Betting on a lame horse
The tenor of Bobby Tuazon’s piece published in this space, “Lorenzana’s wishful thinking” (1/12/19), is the inevitability of Chinese hegemony in our region, that the countries in the area welcome this development and, thus, the Philippines should join the parade by junking our special relations with the United States.
The framework for evaluating this issue is the division of the world into revisionist versus status quo states. Usually, the dispute is over territory — the same issue now over the West Philippine Sea.
Revisionist powers are those who seek to grab the territory of their neighbors. The status quo powers aim to keep current boundaries intact, and changes must be done through “peaceful means” pursuant to the UN Charter.
China is the revisionist in the West Philippine Sea dispute. China has never been a maritime power with an overseas domain. The only time the Chinese tried to establish an overseas empire was in the 13th century in Japan. The outcome was a disaster; Kublai Khan’s invasion fleet was devastated by the so-called “Divine Wind.” Thus, the “nine-dash line,” the basis for Beijing’s claim in this dispute, is spurious.
A list of the major wars in the 20th century show that, save for the Russo-Japanese War in 1902, the revisionist powers were the losers in all the conflicts (revisionist powers are in italics): Russo-Japanese War 1902; World War I — Germany and Axis versus the Allies; World War II — Germany, Japan and Italy versus the Allies; Korean War — North Korea versus UN Forces; First Gulf War — Iraq versus Kuwait and Coalition; Iraq-Iran War; Falklands War — Argentina versus United Kingdom; Arab-Israeli Wars, 1948 (Partition War), 1956 (Suez Canal War), 1967 (Six-Day War) and 1973 (Yom Kippur War); First Afghan War—Soviet Union versus Coalition.
The Korean War and the Iran-Iraq War ended in a draw. However, since both North Korea and Iraq failed to achieve their goal of seizing the territories they coveted, they are losers in this sense. The same holds true in the 1956 Suez Canal War, where Britain, France and Israel failed in their goal of permanently seizing control of the Suez Canal.
In these conflicts, the revisionist powers were initially successful. They usually get a head start in arming themselves for war. The outcome is reversed later on. Eventually, a grand alliance of nations is formed once the rest of humankind realizes they must join together in fighting the revisionists, or hang separately.
A big power acting like a bully, as China is doing now without regard to the norms of international law, will create fear among its neighbors and not the welcoming attitude mentioned by Tuazon. A look at the roster of revisionist bullies illustrates this point: Napoleon the Great, the German Kaiser Wilhelm I, Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Hideki Tojo and Saddam Hussein in the past, joined by the current revisionists, Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping — that’s no distinguished company at all. These revisionists are invariably the troublemakers in a peaceful world; they are never trusted, and are universally feared.
Finally, the claim by Tuazon that there is “near military parity” between China and the United States qualifies as propaganda. Not even Beijing is making this claim. The US defense budget at $639 billion is three times China’s $230 billion. To be a superpower, one must be able to project its power to all points of the globe. The United States has overseas bases and 11 nuclear-powered aircraft carriers to do this. China has one recycled conventional-powered aircraft carrier. It will take a long time before China gets this capability.
In short, aligning ourselves with China is a case of betting not only on a long shot, but also on a lame horse. Aligning our country with a revisionist state like China, as advocated by Tuazon, is a ticket to disaster.
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Hermenegildo C. Cruz has a graduate degree from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and is a career ambassador, serving in this capacity at the United Nations, Chile, Bolivia and the Soviet Union.
