Defense parameters

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A FEW days ago, the Chinese Coast Guard and militia vessels made another attempt to block a resupply mission for troops on the BRP Sierra Madre in Ayungin Shoal, using water cannons and engaging Filipino boats in dangerous maneuvers. This misadventure by the Chinese maritime personnel resulted in injuries to several Filipinos.

This came after reports on the sighting of two Chinese scientific survey vessels in the vicinity of the Philippine (Benham) Rise off the country’s eastern coast in the Philippine Sea.

‘… we need to be pragmatic enough to admit that we have just begun to modernize our defense capabilities…’

These continuing provocations in the West Philippine Sea by our powerful neighbor prodded the Department of National Defense (DND) to work out revisions in the nation’s military strategies to ensure a stronger external defense for the Philippines.

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The Armed Forces, according to Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr., has embarked on the new “Comprehensive Archipelagic Defense Concept” or CADC, an overall external defense strategy conceived and developed by Teodoro himself.

He explains the concept: “In plain language, we are developing our capability to protect and secure our entire territory and exclusive economic zone (EEZ) in order to ensure that our people and all the generations of Filipinos to come shall freely reap and enjoy the bounties of the natural resources that are rightfully ours within our domain.”

He stressed the CADC is a strategic action that will not need constant directives to carry out.

There should be nothing controversial or contentious in Teodoro’s CADC except that when implemented across the archipelago, such heightened readiness to defend the nation’s territory is bound to heat up geopolitical tensions in particular areas of the country. Consider this one: As part of the CADC, Teodoro ordered increased military presence in Batanes, the country’s northernmost island province near Taiwan, as he highlighted its strategic importance for the country.

True enough, this raised plenty of red flags in China, with Beijing warning Manila to “tread carefully” on the Taiwan issue as it considers it a “red line.” While the DND had shrugged off this objection, saying China has no business with Philippine military activities inside its own territory (which is true), the fact that soldiers are deployed a few kilometers from the flashpoint in Taiwan Strait is indeed disconcerting, even for a giant military power as China, which has vowed to retake its renegade “province” now under the protective umbrella of the United States.

Obviously, Teodoro’s CADC is a forceful, calculated reply to the ongoing attempts by Beijing to thwart Manila’s maritime activities in the Ayungin (Second Thomas) Shoal and Panatag (Scarborough) Shoal – the maritime features inside the western section of the Philippines’ EEZ.

Academics such as De La Salle University professor Renato de Castro noted that “for many decades, and several administrations, our defense has been focused on internal security operations. But now, the emerging major challenge is external security threat — our waters and marine resources are being gobbled up. If we let this continue, even our inter-island waters and resources will be targeted in the future, so we really need this (CADC).”

De Castro said the very essence of the strategy is to develop the country’s ability to project comprehensive power in the entirety of its territorial jurisdiction.

That is the ideal scenario, a most valid national objective, and since it will take a lot of money and resources to reach this goal, we need to be pragmatic enough to admit that we have just begun to modernize our defense capabilities, and therefore government policies should conform with this reality.

 

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