The American factor in Philippine foreign policy (2)

Second of three parts. [Part 1 of this 3-part series came out Saturday Oct. 17.]

FRIENDSHIP between the two countries is bound to endure permanently. This will give the lie to the cliché that, in the relations among nations, there are no permanent friends, only permanent interests. There are a number of reasons why Filipino- American friendship will endure. The historical link is intact. Their security partnership is assured under the 1951 RP-US Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT). According to a census report released in March 2010, the Filipinos constitute the second largest Asian group in the US after the Chinese. The total number of Filipinos was placed at 3.4 million with one million undocumented outside this number. “Decoupling” from American economic linkage is impossible since the US has remained a major economic partner of the Philippines in many ways. There had been “love-hate” episodes in PH-US relations but they almost always succumbed to the better nature of the Filipinos and the Americans. Given the foregoing considerations, the furtherance of PH-US relations will remain a “constant” in Philippine foreign policy.

Post – 1991 scenario

troops from the Philippines, the by a rather ironic situation.

When President Corazon Aquino opened the Asean Summit in Manila in December 1987, she quoted a US publication: “The Philippine factor is said to have contributed to the securing of the air space and sea lanes that are vital to the continued economic stability and growth of our neighbors in Southeast Asia,

This statement signified the importance to the region of the American military presence in the Philippines. But when the Philippines was about to start negotiating for the 1991 treaty and seeking expression of political support from its neighbors nobody dared to come out in the open, except Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore who said that his government was appreciative of the regional worth of the American bases but stopped short of indicating that it was willing to share the political burden of the Philippines in hosting the bases. The Aquino government, therefore, was left alone to carry the burden of justifying the continued American military presence in her country.

The scenario in Southeast Asia, general, appeared to have changed during the post-Cold War period. Speculations have been made as to whether the US would remain “strategically engaged” and continue to contribute in maintaining peace and stability in the region. There was likewise awareness of the fact that dangerous flashpoints exist North Korea’s intransigence on the nuclear issue and the contest among six Asian countries for control of supposedly oil-rich Spratly Islands in the South China Sea.

Asean member countries with dynamic economies have realized that they have to take responsibility for the basic elements of regional security. Therefore, as a strategy for self-reliance, they were modernizing their armed forces as much as their increasingly ascending economies would allow. The Philippines was left behind in this regard.

Although helpless in modernizing its military, the Philippines managed to spell out its foreign policy. Under the presidency of Fidel V. Ramos, the three pillars of Philippine foreign policy were enunciated as follows:

First, the preservation and enhancement of national security; Sec- ond, the promotion and attainment of economic security through the mobilization of external resources of economic advancement and social development; and Third, the protection of the rights, and the promotion of the welfare and interests, of Filipinos overseas. (These three of Philippine foreign policy up to the present.)

Apart from the quotation cited by President Aquino in 1987, some of the arguments stated by the protreaty advocates in 1991 appeared valid. Consider the following:

1. The new treaty will neither impair nor violate Philippine sovereignty since entering into a treaty is by itself an exercise of sovereignty. The US has military base rights agreements with seven other countries, namely, Japan, South Korea, Spain, UK, Greece, Portugal, and Turkey, but these countries never consider these basing agreements as an infringement on their sovereignty.

2. The end of the Cold War does rather the beginning of intraregional dissension. Therefore, the US military bases have not become anachronistic or obsolescent because they contribute to regional order and stability. (Underscoring supplied)

3. Approval of the treaty would give the Armed Forces of the Philippines the required time to implement a ten-year modernization program, a third of which will be - tion package.

The pro-treaty advocates seemed to have argued with prescience. In early 1995, a few years after the American withdrawal from the Philippines, Chinese structures on Panganiban Mischief Reef were discovered. The reef was inside the 200 miles Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) or just 135 miles away from the coastal state, which is the Philippines. The structures for seemingly military uses. The occupation of Mischief Reef is unprecedented in post-Cold War history and during the period after the passage of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), of which both the Philippines and China are signatories.

It was obviously in response to the Chinese challenge on Philippine sovereignty and territorial integrity that the Philippines entered into a Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) with the US in February 1998. The VFA was deemed to be an implementing agreement to the 1951 MDT. The Supreme Court had upheld the legality of the VFA, cognizant of the fact that it was duly concurred in by the Senate and had been recognized as a treaty by Washington. It should be noted here during the incumbency of President Joseph Estrada, one of the so-called “Magnificent 12” senators who in the treaty that would have allowed the retention of the American military facilities in the Philippines for ten years.

Since the entry into force of the has become more pronounced and intense because of two main issues: 1) China’s creeping assertiveness and expansive territorial claims in the South China Sea and East China Sea; and 2) The US “pivot” - ing American forces that envisions the deployment of 60 percent of the

The US “pivot” or rebalance policy was designed to have a network of security or military partnership. It was under this premise that the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement ( EDCA) was signed by the Philippines and the US in Manila on April 28, 2014. Good for 10 years, EDCA would provide for US forces to rotate in and out of existing Philippine bases for missions ranging from narrowly defensive to humanitarian to training the Philippines’ small, weak military establishment. EDCA is considered an executive agreement and an offshoot of the MDT.

End of Part 2. The conclusion, will come out on Saturday, October 31.