In June 1992, before assuming the presidency he had just been elected to, Fidel Ramos expressed reservations about a higher military profile for the Japanese Self-Defense Forces in Asia. The New York Times dutifully reported his view, that any Japanese military initiative would arouse regional concerns. Fast forward to June 2014. On an official visit to Tokyo, President Aquino all but encouraged Japan to amend its pacifist constitution.
Tectonic plates of instability in the Asia-Pacific region shifted on the margins of the World Economic Forum (WEF) on East Asia in Manila on May 21-23, heralding the emergence of a new security alliance in the area in response to the aggressive occupation by China of disputed maritime territories in the East and South China Seas.
As the backlash to China’s deployment of a giant oil rig to waters close to Vietnam’s coast in the Paracels Islands intensified in Hanoi, government-controlled newspapers fueled nationalist sentiment by running a series of reports detailing how China had taken the Paracels by force.
The deteriorating situation in Ukraine and rising tensions between Russia and the United States threaten to bury US President Barack Obama’s floundering “pivot” toward Asia—the world’s most vibrant (but also possibly its most combustible) continent. Obama’s tour of Japan, South Korea, Malaysia and the Philippines will do little to rescue the pivot or put his regional foreign policy on a sound footing.
Manila and Washington are said to be rushing to complete negotiations on the Agreement on Enhanced Defense Cooperation (AEDC) so both Presidents Aquino and Obama can seal the new security deal when the American head of state arrives next week.
