President Rodrigo Duterte said he is ready to go to war if any country should claim the Sulu Sea, but admitted he cannot do the same with China over maritime disputes in the West Philippine Sea.
“I have plans also of my own. The Sulu Sea is ours. I will never budge also. When the time comes, we will also patrol that area to show that is mine. I will not compromise—we can go to war over that. Sulu Sea is ours. That will really be contentious because I am ready to form a blockade [if other countries claim Sulu Sea],” he said in a press briefing Wednesday evening.
President Duterte, however, acknowledged that going to war with Beijing is not an option despite the repeated incursions by Chinese vessels.
He said he raised the arbitral decision that favored Manila against Beijing’s nine-dash-line claim over the entire South China Sea in his bilateral meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping last week.
“I told him, Mr. President I am here and the most important purpose of my visit is I am reiterating the arbitral award that was in our favor. I am here to reiterate it because your response in our previous meeting was we will do it peacefully. Now I am asking you, how do we do it peacefully?”
“He said, ‘You know our statement was we will not budge.’ He said we do not want to talk because that property is ours—he said as much, but almost in a whisper.”
“I said it will remain a problem. It will be a thorn, a sore thumb that sticks out painfully everyday,” Duterte said.
He, however, did not pursue the discussion, saying Xi was “under stress” due to the unrest in Hong Kong.
“He shifted [the discussion]. And out of courtesy, I said I will not insist on your answer now. I am not satisfied with your answer but I will not ask for any other answer. He has a problem so naturally, he is irritated, so you have to time it—that’s the art of diplomacy,” he said.
Asked for his next step, Duterte said, “Quo vadis, Philippines? If I go to war, you must all agree with me that we will go to war. It will be the end of our civilization. If we go to war, we go to war. If we die, then we all die.”
“If I shoot down one of their [Chinese] vessels, their missiles will rain on us. If I go now to Spratly islands and tell the Navy, attack one of the Chinese coast guard vessels, and I ask the US if they are ready to send their missiles like rain to China—is America ready to help us?”
“They are claiming it as their historical right and they have control over the property. That is our problem. Have you heard of any other sane solution short of going to war? So what is next? Seize the property? With what means? On bended knees? …Might is right. I cannot go to war because we will all get killed,” Duterte added.
He also blamed former Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert del Rosario for the problem, citing the US-brokered deal to end a maritime standoff between Manila and Beijing over ownership of Panatag Shoal in 2012. The Philippines withdrew its vessels but China did not.
“Who’s problem is this? Who withdrew? That son of a bitch Del Rosario. There was a standoff then the US acted like a lawyer—we withdrew but China did not,” the President said.
The Philippines has filed about 60 protests against Chinese incursions in the West Philippine Sea since 2016, Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. told a Senate budget hearing Wednesday.
“We have filed diplomatic protests at every turn. When they tell me there is an incursion… I fire off a diplomatic protest,” he said. “I have changed the language of our diplomatic protest from the usual niceties to direct protests, no nice words anymore.”
Locsin declined a request for copies of the protests, however, saying they were “exclusively executive communications.”
The Duterte administration has come under fire for its soft stance toward China, which claims almost the entire South China Sea, through which some $3.4 trillion in trade passes each year.
READ: Xi jilts Duterte on sea claim
READ: Rody gets Xi OK on sea code
