The newspapers the past days carried the headline quote from President Ferdinand “Bongbong” R. Marcos Jr. (PBBM) statement at the 17 East Asia Summit November 13, 2022 on the sidelines of the ASEAN Summit in Cambodia that “Countries beyond Asia have stake in keeping SCS peace”. The statement I can show is a huge misleading mistake and exposes the South China Sea (SCS) and its littoral countries to great period.
Actually, the “countries beyond Asia” should really be stated more accurately as the “powers beyond Asia” as the vast majority of the 193 countries of the UN have never really has much direct stake in the SCS. It is the “powers of the West” that have claimed a stake in the SCS since the 1500s when the Western Powers started aggression and conquest around the SCS -including the colonization of the Philippines.
Following the Spanish colonization of the Philippines was the 500 years wave of invasion and colonization of the rest of Southeast Asia and Asia through “gunboat diplomacy” conducting mayhem and murder, land grabbing and cultural genocide particularly in the Philippines, supplanted indigenous religions with Christianity where they could, looted economies to the tune of trillions of dollars in today’s terms from the nations of the East.
I don’t know what afflicts the speech writers of PBBM, writers from Secretary Enrique Manalo’s stable himself (who is married to an American and likely mesmerized by American lore). What the DFA (or combined with presidential second-cousin Ambassador to Washington, Romualdez) made the president read smacks of shameful or shameless colonial mentality unbefitting of a historically enlightened statesman – which PBBM Is supposed to be being the scion of a great historical leader.
The PBBM statement obviously has a direct bearing in the final negotiations on the Code of Conduct the ASEAN is in ongoing discussion with China. The American Boys (Amboys) of the Philippines represented by the likes of Locsin, who preceded Manalo to the post of DFA secretary, has said before, “Here is the non-negotiable: The COC will never exclude a Western power, well the U.S., from the area because that’s part of our national defense, it’s MDT”.
U.S. defense of the SCS my eye, the US has used the SCS only for colonization, invasion, occupation and war, war, war. The Filipino word for these Amboys is “gago” and “ulol”. The era when Filipinos can be fooled to accept false colonial narrative is over. Even the Second World War in the Philippines was not in defense of Filipino but of American interests – in fact the American killed 100,000 to 250,000 Filipinos (Robert Farley, 2021) and only 16,000 Japanese soldiers in the 1945 siege of Manila.
All the unjust wars the U.S. engaged in Asia directly or indirectly used the South China Sea and other surrounding seas in the conduct of their wars, from the Korean to the Vietnam wars, and the Philippines as a launching pad for air and sea sorties. Only the stupid can swallow the ridiculous story of the U.S. using the South China Sea for peace and security, and we hope PBBM is not stupid. In fat, he is so bright that people are beginning to believe he’s bargain for alleged ill-gotten wealth to be restored!
What is the security threat in the SCS and Asia? For the Philippines the former national Security Adviser of President Rodrigo R. Duterte in 2016 stated very unequivocally that “China is not an enemy..” and reiterated again in 2019 “We are not at war with China…” so what was Locsin talking about that the U.S. is needed in this region? What Locsin really meant was Philippine sovereignty is his real enemy and needs US. naval patrols to ensure that sovereignty is in check by the masters – the Americans.
As the presence of U.S. bases in the Philippines threatens the Philippines to be used as human shield for the Americans in the war it is plotting against China, the U.S. naval or gunboat Freedom of Navigation (including submarines) in the SCS is the flotilla constantly threatening China with a first strike annihilation of its A2/AD defenses which China can not allow in any way and in any document such as that which Locsin wants in the Code of Conduct.
Our friend and colleague in the anti-imperialist crusade in Asia Butch Valdez wished that China, care of President Xi Jinping, during PBBM’s 2023 January 3, state visit to China. Issue an ultimatum telling PBBM that China will keep its Dong Feng nuclear missiles aimed at the U.S. military bses in the Philippines while the MDT, VFA and EDCA are in force in the Philippines – to beat the daylights out of PBBM’s obsequiousness to the Americans.
Of course, Butch Valdez saying this partly in jest and partly out of immense frustration in the weakness PBBM is showing in protecting the real interests and welfare of the Filipino people. Still I said that China is infinitely patient and polite, and I expect President Xi Jinping to offer new funding and investment packages for Philippine “Build, Build,, Build” Part II, more friendship and cooperation, and only polite references of “the sum total of shared interests”.
It is for the president of the Philippines to protect the interest, welfare and security of Filipinos and the country, from the ultimate harm of war and destruction. It is a fundamental historical fact that the Western Powers, particularly the U.S., has invariably used its presence in the South China Sea for its repeated wars of profit and conquest, and intends to do it all again in our region following the Ukraine War model this time. PBBM has no right at all to play with words and fire that jeopardizes our communities and homes.
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