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MANILA, Philippines — A week ago, a friend commented that there seemed to be little news coming from the West Philippine Sea, and things had been (relatively) calm.
If you’re talking about headlines, that might have been the case. The dangerous and splashy confrontations between Philippine maritime forces and the Chinese have been quite few and far apart — although Beijing’s maritime assets are never truly far behind.
During the Philippine Navy’s days-long maritime patrol to different Philippine-controlled features, a People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) or China Coast Guard (CCG) vessel would almost always be in the vicinity. Even during the BRP Miguel Malvar’s bilateral training with Japan in mid-June, at least one PLAN vessel was loitering nearby.
I told my friend to never say that again because, as we’d say in Philippine news rooms, “Huwag mong batiin.” (Literally, don’t welcome it — but the phrase loosely means “don’t manifest it.”)
They must have worked their magic because just in almost immediate succession, the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) reported the “illegal swarming” of Chinese maritime militia ships near Rozul Reef on June 19. A day later, a Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources’ vessel was hit by the CCG’s water cannons while the vessel and several other BFAR ships distributed aid to fisherfolk near Scarborough Shoal or Bajo de Masinloc.
The BRP Datu Taradapit managed to avoid damage while another vessel, the BRP Datu Tamblot, managed to avoid China’s water cannons altogether.
Water cannons, PCG spokesperson for the West Philippine Sea Commodore Jay Tarriela would remind reporters whenever these incidents happen, are meant to put fires out at sea — and not to target other vessels.
That China’s behavior is unacceptable and uncouth is a given — not just for the Philippines but to its allies and friends, both old and new. Scarborough is a high tide elevation that’s been controlled by Beijing since the fraught 2012 standoff with the Philippines.
According to the 2016 Arbitral Award — which Beijing refuses to recognize despite being a signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea — Scarborough Shoal is the traditional fishing ground for Filipino, Chinese, and Vietnamese fisherfolk. That means no matter who controls the shoal, these fishing communities should be allowed to enjoy its riches.
It is, understandably, tempting to feel either complacency or fatigue over the incidents or lack thereof in the West Philippine Sea. But it’s important to remember: infractions small and big by the superpower China against the Philippines is practically a “daily situation,” in the words of outgoing Foreign Secretary Enrique Manalo.
That Chinese vessels loiter so close to Pag-asa Island is a serious concern. That a PLAN or CCG vessel immediately tries to “shadow” Philippine vessels that try to approach Scarborough Shoal or even Sabina Shoal is a serious concern.
Protests against Beijing’s actions in the West Philippines are filed almost every week for this reason.
And here, yet again fatigue sinks in: For what use are these protests if China does it all over again anyway? The complex answer is that protests put on record Manila’s unchanging stance on both its rights and claims in the West Philippine Sea. This is useful if, say, the Philippines decides to bring China back to international court.
But their immediate benefit is, perhaps, a little harder to explain to a public that’s tired of seeing the Philippines’ uniformed personnel bullied at sea.
The Philippines’ usual collective of friends and allies have condemned China’s use of water cannons in the shoal. “We call on China to cease unlawful actions, act with restraint, and adhere to international law to maintain regional peace and stability,” Manila’s National Maritime Council (NMC) said in a statement on June 22.
Missiles over the Middle East
But over the weekend, any outrage over China’s latest actions in the South China Sea seemed to have been overshadowed by confusion, concern, and fear after the United States joined Israel’s war against Iran by using their “bunker buster” bombers in targeting key nuclear strikes — including Fordow, thought to be up to 295 feet below the surface.
The Pentagon has since confirmed that Operation Midnight Hammer involved over 125 US aircraft and 75 precision-guided munitions, including more than two dozen Tomahawk missiles. For the first time too, the US deployed its GBU-57 Massive Ordinance Penetrator, its largest bunker-busting bombs.
US Vice President JD Vance has framed the operation this way: that the US is not at war with Iran but its nuclear program. Sure.
Why Filipinos should care about an evolving and admittedly volatile situation is easy to pick apart: there are hundreds of thousands of Filipino workers in the Middle East, and conflict in that part of the world affects oil prices, which in turn affects everyone else, including the Philippines.
“We strongly urge concerned parties to take the path of diplomacy and avoid further escalation of this conflict that could threaten regional and international peace and security…. The Philippines continues to reiterate the need for a peaceful and diplomatic solution to this crisis,” the Department of Foreign Affairs said on Sunday, June 22.
That the US is the Philippines’ treaty-ally is especially a reason to care — not so much because we’d be a likely target for retaliation but because it reveals more of what “peace through strength” for a second Donald Trump presidency means.
In the case of the June 20 operation, it means Trump not asking their Congress for approval (but as Vance says, it’s not war against a country but just…their nuclear facilities?) and unabashedly flexing the US military’s unmatched power — a show, some pundits and critics argue, of how might makes right in parts of Trump’s America.
What does this mean for a Philippines that’s constantly being bullied by China — which seems to believe that might makes right in the West Philippine Sea?
Thus far, Trump through US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has signaled that defense and security commitments to the Philippines will pretty much stay the same, despite dramatically cutting American aid to the world.
On Friday, June 20 too, the Pentagon told Japan Times that its “European allies are now setting the global standard for our alliances, especially in Asia, which is 5% of GDP spending on defense.” It’s difficult to imagine Manila being able to allocate 5% of its gross domestic product to defense — although its allocations (relative to the total budget) have been steadily increasing. – Rappler.com
