Beijing’s agents worry about VFA more than de facto war with China

When China interdicted the vessels supplying our Marines in RPS Sierra Madre in the Ayungin Shoal, it blockaded territory that is ours under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. A blockade is an act of war. Under international law, a blockaded country can use force to break a blockade. We can legally sink the blockading Chinese vessels if we have the means to do so. We ended up sneaking supplies to Ayungin Shoal.

The standard approach in diplomacy is to grade the threat to a country’s security (according to graveness) as actual, immediate, remote and potential. The  presence of US forces in the Philippines is, at most, a remote one. We can erase this threat by simply abrogating the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA). Conversely, China’s action has gone off the charts; it is waging war against us. Nonetheless, Salvador France regards  the VFA threat as equal to the threat posed by China. (“‘Beijing’s agents’ to defend PH from foreign meddling,” Opinion, 6/1/16 ).

Beijing’s agents want us to ignore lessons of history. The SOP of all hegemonic powers is to strip their victims of allies and then pounce on them once they are isolated. The Roman Empire came into being because its diplomats beguiled its smaller neighbors into not forming alliances. The world learned the lesson about the danger of a powerful country devouring smaller neighbors. This gave rise to the “balance of power” doctrine. Under this doctrine, small countries join alliances to protect themselves from their powerful neighbors. This doctrine is the foundation of modern diplomacy.

Notwithstanding, Salvador France and China’s agents of disinformation have declared this doctrine obsolete and want us to discard our allies. In 1938 Hitler fooled the French and the British to abandon the Czechs. After the Munich Agreement, Hitler swallowed Czechoslovakia. Two countries lost parts of their territory recently: Georgia lost Abkhazia  and Ossetia, while Ukraine lost Crimea. Both countries recognized the danger—of not having allies—to their sovereignty, but they cannot join Nato because of the opposition of ethnic Russians in their territory. Baltic states (Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia) escaped this fate because they were smart enough to join Nato.

Beijing, supported by its agents of disinformation, is following the tracks set by the Romans, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Putin—isolating us so we will be ripe for a takeover. These agents have gone so far out on a limb such that they want us to rewrite the rules of diplomacy cited above—for the benefit of Beijing.

Even worse, these agents disguise themselves as patriots out to safeguard our sovereignty.

As noted, by blockading Ayungin Shoal, China is waging a de facto war against us. Beijing’s agents in our midst are committing acts amounting to treason. By now, our countrymen  should be smart enough to identify these agents in disguise.

—HERMENEGILDO C. CRUZ, retired ambassador, [email protected]