Philippines courts new partners to take on China
With China aggressively asserting its claims on the South China Sea, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. of the Philippines spent his first year on the job beefing up the Philippines’ alliance with its oldest ally, the United States. Now he is shoring up support from a wider and new network of partners.
Marcos is adding a new intensity to his muscular foreign policy at a crucial moment in his country’s territorial dispute with China. Maritime clashes between Chinese and Philippine vessels have become more frequent in recent months.
In January, Marcos and the leaders of Vietnam, another country fighting off Chinese claims to the waterway, pledged closer cooperation between their coast guards. This month, Marcos clinched a maritime cooperation deal with Australia. And this past week, he took his pitch to Europe.
“It has to be recognized that the South China Sea handles 60% of the trade of the entire world. So, it’s not solely the interest of the Philippines, or of ASEAN, or of the Indo-Pacific region, but the entire world,” Marcos said Tuesday in Berlin, referring to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
Standing alongside Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany, Marcos, the first Philippine president to visit Germany in a decade, added, “That is why it’s in all our interest to keep it as a safe passage for all international commerce that goes on in the South China Sea.”
This flurry of diplomacy, analysts said, might ultimately help to deter China. But they also acknowledged that China was going to continue doubling down on its territorial claims, increasing the risks of a conflict that could ultimately draw in the United States, the Philippines’ oldest treaty ally. The U.S. has repeatedly condemned China’s actions and has vowed to come to the aid of the Philippines in the event of an armed conflict.
The foreign policy strategy adopted by Marcos, who took office in June 2022, is almost the opposite of the approach of his predecessor, Rodrigo Duterte. While Duterte spurned the West and courted China, Marcos has revived and cemented ties with traditional security partners including the U.S. and Japan. He has also cultivated new relations with the likes of Sweden and France, and his government has pushed for arms deals and military drills.
Tensions flared again this month when Chinese boats blocked Philippine vessels off the Second Thomas Shoal, a contested reef 120 miles off the coast of the western province of Palawan. The confrontation culminated in Chinese and Philippine coast guard vessels colliding.
Marcos told reporters then there was no reason yet to invoke the mutual defense treaty with the United States.
China claims 90% of the South China Sea, some of it hundreds of miles from the mainland and in waters surrounding Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia and the Philippines. In the past decade or so, China has asserted ever greater control over these waters, using two island chains called the Paracels and the Spratlys to expand its military footprint by building and fortifying outposts and airstrips.
The militarization of the Spratly Islands allowed China to maintain a round-the-clock presence in waters about 500 miles from the coast of China. Chinese boats stationed there then repeatedly harassed Filipino fishing boats in an area that an international tribunal in The Hague had ruled was a traditional fishing ground of the Philippines, Vietnam and other nations. The Chinese presence also prevented the Philippines from fully exploring oil and gas deposits in the surrounding water.
China has blamed the Philippines for frequent clashes in the South China Sea.
Wang Yi, China’s foreign minister, in December admonished the Philippines for “changing its policy stance, reneging on its commitments and continuing to provoke and cause trouble at sea.”
Wang also issued a warning: “If the Philippines misjudges the situation, insists on going its own way, or even colludes with malicious external forces to continue causing trouble and chaos, China will definitely safeguard its rights in accordance with the law and respond resolutely.”
Two weeks later, the Philippines announced it had signed agreements with Britain and Canada to increase defense cooperation. They were part of 10 security agreements that Marcos has signed with seven countries since last year, according to a tally of public statements.
“China is basically pushing us closer to the United States and to the other countries that have already indicated their support, as far as Germany and as far as the Czech Republic,” said Renato Cruz De Castro, a professor of international studies at De La Salle University in Manila, the capital of the Philippines.