Military

With the Russia-Ukraine conflict showing no signs of a peace agreement anytime soon, the world is watching on how Ukraine will respond to the proposal of the World Health Organization to destroy high-threat pathogens housed in the country’s public health laboratories to prevent “any potential spills” that would spread disease among the population.

While biological laboratories such as these are used to mitigate the threats of dangerous diseases affecting both animals and humans, Moscow has always insisted that these biolabs do more than legitimate research.

Recently, Russia called the meeting of the 15-member U.N. Security Council to reassert through its envoy Vassily Nebenzia that Ukraine ran biological weapons laboratories with U.S. Defense Department support.

Mr. Nebenzia said that Russia had discovered “truly shocking facts” related to what he said were at least 30 Ukrainian laboratories working on diseases including anthrax, cholera and “the plague,” with funding and oversight by the U.S. military.

He said the “reckless” activity included research related to diseases born by birds, lice and fleas. “We call on you to think about a very real biological danger to the people in European countries which can result from an uncontrolled spread of bio-agents from Ukraine,” he said.

While his claim has been strongly denied by the United States, claiming that Moscow is merely using this as a pretext to use biological weapons in what it calls a ‘special military operation’, what has not been denied is the fact that Ukraine has five biological research centers that are focused on disease prevention and treatment.

Additionally, several of these biolabs had received support from the United States, European Union and the WHO, and the US Defense Threat Reduction Agency (US DTRA) has been undertaking containment and destruction of pathogens and biochemical agents in former Soviet republics.

While the world can merely dismiss all of these claims as Russian propaganda in prosecuting its conflict in Ukraine, what gives us pause is the involvement of the US DTRA in all of these supposedly civilian research activities.

PH biolabs

In the Philippines, the DTRA funded a $643,000 animal disease diagnostic laboratory in Tarlac City and turned over to the Department of Agriculture (DA), with the aim of supposedly boosting the country’s biosecurity efforts against transboundary animal diseases.

This project would certainly be a welcome development to reverse the dampening bilateral relations between Washington and Manila, had it not been for the fact that it was funded by the DTRA, which is an agency within the United States Department of Defense (DoD) and is the official Combat Support Agency for countering weapons of mass destruction (WMD; chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and high explosives).

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In other words, a civilian laboratory was constructed on the dime of a foreign military agency, which has the responsibility of managing and integrating the US DoD chemical and biological defense science and technology programs.

This is concerning, because the task of civilian cooperation on bilateral agricultural concerns lies with the US Department of Agriculture, not with agencies within the US DoD, and allowing US DoD agencies to influence civilian agricultural initiatives gives rise to reasonable suspicions on the true objectives of these projects in the Philippines.

As a military agency, DTRA certainly has specific but undisclosed military objectives related to its biochemicals mandate.

It should be noted that DTRA has participated in Syrian civil war, by developing the Field Deployable Hydrolysis System, which was used to destroy alleged Syrian chemical weapons.

Further, DTRA has been involved in the Iraqi occupation, identifying, collecting and securing radiological material, including almost two tons of low enriched uranium (LEU), several hundred tons of yellowcake (a type of uranium powder), and other radioactive sources.

In other words, the funding agency for the PH DA agricultural labs have clear overt and covert military objectives in the Philippines which may not necessarily align with the civilian, even military objectives of Manila.

Shutdown US-funded biolabs

Given the fresh allegations on biolabs at the level of the UN Security Council, the next President should look at these foreign activities in Philippine soil with greater scrutiny than before, as there exist international partners in the civilian sector which can competently provide the same services to our agricultural sector but without the accompanying military risks.

It should be noted that the USDA, through its Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, undertakes similar international cooperation by collaborating with foreign partners to control pests and diseases before they can harm the US, ensuring the effective and efficient management of internationally-based programs, and investing in international capacity-building with foreign counterparts to build technical and regulatory skills that prevent the spread of damaging pests and diseases.

With the 2022 elections around the corner, this is a core foreign policy issue which should the determine the fate of the bilateral relations with Washington under a new President.

The country should certainly not be used as a platform for covert biolabs objectives by foreign powers.

In June 2021, the U.S. State Department approved the potential sale of F-16 fighter jets, as well as Sidewinder and Harpoon missiles, to the Philippines in three separate deals.

This came on the heels of Washington’s charm offensive to convince Manila to retain the Visiting Forces Agreement and continue their partnership as treaty allies.

