Is the current Philippine government administration still sentient and aware that the country is going downhill with its present foreign policy?
China’s “Great Wall of Ships” protects the peace and stability of the South China Sea, its ingress and egress points from the Indian Ocean and the Western Pacific, assuring Asia the US – that according to its former president Jimmy Carter said was the “most warlike nation in history” – and its Western allies shall never again repeat its 19th century invasions of Asian nations.
Since the announcement in 2011 by then President Barack Obama of the “US Pivot to Asia” openly declaring the start of the transfer of “60 percent of US military and naval assets to Asia” the geopolitically aware Asian and Filipinos have been alerted to the “warlike” intentions of the US against the region — focusing on the rising and dynamic economic power of Asia: China.
Alas for the US, the decade from 2011 proved impossible for the “Pivot to Asia” to make headway as the US economy and financial system continued to flounder from the 2008 US Financial Collapse, political infighting pitting Democrats vs. Republicans and the subsequent win of President Trump upended everything for that “pivot to Asia” and went “trade war” instead.
Eight years of “trade war” passed and the US. trade deficit with China has only grown while China’s economy continues to grow and the US teeters on the brink of recession — weighed down like “cement shoes” by its $37-trillion debt growing by another trillion every month and constant demands for funds and arms to Ukraine and Israel.
“When all else fails, they take you to War” says economist Gerald Celente, among the legendary few who predicted the 2008 US Crash.
Celente is talking again about the US, baiting Russia into the Ukraine War to destroy its economy but Russia thrived, now it’s time to try the US war on Asia and China, rallying the “Asian NATO”, proxies Japan, Philippines, Aussies and UK.
Befogged by the massive 2022 “American COMPETES Act” $ 500-million special fund for anti-China, and the US psywar propaganda dubbed as “Operation Myoushu” or “assertive transparency,” the Filipinos can’t see yet that China is the great stabilizing force in Asia and the South China Sea, without which, the US would already be running roughshod dividing-and-ruling Asia again.
Without China’s super-dominant but benign presence, the US would already have broken up ASEAN — pitted vassal Philippines against Vietnam over its 1995 grab of Philippine Marines-occupied Pugad Island away from the Philippines, which has been a silent timebomb since then, or Philippines vs. Malaysia over Sabah, etc.
China’s current People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) battle force numbers 370 platforms concentrated in Asia, compared to the US Navy deployable 299 combat vessels scattered around the globe.
The Chinese Coast Guard has 225 ships of over 500 tons, considered the largest fleet in the world -– plus thousands of maritime volunteer force – that would dwarf the US Coast Guard.
The Philippine government and mainstream media’s monomaniacal focus on so-called Chinese aggression over the island being claimed by the Philippines naturally missed the realities I am pointing out above, and consequently misleads the national policy down to a seriously unproductive and even catastrophic paths.
While the Philippines locks horns with a miniscule part of the Chinese maritime and naval force, it is losing all the opportunities to be reaped in engaging with China.
Indonesia just got a $ 1.3-billion EV BYD investment or Malaysia’s US$ 10.7-billion 720-kilometers East Coast Rail Link, or Cambodia’s $17-billion Funan Techo Canal to link Phnom Penh to Gulf of Thailand.
Is the current Philippine government administration still sentient and aware that the country is going downhill with its present foreign policy?
The latest Publicus/PAHAYAG survey reporting the precipitous decline of Bongbong Marcos’ approval ratings to negative 56 percent and trust ratings to negative 67 percent should wake them up – hopefully – for the nation to be saved.
The South China Sea “assertive transparency” project and the tensions with China is a serious distraction from the imperative of National Economic Development and the alienation from China is a critical blow to that path towards economic upliftment of the nation.
China, in any case, will not budge with its Great Wall of Ships guarding its southern gates – the US beware. ([email protected])