FOURTEEN projects funded by the United States will will be implemented at the four new Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) sites in the provinces of Cagayan, Isabela and Palawan, the Armed Forces said yesterday.
The projects include rehabilitation of a runway; establishment of a command and control fusion system; construction of a pier, a mess hall, a billeting facility, and humanitarian assistance and disaster response hangars; installation of an electrical system; and acquisition of generators, said AFP spokesman Col. Medel Aguilar.
The new EDCA sites are Lal-lo airport in Lal-lo, Cagayan; Naval Base Camilo Osias in Sta Ana, Cagayan; Camp Melchor Dela Cruz in Gamu, Isabela; and Balabac Island in Palawan.
As to the five original EDCA sites, five projects have been completed, nine are ongoing, and seven are pending as these are awaiting funding, Aguilar said.
On the projects at the four additional sites, Aguilar said these are aligned with the Armed Forces modernization program which calls for the acquisition of modern equipment including ships and aircraft.
Aguilar said these projects “will strengthen our capabilities because these EDCA sites will facilitate the conduct of training.”
American troops may proposition assets to respond to emergency situations, including disasters.
“If we will be attacked, of course we can use that. Only if we are attached, which is remote from happening,” said Aguilar.
The 1951 Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT) between US and Philippines says each party recognizes that an armed attack in the Pacific region on either parties “would be dangerous to its own peace and safety and declares that it would act to meet the common dangers in accordance with its constitutional processes.”
The treaty also says such attack “is deemed to include an armed attack on the metropolitan territory of either of the Parties, or on the Island territories under its jurisdiction in the Pacific Ocean, its armed forces, public vessels or aircraft in the Pacific.”
Aguilar said projects to be implemented at the new EDCA sites were “discussed at the higher level and as I have said, it’s aligned with modernization program, the capability upgrade.”
“Therefore, it is also us who identified and it was agreed on both sides,” added Aguilar.
As to the funds needed to implement these projects, Aguilar said: “I don’t have the figure yet.”
The four EDCA sites were announced by Malacañang last month.
The first five sites were identified in 2016, or two years after the EDCA was signed by the US and the Philippines. These are Antonio Bautista Air Base in Palawan, Basa Air Base in Pampanga, Fort Magsaysay in Nueva Ecija, Lumbia Air Base in Cagayan de Oro City, and Benito Ebuen Air Base in Cebu.
EDCA allows the Americans to pursue at the agreed sites various activities, including training; transit; support and related activities; refueling of aircraft; bunkering of vessels; temporary maintenance of vehicles, vessels, and aircraft; temporary accommodation of personnel; communications; prepositioning of equipment, supplies, and materiel; deploying of forces and materiel.
The agreement also permits US to preposition and store defense equipment, supplies and materiel, including, but not limited to, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief equipment, supplies and materiel.
China is opposing the additional EDCA sites and has accused the US of dragging the Philippines into its rivalry with China to advance its interest in the Asia Pacific and hold back the rise of China as a super power.
China claims almost the entire South China Sea, through which $3.4 trillion of goods passes annually. The Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, Brunei, and Malaysia claim parts of it.
China has refused to recognize a 2016 ruling of the arbitral tribunal junking its sweeping claim in the South China Sea under the so-called nine-dash line.