However, no less than Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said in September 2021 that the Philippines is unlikely to proceed with the purchase of the F-16s due to budget concerns.

The defense chief also said that the government is looking for alternative sources of fighter jets, such as Swedish-made Gripen fighter jets, due to lower costs.

With these developments, the decision on the fate of the $2.5 billion sale of F-16 fighter jets and other equipment from the United States should be left to the new administration.

In fact, the new President should scrap the F-16 deal entirely, as government funding might be better spent somewhere else, especially since the coronavirus pandemic continues to ravage the world.

It is worth noting that the defense department has annual budget of around P200 billion (US$4.3 billion) per year. Acquiring the F-16s already represents more than of the agency’s annual budget.

On the other hand, the proposed price for the F-16s already represents one-fifth of the five-year budget for AFP modernization. It is foolish to rely on a handful of aircraft for our national defense, and at this level of costs.

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With limited funding, Washington is practically egging Manila to undertake loans to finance its F-16 procurement.

It therefore makes sense to look for other vendors for fighter jets who can provide more units at the same price.

More important, Washington considers this deal as important in nurturing its relations with Manila. But it needs to be stated that treaty allies should treat each other under conditions of mutual benefit.

If the prices of their fighter jets cannot compete with the prices of other suppliers, Manila should certainly reconsider its status as a US ally.

More than anything, what matters to the Philippines today is to preserve sufficient funding for its coronavirus response.

For context, the proposed price for the F-16s is already sufficient to provide booster shots to all Filipinos. It is also sufficient to build at least 24 world-class tertiary hospitals to augment existing hospitals responding to the coronavirus pandemic.

But most important, the new President will have to decide the fate of US-PH relations during their term. Will it continue the Duterte policy of independent foreign policy and balancing between Beijing and Washington? Will it return to the fold of Washington as its reliable allly in the Indo-Pacific?

With the concerns raised on the F-16 proposal, the new President should seriously rethink whether Washington truly considers the Philippines as its close friend, partner and ally.

Last week, the US-China dialogue had been on to a fiery start in Anchorage, Alaska, attended by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, national security adviser Jake Sullivan, Chinese Director of the Office of the Central Commission for Foreign Affairs Yang Jiechi and Foreign Minister Wang Yi.

The uneasy dialogue appears to set the stage of a new round of escalation by the US, its Western and Pacific allies, and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) on China and the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) under the presidency of US President Joseph R. Biden.

In the guise of pursuing a rules-based order to maintain global stability, the US side has intimated concerns relating to the internal affairs of China, such as Xinjiang, Hong Kong and Taiwan, and boasted the results of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue leaders’ summit.

In response, the Chinese side rebuked classical American exceptionalism as displayed by Blinken and Sullivan, by pushing back on its claim of influence and dominance in Asia, as China views that the same strategic Asian allies, South Korea and Japan, relied upon by the US are similarly engaged with China as its second- and the third-largest trading partners.

More importantly, the Chinese side stated that ASEAN has now become China’s largest trading partner, overtaking the European Union and the United States.

This is the current context of US escalation in which foreign interference in the Indo-Pacific, through the Quad and NATO, should be viewed.

Even prior to the Biden administration, Robert O’Brien, national security adviser to former President Donald Trump, in late January called the Quad possibly “the most important relationship we’ve established since NATO.”

In fact, various European governments such as Germany, France and the Netherlands have each drawn-up strategies in the Indo-Pacific.

No less than NATO calls on itself to “devote much more time, political resources and action to the security challenges posed by China” as it considers Beijing “a full-spectrum systemic rival.”

A panel composed of NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg justifies this pivot towards China and the Pacific by stating that NATO should ““monitor and defend against any Chinese activities that could impact collective defense, military readiness or resilience” in the area, as

threats to the security of the North Atlantic can originate anywhere in the world.

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Left without challenges, it will not be surprising if NATO will establish a NATO Liaison Office for the Indo-Pacific, similar to the offices it has established for Ukraine, Georgia and Central Asia, notwithstanding appointing Special Representatives, as it has done for Afghanistan, Caucasus and Central Asia.

In the diplomatic front, the European Union continues to seek observer status in the East Asia Summit.

All of these initiatives point to a growing interest, in the form of seeking institutionalized presence in the Indo-Pacific’s regional and internal affairs.

