AN anti-ship missile platform of the United States is due to fire missiles during a military exercise between American and Filipino troops, the Philippine Navy said yesterday.
Navy spokesman Capt. John Percie Alcos said the Navy-Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System, or NMESIS, will be used in a maritime strike on June 1 during the “Kamandag” exercise.
An earlier advisory from the Philippine Marines said the maritime strike is set to be held in Burgos, Ilocos Norte where a counter-landing training is also scheduled.
“The deployment of the NMESIS … is part of Kamandag,” Alcos told a press briefing at Camp Aguinaldo.
Alcos could not immediately say the target of the maritime strike.
“It is not aimed towards specific threats or specific issues that are currently happening adjacent to where it is going to be fired,” Alcos said, apparently referring to the dispute at the West Philippine Sea where China has been harassing Philippine vessels.
The NMESIS platform arrived in the country on April 14 in time for the “Balikatan,” a huge-scale military exercise also between US and Philippine troops, that was held from April 21 to May 9.
It was deployed to Batanes for “familiarization” but was never fired during the Balikatan exercises, the Armed Forces said.
China has opposed the deployment of the NMESIS, together with the US Typhon missile system which has been in the country since last year. China has said the Typhon poses a threat to regional security, and demanded its return to the US.
The Kamandag exercise formally opened on Monday and will end on June 6. It is aimed at honing the skills of some 4,000 Filipino and American marine troopers in responding to threats.
Alcos said that while the NMESIS is calendared to fire, the actual firing “depends on the actual situation or actual criteria that will be met on the day of the maritime strike demonstration.”
As to the Philippine assets that will be involved in the maritime strike, Alcos said, “The whole Philippine Marine Corps will be involved in this particular exercise.”
“As I mentioned earlier, we try to maximize all training opportunities in every exercise that we conduct, especially when it is conducted with our allies for us to enhance the conduct of combined operations,” he added.
