In October 2016 President Duterte visited Beijing and played the “China Card”, altering the Philippines’s foreign-relations stance. The Chinese government saw this as an opportunity to bring the Philippines closer through more “cooperation” and “incentives”. The United States saw this as a risk to its losing influence in the region, and wanted also to be seen as “friendlier”.
However, both governments are not blind, and soon realized that Filipino public opinion was not in favor of shifting alliances.
The US expresses concern about the $5 trillion in annual trade that passes through the region that China claims as its own. But if a herd of Godzillas suddenly closed down this area, which nations would suffer the most? Nearly 80 percent of China’s trade flows through the South China Sea. It would appear that China—not the US—has more to lose from shipping problems in the region.
But isn’t oil the issue? The highest estimate of potential—not proven in any sense—by the US Energy Information Agency (EIA) is 11 billion barrels of oil. The low-end estimates, like those from energy consultancy Wood Mackenzie, guess that there are only 2.5 billion barrels. However, this is all speculation, and is a decade or more away from any reality. Interestingly, the EIA estimate says Malaysia likely holds the most oil—5 billion barrels—beneath its waters.
It seems that every possible scenario to deal with Chinese occupation of our territory ends with increased American diplomatic and/or military pressure on China. But is that possibility reasonable?
Some suggestions are that the Philippine Navy should force China to either back down or to attack, thereby giving us the chance to invoke the US Mutual Defense Treaty. What if the US finds excuses not to comply? Are we going to threaten not to help them the next time Japan bombs Pearl Harbor? Further, any military action under the treaty is immediately taken to the United Nations Security Council, on which China holds a permanent seat.
The most important US military installation in Asia is on the island of Okinawa, which many Japanese would like to see gone. Are we willing to offer the US a return to Subic and Clark in return for kicking the Chinese off our territory?
The No. 1 Asian problem for the US is North Korea and its nuclear weapons. Since World War 2, China has used North Korea as its tip-of-the-spear against its most hated neighbor—Japan. Now, North Korea is a Chinese “poisoned pawn” against the US.
The recent trip to China by US Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson should have been to follow through on President Donald J. Trump’s hard line on trade, currency and other regional matters. But almost like magic in the weeks leading up to the meeting, North Korea conducted missile tests, leading Tillerson to practically beg for more Chinese cooperation. Maybe the Philippines could send some rouge police officers to “kidnap” Kim Jong-un, like they recently did with another Korean, to get the US to help against China.
Sarcasm aside, trying to find mutually beneficial interests with the US to protect Philippine sovereignty is difficult. Nonetheless, the Philippine government needs to protest in the strongest terms against recent Chinese moves in our waters. Expecting the US to do the “right thing” is naïve. Therefore, instead of looking to the US, the key should lie in Asean.
The Philippines has not yet been able to rally strong active support as Asean members have been cutting their own separate deals with China. Now is the time to remind them that relations with a bad neighbor like China may be the best example of “we must, indeed, all hang together, or, most assuredly we shall all hang separately”.