But with this interest comes the same interventionist mindset similar to American exceptionalism displayed in the US-China dialogue. The NATO panel on China views Beijing’s “approach to human rights and international law challenges the fundamental premise of a rules-based international order.”

Stoltenberg made an even worse statement: “China does not share our values. It undermines human rights.”

As the US, Quad and NATO seeks to contain a rising China, there should be no doubt that what these entities seek to do is to undermine or influence all formal and informal platforms in which Beijing currently exhibits a leading role.

This includes ASEAN, EAS, and perhaps even the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC). But while Washington and the Quad may be granted legitimate status in officially dealing with regional concerns, it is a wonder NATO can justify its relevance in dealing with clearly regional issues within the Indo-Pacific.

Outside of NATO’s concerns for non-North Atlantic attacks which may arise outside its borders, it has absolutely no role nor legitimacy to intervene on regional concerns such as tensions in the South and East China Seas.

As we had previously stated, all it takes is a miscalculated maritime incident along international waters for military confrontation with Beijing to reach unmanageable levels.

With the insistence of the US on its own strategy of freedom of navigation in the South China Sea with the clear objective of involving more international players, a military incident in these waters is a question of when, not a question of if.

There is no quibbling with this: NATO in the ASEAN is military interference in the region, nothing else.

With President Rodrigo Duterte, training his sights once again on unequal military relations between the Philippines and the United States, sharp focus needs to be made on a specific aspect of PH-US military agreements: the prospect of short- and medium-range missiles being stockpiled and situated within Philippine territory.

There is no going around it: Under the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA), there is no prohibition for the stockpile and location of short- and medium-range missiles within EDCA agreed locations. Agreed locations is the term defined by the EDCA to refer to areas within PH military bases on which US forces have absolute command and control.

The only prohibition in EDCA refers to the constitutional prohibition on nuclear weapons, but the agreement, within the entire framework of the Mutual Defense Treaty, allows conventional weapons stockpile in EDCA agreed locations.

Most recently, Mr. Duterte warned that he will scrap the VFA if proven that the US brought nuclear armaments into the country.

“I am warning you that if I get hold of a hard information that nuclear armaments are here brought by you, I will immediately ask you to go out and I will terminate the Visiting Forces Agreement ora mismo (right now),” he said.

Duterte added that should a war break out between the US and its enemy, it would cause serious damage to the Philippines.

“Kung magka-giyera (if a war breaks out) and it will surely start maybe in the theater of war would be the Spratly and China Sea. Katabi lang tayo. Pangasinan, it’s just — nakaharap. Maraming probinsiya nandiyan. Alam mo kung may armaments sila dito ang unang tatamaan ‘yon. Saan? Sa Pilipinas (We’re just beside it. Pangasinan, it’s just — in front. There are so many provinces there. You know if they have armaments here we’ll be first to get hit. Where? The Philippines),” he said.

He said US troops have also stored their weapons “all around the Philippines.”

“Ang unang matamaan, ang Pilipinas. Kasi nandito ‘yong base, nandito ‘yong mga armas nila …(The Philippines would be first to get hit. There bases are here, their arms). The arms are stored everywhere in the Philippines, baka hindi niyo alam. May mga (maybe you don’t know. They have) depots all around the Philippines where the arms are,” he added.

The President is correct with his intuition that regional tensions will escalate not only with nuclear armaments stockpiled in the Philippines, but even if these armaments are mere conventional weapons.

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The situation in armaments has been further worsened with the departure of the US from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty) with the Russian Federation in 2018.

The US withdrawal from the INF treaty bodes ill for international and regional security at a time when disputes on the South China Sea continue to linger.

With the US withdrawal, the Philippines should be alarmed with this development especially as the US continues to pursue its plans of setting-up bases in the country under EDCA.

In fact, Washington should not have withdrawn from the INF treaty, and instead pushed for international cooperation to include other non-treaty nations such as China into the fold of the INF. Through diplomacy, it should have found ways on how to bring rising nuclear nations to the negotiating table on intermediate-range nuclear weapons.

Certainly, the US will pursue this strategy of armaments stockpile within the Philippines for as long as the EDCA remains in effect, especially at this time that Washington’s pivot to Asia continues, and the recently concluded Alaska dialogue between Washington and Beijing started and ended on sour notes.

