Gunboat diplomacy off Scarborough Shoal

The Philippines and China have agreed to lower tensions over a naval standoff in the disputed Scarborough Shoal in the West Philippine Sea (South China Sea). But the moves to set aside diplomatic protests over Chinese fishing intrusions into the uninhabited shoal will not cut short centuries-old disputes over the resources-rich Spratly Islands to the south.

The saber-rattling is likely to echo across the seas which have a rich history of gunboat diplomacy. The Philippine archipelago straddles a piece of ocean that almost touches the southern fringes of the Chinese mainland. The northernmost tip of the Philippines is closer to the Chinese island of Taiwan than to its main island of Luzon. Its southern islands, part of the Mindanao group, border the vast Indonesian archipelago directly south and the Malaysian territories to the southwest, whence many of the early settlers came in their wooden boats.

Trade routes.  The Philippines lies smack in the middle of a vast expanse of water separating the Pacific from the South China Sea, forming a veritable natural breakwater that tamed the violent typhoons spawned in the Pacific so that commerce could proceed inexorably in the generally placid waters that connect the southern Chinese coast to the Indochinese peninsula to the west and on down to the Malay peninsula and the Indonesian archipelago.

Lying across the latitudes that bear the brunt of typhoons, the Philippines also benefited from the trade winds that blew across the ocean, the same winds that propelled Magellan’s expedition to Cebu and the rich galleon trade between Manila and Acapulco in Mexico for two centuries and a half. On the western borders of the islands, trade flourished among the Southeast Asian nations, fueled by the riches of China and the bounty of India once the passage through the narrow but pivotal straits of Malacca was charted.

For centuries these trade routes defined the trajectory of civilization in the region. The lucrative passage to India gave rise to the Sri Vijayan and Madjapahit empires from the 7th century to the 12th.  Ancient chronicles in China record the existence of diplomatic relations with these Indo-Malay empires.

Reluctant colonizers.  And so, almost reluctantly, Spain began its colonization of Las Islas Filipinas until, almost inadvertently, a new power would find its way into Manila Bay and decimate the remnants of the decrepit Spanish armada. The world was entering a new phase: the American Century.

The winds of change, as history would have it, would blow from the sea—again—to reshape the destiny of the Philippines forever.

Near midnight of April 30, 1898, Commodore George Dewey’s fleet of nine ships slipped past Corregidor and entered Manila Bay to seek out a Spanish armada of 12 ships—and ultimately America’s destiny as a colonial power.

The American century.  As dawn broke on the morning of May 1, 1898, Dewey issued an imperious command to the skipper of his flagship Olympia, Charles W. Gridley, that would reverberate to this day in the annals of the US Navy at its academy in Annapolis, Maryland: “You may fire when you are ready, Gridley.”

Seven hours later, the naval battle in Manila Bay would be over with only one Spanish ship barely afloat.

Not one American ship was damaged, and the only American casualty was a sailor who died of heat stroke. Nearly 200 Spanish sailors were dead, and as Dewey watched the famed Manila Bay sunset for the first time, America sauntered into history as a colonial power.

Of course, the US Navy had also disemboweled the bulk of the Spanish armada off the coast of Cuba, but it was the Philippines that would test America’s resolve to become a world power, ignoring the most ardent warnings of its founding fathers.

Manifest destiny.  In the winter of the following year, US President William McKinley brushed aside criticism that in annexing the Philippines, America had violated one of its most sacred democratic principles, the consent of the governed. The Philippine war of independence against the United States had begun, and American atrocities would be matched only in the Vietnam War six decades later. But McKinley was slowly evolving the principle of “manifest destiny” that was to become the hallmark of US foreign policy over the next century.

Later that year, McKinley would narrate the spiritual circumstances of his decision: “When I next realized that the Philippines had dropped into our laps, I confess I did not know what to do with them. I went down on my knees and prayed to Almighty God for light and guidance more than one night. And one night it came to me, that there was nothing left for us to do but to take them all, and to educate the Filipinos, and uplift and civilize and Christianize them, and by God’s grace do the very best we could by them, as our fellow men for whom Christ also died.”

The fact that the Philippines represented the antithesis of America’s own revolution against the British monarch was a matter that could be resolved in the emerging mantra for world domination: Manifest Destiny and its beguiling rewards. It was too tempting not to taste the sweet apple offered by destiny. (It was a bitter taste America would long regret in the years to follow: World War II, Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan.)

The American Century was in the offing, and who could refuse the laurel garland that awaited the American Caesar?

Winston A. Marbella is chief executive of a think-tank specializing in transforming social and political trends into public policy and business strategy.