So, the Ayungin Shoal-BRP Sierra Madre resupply run and “military laser” pointing from a Chinese Coast Guard ship at a Philippine Cost Guard ship was made a sensational issue, with the pitiful Coast Guard spokesman Commodore Armand Balilo lying that the Chinese “violated international law” by the “offensive” and “unsafe” maneuvers.
“International law” ‘my eye, Mr. Balilooney. A “military grade laser” is used by military friendlies to signal each other, soldiers calling their rescue helicopters’ attention to their location, estimating distance or signaling presence in the darkness of night. The lasers can only blind if the viewer makes an effort to focus his eye on the beam directly – and who but only the stupid would do that.
Maybe it’s the main purpose of the latest diversionary propaganda blitz of the spinmasters – to distract from the news of the 14-year high 8.7% inflation that struck the country just the past week after DOF Secretary Diokno just boasted that peak inflation had been reached at 8.1% last January and BBM boasted how glad he is of it – now he is being called “Bobo Marcos”.
BBM’s public image is really in big, bad shape after all the sky-high prices from onions to garlic, fiascos from expansion of U.S. bases to joint patrols with the NATO forces U.S. and allies joining in that Filipinos are indifferent to, as Pulse Asia found in December 2022, as 97% of the people are worried about inflation, prices, availability of goods, jobs and sustainable income.
Of 16 priorities of the Filipino the “external threat” gets on 3% vote while the rest rank economic and corruption issues from one to 14, in other words the public don’t see any external threat to justify all the brouhaha over the issues about the “China threat” that former National Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon has repeatedly said “China is not an enemy!”
The real enemy is poverty, a conclusion that is inescapable after the January 2023 announcements of the DSWD survey and the SWS, the latter reported that those who called themselves poor rose to 51% from 49% in December 2022 – and that was before the latest surge in inflation to 8.7% that is expected to go even higher in the months ahead.
The BBM spinmasters are revving up the SWS positive rating of BBM, pulling out the old survey from last December at this time to headline again to boost BBM and this new negative posture of BoBo M against China, is that survey if December 2022. The public doesn’t now that and many are led to think its supportive of the smears against China at this time.
Is China’s patience wearing thin?
China’s patience is legendary, and it is being patient with the Philippine leadership at the moment despite the momentous sense of betrayal and let down it feels by the erratic, even neurotic and schizoid, behavior of BBM. China can leave the Philippines under PBBM to its own folly now, but I hope it will not as China is the only saving grace for the Philippines in its current economic and social crisis.
It is becoming obvious that deep down BBM is prostrate before the US and will do anything to kowtow to its demands, including demean himself acting the dunce and the fool – and most of all, acting “ingrato” after all the good that China has been doing for the Philippines these short six-years since the China-Philippines entente started under President Duterte. BBM is ingrato not only to China but more importantly, to Duterte.
BBM is treating China like a low-level party in the same manner he thinks of his own country the Philippines, that he can disrespect the institutions and the people and take their dignity for granted. China is not like the rogue and street corner bully U.S. from which BBM has clearly sought umbrage and puppet status. None of this is missed by the watchful Chinese.
China, as I have said again and again and which we all should know, is a civilization nurtured over thousands of years and its sense of state and international diplomacy highly developed and sophisticated, its sense of mission for Asia and the world an all-embracing vision of a “Community of Shared Future” under a regime of “Forever Peace.”
China will be patient with BBM, to a point, after which a lesson will be taught in the same manner as Australia was taught a lesson and now seeks rapprochement, or Vietnam after a series of historical clashes it is now the closest partner of China. The height of the insult from BBM is the “summoning” of Ambassador Huang Xilian instead of an “invitation”, that is now “tiny” BBM is.
The good works of Ambassador Huang.
Ambassador Huang Xilian arrived in Manila sometime late 2019 following the stint of former ambassador to Manila Zhao Jianhua. I often describe Amb. Zhao as the architect of the personal diplomacy that enhanced the China-friendly diplomatic polices of President Duterte while Amb. Huang provided the heart and soul of China’s beneficent contributions to Philippine society.
While a diplomat is sometimes seen only as a functionary of a vast government external affairs bureaucracy, the personality and commitment of the diplomatic himself counts a lot in the performance of his duties and delivery of commitments. Ambassador Huang has shown himself to be a genuinely concerned person caring for the Philippines and the Filipino people.
Under his care the extra-early delivery of many infrastructure projects was assured, such as the completion of the two donated bridges across the Pasig River to ease the Metro’s traffic – the Binondo-Intramuros and the Estrella-Pantaleon bridges were competed through the pandemic crisis and delivered in time for the Philippines’ economic recovery period.
A most critical facilitation that Amb. Huang performed was the early delivery of the first batch of anti-Covid vaccines on February 28, 2021, 500,000 doses in time for the March 1 launch of Duterte’s vaccination roll out. The US vaccine were promised in October of 2020 but arrived only mid-2021 in trickles. It was Amb. Huang’s extra effort that the Sinovac vaccines arrived in the nick of time.
Amb. Huang invited and gracefully received BBM to the Chinese Embassy in Dasmariñas Village, Makati, showing off the proud photos of the late President Ferdinand E. Marcos, Madame First Lady Imelda R. Marcos and BBM himself as a young lad during their several visits to Chinese leaders in Beijing during the process of establishment of formal ties between the two countries in 1975.
Suffice it to say that the laughable “laser” pointing yarn is no valid reason for the insulting “summons” of the Philippine government to Amb. Huang. An “invitation” would be appropriate for such a helpful representative of a “strong partner” country, but BBM preferred to insult envoy the thousand-year friend and partner China.
Even the US fears China.