Washington has a first-mover advantage as its military influence stretches as far north as Korea down to Singapore, in what is called the first island chain. The Philippines is included in this chain, after Manila signed the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) which allowed the US to establish forward operating bases (FOB) in the country despite the Philippine constitution prohibiting the establishment of foreign military bases.

And here lies the precarious situation of the Philippines. With increasing trade tensions between Beijing and Washington, it is within the realm of possibility that their dispute escalates to the level of military provocation, such that the FOBs in the Philippines may be equipped with military equipment and materiel within the missile defense framework of the US Department of Defense.

This does not only render the Philippines vulnerable to acts of aggression from US adversaries, but also makes Manila responsible for the expected presence of non-nuclear conventional weapons which may have the same lethality as nuclear weapons.

Mr. Duterte should act quick to neutralize this situation. The issue is not only about US forces in the country. The more important concern is the prospect of stockpiling of US missiles and further worsening regional conflict in the South China Sea.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is a regional organization comprising ten countries in Southeast Asia which aims to promote political, economic, military and sociocultural cooperation among its members and other countries.

The ASEAN has expanded meaningful dialogue with other countries such as China, Japan and South Korea. Currently, it has pursued relations with India, Australia and New Zealand.

But in the main, ASEAN is primarily an organization for regional economic cooperation, which has resulted in the ASEAN Free Trade Area with the idea of creating a single unified market, the ASEAN Economic Community.

In fact, ASEAN was able to sign free trade agreements with Australia, New Zealand and China.

This is why there is much skepticism in ASEAN by attempts by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to establish relations with the ASEAN and its member states.

NATO, in contrast to the ASEAN, is mainly an intergovernmental military alliance between thirty North American and European nations, established for mutual defense in response to an attack by external parties.

In truth, NATO was established primarily as a military counterbalance then, to the Soviet Union, and today, to the Russian Federation.

Outside of NATO, the military alliance has established relations with the European Union under the Berlin Plus agreement, in which the EU was given the possibility of using NATO assets in case it wanted to act independently in an international crisis

It had also established the Mediterranean Dialogue to coordinate relations with Israel and North African states. It has also entered into a security arrangement with Qatar in 2018.

Towards the Pacific, it has trained its sights towards the need to ‘address the rise of China,’and sought greater cooperation with Australia, New Zealand, Japan and South Korea.

By and large, what is clear is that NATO has been breaching its mandate beyond the territories of its members. In the guise of bilateral security cooperation, it is actively engaging in expanding the scope of its powers outside of Europe.

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In fact, NATO has made Colombia its latest security partner, interfering militarily on areas clearly beyond the scope of the military alliance’s original purpose.

What needs to be stated is that by entering into security arrangements outside of its original mandate, NATO is raising regional tensions risks on issues it has no business in the first place.

By entering into a security cooperation with Colombia, it has raised regional tensions with Venezuela. By entering a similar agreement with Qatar, the geopolitical tensions with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates will continue to linger.

As such, ASEAN member states should be on high alert on attempts by NATO to establish relations with ASEAN.

By allowing NATO to establish relations with ASEAN, regional tensions relating to the South China Sea will definitely reach a fever pitch.

This is an initiative that certainly Beijing, as an existing ASEAN partner, will object to, and vigorously oppose at all diplomatic levels.

More important, these objections by Beijing will have real economic impact on member economies reliant on impactful economic relations with the Chinese economy.

Worse, if ASEAN enters into a security arrangement with NATO, it will be complicit in endangering entire peoples if a military incident arises in the South China Sea.

All it takes is a miscalculated maritime incident along international waters for military confrontation with Beijing to reach unmanageable levels.

With the insistence of the United States on its own strategy of freedom of navigation in the South China Sea with the clear objective of involving more international players, a military incident in these waters is a question of when, not a question of if.

There is quibbling with this: NATO in the ASEAN is military interference in the region, nothing else.

In sharp rebuke to contradictory statements made by heads of the Philippine government’s foreign and defense departments, President Rodrigo Duterte continues to maintain his diplomatic pivot to Beijing in statements made during his State of the Nation Address last July.

“We have to go to war. And I cannot afford it. Maybe some other president can but I cannot. Inutil ako diyan. Talagang inutil ako diyan. Walang magawa [I’m useless when it comes to that. Really, I’m useless to that. I can’t do anything]. I cannot,” the President said.

