In the Philippines’ war of words with China over the Spratlys, the United States has made it clear it’s siding with neither, which means it is siding with China and leaving its former colony in the lurch. This is the logic of the surprising e-mail statement of US press attaché Rebecca Thompson regarding the remark of Presidential Deputy Spokesperson Abigail Valte that Malacañang expects the United States to come to the Philippines’ aid if ever hostilities break out with Beijing over the Spratlys and honor its commitment under the Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT). “The US does not take sides in regional territorial disputes,” Thompson said, adding that her country “shares a number of national interests with the international community in the South China Sea.” She did not mention the Philippines, her country’s historic ties with it, or the two countries’ MDT. The silence of the statement on the Philippines and its concerns over Chinese encroachments on its territory is deafening.
Thompson’s laconic statement seems to dampen an earlier statement by US Ambassador Harry K. Thomas Jr. paying effusive tribute to the close relations between the two countries. It may yet show that statements on very crucial issues should not be left to underlings, much like concerns on the Spratlys should not be left to Palace spokesmen but to the Department of Foreign Affairs. Valte’s statement on the radio about the MDT was amateurish. She said that the United States is bound by the MDT to come to the rescue of its ally if hostilities break out with China although “I haven’t seen the terms of the MDT quite recently.”
Her candor is understandable because her boss, President Aquino, shares the same fatal candor: in Brunei, he practically told the press the Philippines was ruling out force “because they (China) are at a great advantage.” He could not have made it any clearer the he thinks we are pushovers. Even in our war of words with China, we are wimps.
But the Philippines needs to toughen up in order to assert its territorial and other sovereign claims. And toughening up should not only cover beefing up its external defense but also flexing its diplomatic muscle and reviewing international commitments. In the light of Thompson’s statement, there’s especially a need to review the MDT and the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA). For all of its gung-ho pronouncements about the MDT, Malacañang should be cautioned against gullibility. The MDT contains enough ambiguity to allow US inaction on Philippine security concerns. Only self-interest will compel the United States to get involved in the Spratlys and because of its growing rapprochement with China because of business interests, the odds are against it now.
As for the VFA, the defense relations between the Philippines and the United States have taken on more and more the color of serving American interest only—as part of its global war on terror. While the Philippines shares that concern, it also has more humdrum preoccupations, such as China’s “terror” tactics in the Spratlys.
China must be compelled to honor the Declaration of Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea (DOC), which it signed in 2002 with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. The DOC enjoins disputants to exercise self-restraint so as not to complicate or escalate their dispute and to handle their differences constructively. As Foreign Secretary Alberto del Rosario has said, the provision “is being aggressively violated.”
As the Spratlys row escalates and as China flexes its muscle as a superpower, there’s a need for the Philippines to review its foreign policy, especially toward the United States. Lee Kuan Yew has urged Asean to creatively engage the United States so that it would remain a key player in the region, the better for it to act as a counterweight to China. But America’s seeming reluctance to put its foot down on China’s bullying of the Philippines, a former colony and an ally, may yet be a sign of things to come.
It is noteworthy that the Philippines has receded more and more from the radar of American foreign policymakers as China’s economic weight becomes more and more a tantalizing prospect for American business. Liberal capitalism and totalitarian communism may not be strange bedfellows after all. As for the Philippines and the United States, so much for shared values and historic ties. The lure of nostalgia—and Hollywood—may be irresistible, but the Philippines needs a douse of shocking realism to wake it up from its stupor. And that shock comes with the Spratlys.