THE Philippines must take advantage of growing momentum of international support and evolving foreign and security policies toward the Indo-Pacific region to be able to respond more decisively to China’s aggression in the West Philippine Sea, according to think-tank Stratbase ADR Institute.
“States have become more responsive to the changing regional security architecture considering its possible impact on their national security and economic development,” Prof. Dindo Manhit, president of Stratbase ADR Institute, said recently.
Such a shift is evident in the various Indo-Pacific strategies proposed by various governments and international organizations, Manhit added, citing as an example greater international support for the Philippines in the West Philippine Sea, with countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan and Australia getting behind the Philippines in upholding the decision of the Permanent Court of Arbitration.
Manhit cited these developments from a book recently launched by Stratbase ADRi titled, “The Strategy of Denial: American Defense in an Age of Great Power Conflict authored by Former US Department of Defense Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategy and Force Development Elbridge Colby, which stressed the need for the Philippines to work with allies on various strategies to effectively respond to scenarios should China resort to direct force to impose its will in the region.
Colby said: “What we need to do together in response is that the United States, the Philippines, Taiwan, Japan, and Australia in various permutations need to have a strategy of denial, which is basically the ability to deny China its own ability to impose direct force on one of those states within the US defense primitive, which is to say, consummate an invasion.”
Stratbase fellow Richard Heydarian highlighted China’s continuing expansion of China’s military and commercial footprint across different strategic bases and port facilities in the Indo-Pacific.
Heydarian said China has led its gaze on dominating its “blue national soil” — the South China Sea — and has had its naked opportunism on full display unlike at any point in contemporary history. The Asian powerhouse is gradually creating a new order with Chinese communist characteristics, he said.
“It poses a direct threat to smaller claimant states such as the Philippines, which have yet to develop a minimum deterrence capability against growing Chinese incursions into its Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and continental shelf.
Heydarian cited examples of other countries facing harassment from China — Vietnam with its fishermen and Malaysia in its oil exploration activities, especially since the South China Sea is an artery of global trade.
“China’s revisionist challenge to the post-war order in the Indo-Pacific is arguably the single most consequential geopolitical development of our era,” he said.
Manhit said that moving forward, the Philippines should prioritize multilateral and inclusive cooperation with like-minded states to ensure the maintenance of a rules-based international order and the realization of a free, open, peaceful, prosperous and stable region.