He further said that unless that nation is prepared to go to war, he suggests the territorial dispute should be considered as a diplomatic endeavor.

In fact, the President briefly went off-script and revealed that he made a plea to Chinese President Xi Jinping for the Manil to have preferential access to Chinese-made vaccines.

The President also doused hopes for the return of warm relations between Manila and Washington, as he expressly said that he would not allow foreign bases in Subic Bay, as he fears the destruction of cities, similar to the destruction of Manila in World War II.

By disallowing US bases in the country, it will be difficult for US forces to advance their strategic interests in the Indo-Pacific. Without policy clarity, this should be understood as including agreed locations or forward operating bases under the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement, which are military bases for US troops but not considered foreign military bases.

These presidential pronouncements are in stark contrast to the very combative posturing made by Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. and Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana in relation to Manila’s claim over the West Philippine Sea.

Locsin called as “non-negotiable” the historic ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) in The Hague on July 12, 2016, which invalidated China’s expansive claims over the entire South China Sea. The defense also doubled down on this by urging China to comply with the PCA ruling and abide by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Seas (UNCLOS).

In response, the Chinese Embassy in Manila maintained that the PCA ruling was illegal and invalid.

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Moreover, the President has recently banned the Philippine Navy from joining maritime drills of other navies in the South China Sea, a move which essentially suspends joint military patrols with the United States, whether under the Mutual Defense Treaty or freedom of navigation operations.

No less than Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said that Beijing appreciates the ban and looks forward to properly resolve maritime disputes with the Philippines through friendly consultations.

All of these developments put both defense and foreign affairs chiefs in a very awkward policy position.

The two heads of agencies have raised diplomatic tensions between Beijing and Manila without clarifying with the President his real thoughts on the entirety of the relationship between the two countries.

In fact, there should be a determination on whether or not the pointed policy statements relating to the PCA ruling had clearance from the President himself.

Because if there was actual presidential clearance, the President’s pronouncements and subsequent developments relating to the bilateral relations would not have been made.

The impact of this sharp rebuke redounds towards PH-US relations as well, given that a rapprochement between Beijing and Washington has not yet been reached over trade disputes, and now evolving towards diplomatic disputes.

The President is correct that it is not in our national interest for foreign military bases to be established in the country. Nonetheless, the public should be wary on whether US-allied defense or diplomatic officials will continue pandering to Washington’s interests in the country and the region.

This includes being on high alert on whether diplomatese or legalese will be used to justify continuing plans for US forward operating bases in the Philippines.

An infrastructure-oriented thinktank urged President Rodrigo Duterte to avoid any defense activities with the United States until the termination of the US-PH Visiting Forces Agreement is formally lifted by Manila.

“The current status of VFA termination is merely a suspension, and not a formal lifting by Philippine authorities. As such, the President should not allow any defense activities with Washington, including military exercises, military procurement and base development, at this time. All exercises and procurement should remain suspended until the termination is lifted.” 

This was the statement of Terry Ridon, Infrawatch PH convenor and former petitioner against the US-PH Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement.

Clarify policy on US military equipment ban

Ridon said the President should clarify whether he is open to purchasing US military equipment again.

“While he had said in June 2019 that he was reconsidering the purchase of US military equipment, he had also announced the termination of then VFA early this year, only to reconsider once again. For clarity of policy, the President should address this question once again.”

Old, used equipment

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Ridon cautioned the President against considering the same military procurement policy as before, saying that the country’s is being sent old and used military equipment and technology.

“The President should learn the lesson of previous governments. When we procured from the frigate BRP Gregorio del Pilar, it was a refurbished US Coast Guard Vessel, built fifty years ago. We cannot assert sovereignty in the West Philippine Sea on 1960s technology.”

Excess defense articles

During Mr. Duterte’s term, there had been seventeen requests for military equipment from the United States amounting to $27 Million through the Excess Defense Articles program of the US government. The request includes military aircraft, artillery and vehicles. 

“While the savings for these items amount to sixty percent of original price, it should be remembered that these are used items already. Even if these equipment will be refurbished, the level of service will be incomparable to new equipment.”

Ridon said Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana’s decision to procure Turkish ATAK helicopters is a step towards the right direction.

“In order to credibly defend our interests in the West Philippine Sea, we cannot rely on old equipment and technology. We might as well give up our claims over these areas if we will insist on using obsolete technology.”