Despite China’s strong opposition to the enhanced security alliance forged by Australia, United Kingdom and the United States, the Philippines on Tuesday backed the trilateral security cooperation, citing its importance to maintaining regional peace and security in the Indo-Pacific region, including the highly-contested South China Sea where Beijing claims nearly the entire resource-rich waterways.
Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. welcomed the decision of Australia to join the trilateral pact that will boost its military apability, saying the accord is very crucial since Canberra’ proximity in Southeast Asia would allow it to respond quickly to regional threats and challenges.
“Proximity breeds brevity in response time. Enhancing an ASEAN near friend and ally’s military capacity to respond in timely and commensurate fashion to a threat to the region or a challenge to the status quo,” Locsin said in a statement.
According to the country’s top diplomat, Australia’s strong regional presence is vital in addressing the “imbalance in the forces available” to members of the Association of South East Asian Nations.
“ASEAN member states, singly and collectively, do not possess the military wherewithal to maintain peace and security in Southeast Asia, discourage the sudden creation of crises therein, and avoid disproportionate and hasty responses by rival great powers,” he said.
“Preventive diplomacy and the rule of law do not stand alone in the maintenance of peace and security,” Locsin added.
Beijing has denounced the security alliance called AUKUS, warning that it will stoke up regional tensions and arms race.
The trilateral security alliance came as China continues to ignore the 2016 arbitral ruling by the United Nations-backed Permanent Court of Arbitration, which nullified its nine-dash line claims over the South China Sea and affirmed Manila’s exclusive economic zone in the West Philippine Sea.
Despite the PCA’s arbitral ruling, Beijing had been fortifying and expanding its military bases in disputed South China Sea territories and harassing other countries’ civilian and military vessels, drawing epeated protests from its weaker and smaller neighbors like the Philippines and Vietnam.
Besides Philippines, Vietnam and China, other claimant-countries – Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan – are also insisting on their territorial claims over the disputed waterway believed to be sitting atop huge gas and oil deposits.
The territorial dispute among these countries have sparked occasional violence in the waters that is now regarded as a potential regional flashpoint for armed conflict.
While the US is not a party to the disputes, it has declared that it is in its national interest to ensure freedom of navigation, trade and peace and stability in the South China Sea, where a bulk of the world’s trade pass.
Australia and the UK have also expressed serious concerns on China’s aggressive actions in the South China Sea.
Locsin stressed that the Philippines “aspires for the South China Sea to remain a sea of peace, security, stability, and prosperity.”
“There is an imbalance in the forces available to the ASEAN member states, with the main balancer more than half a world away,” said Locsin in reference to the US.
“This requires enhancing Australia’s ability, added to that of its main military ally, to achieve that calibration,” he said.
“The enhancement of a near abroad ally’s ability to project power should restore and keep the balance rather than destabilize it,” Locsin added.
The Philippines, according to Locsin, believes that “the fresh enhancement of Australia’s military capacity through this trilateral security partnership would be beneficial in the long term even to the other side if only for the additional time it affords all protagonists for reflection before reacting.”
“Despite advances in military science, time and distance, and the concomitant stopping power of water, remain major constants in determining security capacity to respond appropriately to threats,” he pointed out.
While AUKUS did not refer to China when they announced their security partnership, however, security analysts observe that it is intended to counter Beijing’s clout and control in the region.
The tripartite alliance will arm Australia with a new fleet of nuclear-powered submarines with greater range and more superior technology than the $65-billion deal it scrapped with France in favor of the new military agreement.
“Australia’s actions reflect its concerns about this geographic imbalance and its desire to help maintain regional peace and security. That is its prerogative,” Locsin said.
Locsin did not state whether Australia will violate the Southeast Asia Nuclear Weapons Free Zone Treaty without the actual presence of nuclear weapons.
However, he said the Philippines is open to discussing this with other governments.
“We appreciate Australia’s continued and absolute commitment to meeting its obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty and to the highest standards of nuclear stewardship,” he said.
“The dynamics and wide geographic reach of the Indo-Pacific require multilateral groupings that are flexible and adaptable, in membership, strategic aims and the appropriate wherewithal to respond to changes in the regional military balance,” he added.
