by Rafael P. Tuvera

General Romeo Brawner has developed a troubling habit of exposing the country to danger through careless statements. Not long ago, he proudly revealed that the Philippines is hosting America’s Typhon missile platform, a system capable of sending nuclear warheads to China. Now, he claims the country can defend itself for 30 days before help from the U.S. arrives. Each pronouncement deepens the nation’s exposure to peril while displaying a dangerous ignorance of strategy and diplomacy.

There is a stark contradiction in these pronouncements. Hosting the Typhon system makes the country a launchpad for offensive strikes. However, the same leadership admits that the AFP can only hold out for 30 days before help arrives. In effect, they invite a war they cannot survive. That is not deterrence. It is provocation coupled with helplessness.

When Brawner boasts about hosting the Typhon, he is effectively saying that the Philippines is ready to attack another country on behalf of the United States. Then, in the same breath, he says our armed forces can only hold out for 30 days before U.S help arrives. That means that even he knows we cannot sustain the consequences of hosting a first-strike weapon.

A competent military leader would recognize that you cannot both provoke and plead helplessness. Hosting a U.S. missile system while acknowledging that the country cannot defend itself beyond 30 days is reckless, self-destructive, and ridiculous.

General Brawner’s latest statement reveals the mindset now driving Philippine defense policy. He claimed that the country can defend itself for 30 days before help from the United States arrives. Soon after, he announced that the Armed Forces will begin exercises to prepare for at least 20 to 30 days of combat before help comes. What was once a careless remark has now become official doctrine. The military is no longer training to win but to survive until rescue. This is not defense planning. It is the institutionalization of dependence.

The exercises Marcos, Jr. and Brawner envision are focused entirely on the military. However, in any real conflict, it is the civilian population that bears the brunt of destruction. No plan for national defense is complete if there are no measures to protect the people. Where are the drills for evacuation, food security, or shelter? What preparations exist for communications and medical response? The government speaks only of soldiers holding out for 30 days, but it says nothing about how the rest of the nation is supposed to survive. This “30-day defense” concocted by Marcos, Jr. and Brawner, reveals how their planning begins and ends with military bravado, without any thought for the people who would actually suffer.

In any serious system of defense planning, the objective is victory, not managed defeat. To announce in advance that the country can only hold out for 30 days is to integrate failure in the plan itself. Such thinking does not inspire confidence or readiness as it conditions the nation to accept that loss is inevitable. A strategy that anticipates collapse rather than triumph is not a defense plan but a recipe for disaster.

Reliance on an Unreliable Ally

The Mutual Defense Treaty offers no automatic protection. It leaves the decision to act entirely to Washington. However, both Marcos, Jr. and Brawner cling to the illusion that help will certainly come.

But what if help does not come? What now? When the 30 days pass and the expected intervention never arrives, what explanation will they give to the Filipino people? Will we be told, again, that we fought bravely while waiting for help that never came?

Brawner often speaks as if reciting lines drafted in Washington rather than reflecting independent Filipino judgment. His statements echo the language of foreign briefings instead of national strategy. In doing so, he reveals a mindset conditioned to blindly obey rather than to think. He is just a puppet following someone else’s orders, completely ignoring what’s best for the Filipino people.

When the Americans returned in 1945, they unleashed indiscriminate artillery barrages that utterly destroyed Manila, leaving it known as the second most devastated city in the war, right after Warsaw. This is the exact kind of “help” Brawner is banking on.

A Constitutional Betrayal

Article II, Section 2 of the 1987 Constitution rejects dependence on foreign powers. It renounces war as an instrument of national policy, and directs the State to pursue an independent foreign policy, free from domination from any nation. However, the so-called 30-day plan places Philippine security entirely in the hands of a foreign state. This is not independence. This is surrender disguised as strategy.

The said constitutional principle exists to preserve the State and its people. The 30-day defense plan, by contrast, drives the nation toward the opposite outcome. It invites annihilation, not survival. Instead of ensuring the continuity of the Republic, Brawner’s plan will send the country down the path of annihilation.

Historical Lessons Ignored

The same mistake repeats itself. The country’s leaders seem to have forgotten that reliance of America has never led to any genuine security. The lessons of World War II, the Korean, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan wars stand as grim reminders of what happens when smaller nations become staging grounds for America’s wars. Blind allegiance and reliance on the United States come with a heavy price.

The war that Marcos, Jr. and Brawner imagine is one with China. But they ignore that such a conflict will not be limited to that front. Russia and North Korea view the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) as directed at them as well. Any war under these conditions will not resemble the old conventional wars. It will be fought under the shadow of nuclear threat. In such an exchange, no amount of training or equipment can ensure even minimal survival for the population.

Sun Tzu warned never to engage a stronger enemy while you yourself are weak. Yet, Marcos, Jr., Brawner, including Secretary Teodoro and Jay Tarriela, will ignore this timeless advice simply because it comes from a Chinese mind. They’ve been taught to hate anything Chinese, even the wisdom that could save their own people’s lives.

Leaders Without Consequence

Perhaps the recklessness of these statements lies in the comfort of distance. Like his immediate superior Gilbert Teodoro, Brawner may well hold a foreign passport. If war does come, he can run and take cover elsewhere. The Filipino people cannot. As his name suggests, the general is all brawn and short on brain for he cannot grasp that courage without strategy is mere foolishness.

The Real Threat Within

The country’s gravest danger is not foreign invasion but the leadership’s refusal to think independently. They mistake foreign applause for national strength and confuse obedience with alliance. Thus, the result is a policy of waiting; waiting for orders, waiting for rescue, waiting for ruin.

Until the country learns to stand on it’s own, the Philippines will remain a republic in waiting, always rehearsing for defeat.

The Need for Level Heads

Teodoro, Brawner, and Tarriela should be barred from standing at the forefront of this crucial national issue. Matters of defense and foreign policy involve questions of diplomacy that demand composure, prudence, and reason. These officials, however, do not have these traits. They treat war as a stage for self-promotion, each trying to outshout the other in displays of loyalty and bravado. Their tempers and theatrics make them dangerous to the very Republic they claim to defend.

These three officials need to be replaced with leaders who won’t just echo America’s talking points, but who will actually stand up and fight for real Filipino interests.

   

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