Recent vituperations from the Philippine president, AFP sidekicks and “juke box intellectuals” are trying to project a tough front, but we all know it’s all bluster – “loud, aggressive talk with little effect.” The more BBM and his military officials take this bombastic attitude the less China will be responsive. Let’s see what happens in the next Ayungin “resupply” mission, better if US joint ships join.
The US is brave when they have other fools to do the fighting for them, it was the case in WW I and in WWII – before they entered the picture other countries had already fought the wars years before the US stepped in. For proxy wars like Ukraine, they find enough corrupt fools and mindless soldiers to fight to their deaths for them – not American deaths. BBM is clearly applying to be the next Zelensky.
The US fears China. That was plainly visible in the aftermath of the 2022 Pelosi visit China responded with a blockade of Taiwan. The US forces moved back to a safe distance watching China’s overwhelming show of force meant to communicate the dare to the U.S. China cut of all vital bilateral talks with the U.S. thereafter which the US sought to restore with the “balloon” aborted Blinken visit.
Similar to the “laser” yarn of BBM and the Philippine Coast Guard the U.S. spun the “Chinese spy balloon” threat story to disrupt or distract from either one of the real events stories that matters: a U.S. faction scuttling the Blinken mission to restore key bilateral talks with China, or distract from the Russian victory in the key Ukrainian city of Bakhmut. It’s likely the first.
Now, the Washington Post reports that “The China balloon confrontation may have started as a mistake” coyly admitting the balloon “spy” hype was never true at all, and the US is walking back the “China spy balloon” allegation because they really need the bilateral talks with China if the U.S. is to save itself from final financial, economic and Dollar collapse in the months to come.
But the U.S. is ready to confront China in the Luzon Straits, the Southeast China Sea (facing Palawan) and the Sibutu Passage if the Philippines Coast Guard and Navy can position in front of the U.S. warships, and American missiles can be fired from shore bases of the American EDCA bases. All for the purpose of wrecking China and Asia’s economy so the U.S. can rebuild its own 11,000 kilometers away.
The U.S. will never confront China alone. It is afraid of China. It knows it cannot win against China in the region, but it wants to fight China here staying behind its “allies” back to keep it a regional, limited war while saving the American mainland from any damage. There are apparently still some Filipinos (and Japanese) stupid enough to let the Americans do it.
Economic Backlash Looms.
BBM seems oblivious to the looming economic catastrophe that he is inviting in his tango with the U.S. and betrayal of China. Such a catastrophe the late Noynoy Aquino faced when China started the squeeze on Philippine exports to China. But this time won’t be like 2016, it’s not only banana exports but avocado, tourism, on-stream projects worth billions, sky high inflation when a trade boycott starts.
I have to digress at this point, the anti-China elements keep repeating the mantra that China has not delivered on its $ 25-billion commitment of projects and aid. But a vast amount has actually already been delivered, projects already are in place ranging from trains and bridges, agricultural technology to investments in telecoms and other industries, and of course priceless pandemic medical assistance.
There is also the totally false line that Chinese project loans have high interest at 2% to 3% but when the Department of Finance checked out the figures the Yen loans of Japan, for example for the subway project turns out to be higher when converted to $. The disinformation just keeps repeating themselves until the audiences just turn numb to the black propaganda.
Some alleged delays in some Chinese projects are actually caused by malicious political sabotage, such as the manipulated indigenous tribes’ protests against the Kaliwa Dam water supply project. They demand large-scale infrastructure projects completed in ridiculously short timelines, but their much-vaunted Japanese subway project started in 1973 and started construction 2023 – 50 years!
If BBM is not taking the perils of an economic backlash from China seriously he will face the fate of Aussie Prime Minister Morrison fate who lost in his re-election bid after a few years of antizoning China. The new Albanese government is now re-engaging with China. BBM faces collapse and ouster before the next elections if a Chinese backlash is added to the dire straits of the Philippine economy today.
The Nuclear Threat is real.
It is vital for Filipinos to understand that the U.S. is really pushing World War III to wreck the European and Chinese economies to restore the U.S. economy. Very few Filipinos understand this and many when explained to react with unbelieving bewilderment. They also ask, “But wouldn’t a World War III nuclear war also destroy the U.S.?” The U.S. believes they can stop short of nuclear war.
Impossible? The U.S. doesn’t think so. They are testing the plan in Ukraine, limit the war to conventional weapons, threaten Russia’s red lines just up to the brink, wreck German-Russia cooperation (destroying the Nord Stream pipelines), exhaust Russia in a long war (but Kyiv regime will collapse first) before ending the war – and shift focus on the Asian proxy war using the Philippines.
Retired Gen. Victor Corpus wrote in his book “America’s Dim Mak Points… Unrestricted Warfare in the 21st Century”, the U.S. war-gaming targets a crash of 35% in China’s GDP through the destruction of its industrial infrastructure. No country in Asia wants that except the suicidal “allies” of the U.S. like the Philippines under BBM, making magnets of the EDCA bases to Chinese retaliatory missiles.
The nine provinces where the EDCA sites are located, namely five existing site Cebu, Cagayan de Oro, Nueva Ecija, Palawan and Pampanga, plus the new sites Zambales and Isabela, Cagayan province and additional Palawan site, can expected major devastation and thousands of civilian casualties when the U.S. launches its attack on Taiwan and China, and in the Southeast China Sea west of Palawan.
But if the war transcends the conventional and goes nuclear, we can kiss all our children and grandchildren, lolos and lolas, goodbye and good night. The guilt will be on BBM’s shoulders but he and his family may not be around when zero hour comes, they would likely be flown to Hawaii – but this time for safety and refuge for being the “ally” (or faithful vassal) of the U.S.
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