to China — but for How Long?

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