As Balikatan ends, Gibo says transforming AFP into a ‘multi-threat’ force will continue

AS the 39th iteration of the annual “Balikatan” military between Filipino and American troops officially ended Friday, Department of National Defense (DND) Secretary Gilberto C. Teodoro Jr. said efforts to transform the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) into a “multi-threat, multi-theater” capable force will continue.

“We have also witnessed on the Philippine side the shift towards, as I said, getting out of their comfort zones; and I have told the AFP that we will be increasing the pressure continuously for them to evolve as soon as possible into a ‘multi-threat, multi-theater” operating Armed Forces consistent with the archipelagic doctrine nature of our country and the necessity for defending it in a proactive and not a passive manner, ”he said during the closing ceremonies for “balikatan.”

Teodoro said nations in the Indo-pacific Region must keep this footing so that the area will remain free and open.

Teodoro added that exercises like “Balikatan” and all other drills must continue to keep the AFP and its units up-to-date and well trained for anything.

“In the same vein, exercises such as this should be continued because for us men who are consigned to [the] kitchen at home, we know the worst thing in a kitchen is dull knife and a good chef hones the knife everyday. This is what we should do and this is what we are going to do singularly, bilaterally and multilaterally,” he added.

He added, “no amount of malign or, for lack of a better term perverse, attempts to subvert our goal for a free and open Indo-pacific and rules-based international order will stop our shared advance towards upholding [these] internationally accepted norms come what may,” he added.

In the same vein, Teodoro said President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. has congratulated all “Balikatan” participants for the successful conduct of the more than three-week exercise that started April 22 and ended on May 10.

“I was with our President yesterday [May 9] and informed him that today [May 10] would be the closing ceremonies of the ‘Balikatan’ and he extends his congratulations to both Armed Forces and all those who participated for the successful conduct of this year’s exercise and he looks forward to next year’s exercise which will I believe [will feature a] full-battle simulation which will put to the test the combined capabilities in the most realistic of scenarios possible with safety in mind,” he added.

Some 16,000 Filipino and American troops took part in the exercises which was highlighted by the first ever multilateral maritime exercise between Filipino, American and French naval vessels in the country’s exclusive economic zone from April 25 to 29; the counter-landing live-exercise at the La Paz Sand Dunes in Laoag City last May 6; and sinking exercise where a C-star anti-ship missile was fired successfully, hitting a decommissioned naval oil tanker in Laoag waters on May 8.