China has been increasingly active in the West Philippine Sea, with its military personnel recently boarding and disabling Philippine Navy boats in that area. James Rice gives an overview of the tensions in the region between China and the Philippines. He looks at how, facing a potentially shared threat from China, Japan and the Philippines are growing closer out of concerns over the US’ willingness to be involved in the region if Donald Trump is elected in November.

On June 17th 2024, Chinese Navy (People’s Liberation Army Navy or PLAN) personnel boarded and disabled Philippine Navy boats on a mission to resupply the Sierra Madre, the Philippine outpost that lies stranded in the Second Thomas Shoal (Ayungin Shoal) within the Philippines’ Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). During the incident, several Philippine sailors were wounded including one who lost a thumb. During the skirmish, Chinese military personnel used axes, spears, long knives, teargas and batons against unarmed Philippine sailors. In response, the Philippine sailors fought back with only their bare hands. Chinese military personnel damaged the boats and stole firearms and equipment. It’s important to note that the Philippine Naval boats were boarded in clear violation of the Jus Cogens international legal principle of Sovereign Immunity.

The Philippine government’s responses to China’s aggression

The question of what would have ensued had there been fatalities has changed the thinking regarding the level of aggression needed before the US-Philippine Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT) would be invoked by the Philippines government. Responding to the incident, Philippine Armed Forces chief Gen. Romeo Brawner Jr. demanded that the PRC pay 60 million pesos ($US1 million) in damages and to return the firearms and equipment.

Last week General Brawner stated that the Philippines Armed Forces would respond to future aggressive acts with similar force. “What we’ll do is we will apply the same level of force that would allow us to defend ourselves. If a knife is used, for example, our personnel will also use a knife, nothing more, under the concept of proportionality.”

Since December 2023, the Philippines government had been engaged in a policy known as its “assertive transparency policy” as it attempts to resupply the grounded frigate that serves as an outpost in the Ayungin Shoal. Under the Marcos government (breaking with the previous Duterte administration) the Philippines Coast Guard now films and makes public Chinese government acts of blockading access to Philippine waters in its EEZ. However, the June 17 incident marked a new level of escalation by the Chinese military. At the same time, General Brawner has indicated that the Philippines prefers to rely on their own resources and is holding off in requesting assistance from the United States for now. When asked about whether the US has offered to assist, Brawner stated, “Yes, of course, they have been offering help and they asked us how they could help us in any way. We try to exhaust all possible options that we have before we ask for help.” 

Avoiding conflict with China

There are a range of policy options that are currently available to the Philippines to address the challenges it faces in its attempt to prevent the PRC from its present policy of “salami slicing,” or incrementally seizing control of its maritime territory and resources without engaging in overt armed conflict.

Addressing this issue is former Associate Justice Antonio Carpio who has written extensively on the Philippine PRC maritime dispute and the 2016 ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration which found China’s self proclaimed “9 Dash Line” (claiming virtually the entirety of the South China Sea) to be baseless under international law.

According to Justice Carpio, President Marcos’ decision to form an alliance with the United States was based on China’s intransigence together with the future needs of the Philippines in terms of the fisheries and the natural gas deposits under the seabed within the EEZ. Simply put, the existing Malampaya gas field will likely be depleted in a few years and the Reed Bank field (Recto Bank in Tagalog) will be required if the Philippines is to be able to continue its economic development.

But while vast reserves of natural gas lie within the Philippines’ Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) according to Felix Chang, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, “most energy companies have refrained from bidding for service contracts not because of fear that the offshore blocks will not yield viable natural gas reserves, but because of the risks that China’s aggression brings.”

Closer ties between Manila and Tokyo

Following his return from Beijing in November 2023 Marcos turned to the Americans as a security guarantor in the region. It was at about this time that Japan became more actively involved in what is now know as the trilateral alliance, the first summit of which was held in April 2024, which addressed both military and economic concerns.

This meeting was followed on July 8, with the signing of a Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA) which is meant to allow the armed forces of the two countries to train and operate together. Chief of the Philippines Armed Forces General Romeo Brawner Jr. stated that the RAA would, “allow Japan to come into the country to conduct training… and vice versa,” as well as allow the Philippine military and the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) to “conduct actual military operations.”

“P20240411AS-1480” by The White House is United States government work

Following the June 17 Ayungin Shoal incident, US response has been muted causing commentators in the region to cast doubt on the United States as a reliable treaty partner. This has in part been due to questions such as the degree to which the US can address yet another international crisis (on top of the ongoing wars in Ukraine and Gaza) together with the uncertainty of the November elections and a possible Trump presidency.  However, this has not prevented the Biden administration from continuing to offer diplomatic, military and financial support for the emerging alliance.  In late July 2024, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin met with President Marcos and announced a further $500 million in aid for the Philippines. The funding is to be applied to additional naval assets as well as for the construction of military bases that are being jointly occupied by US forces under the 2014 Enhanced Defense Agreement.

Presently, the trilateral alliance has agreed on a policy of strengthening security and defense cooperation. As part of discussions, Japan and the Philippines have agreed to further maritime safety cooperation as well as coordination and cooperation among their respective coastal guards.

However, Tokyo has since gone further and has agreed to provide coastal and surveillance radar systems and other equipment as well as 12 multi-role response vessels under the “Official Security Assistance” framework.

In November 2023, during a visit to the Philippines, Japan’s Prime Minister, Fumio Kishida, expressed his support stating, “In the South China Sea, multilateral cooperation to protect the freedom of the seas is underway. Through these efforts, let us protect the maritime order, which is governed by laws and rules. Not by force.”

At first blush, the issue of the PRC impinging on the rights of the Philippines to the quiet enjoyment of their maritime resources doesn’t appear to be a matter that is squarely within Japan’s national interest. Article 9 of Japan’s 1947 Constitution specifically renounces war and Japanese foreign policy since that time has been wary of military alliances outside of the “US umbrella.”

However, in 2014, the Japanese Constitution was reinterpreted under the Abe administration to allow for collective self-defense agreements. This shift in Japan’s previous strict anti-war policy has been due to a growing perception of a threat from the PRC and the possibility it would invade Taiwan as a means of reunification. It would seem then that the reason that Japan has taken an interest in an alliance with the Philippines and the US in the West Philippine Sea is that defense planners are now seeing this issue as being vital to its own national security.

High stakes in the West Philippine Sea

This issue involves what the PRC refers to as its “9 Dash Line,” or an invisible line, drawn from the southern Japanese island Kyushu, through to Okinawa, Ishigaki Island, to Taiwan, the Batanes Islands of the Philippines, to northern Luzon, down through the Philippines all the way to Palawan, and then southwest toward the Singapore Strait and to Indonesia. Taken together, this is also known as the “First Island Chain” and was a primary and strategic goal of the Imperial Japanese Navy during the Second World War.

For Japan, the outcome of China gaining control of the First Island Chain would be nothing less than catastrophic. It is estimated by the Global Europe Program and Kissinger Institute on China and the United States that one third of global shipping passes through the naval routes of the South China sea with an annual value of between $3-5 trillion, including manufactured goods, energy and other natural resources transits through the South China Sea.

In other words, the Japanese defense planners see Chinese control of the West Philippine Sea as nothing less than a major crisis for them. As such, they are taking steps on their own in anticipation of a reversal of US policy in the event of a second Trump term.  Regardless of the results of the US elections in November, the stakes are high as the ongoing maritime blockade of key areas of Philippine waters continues and Chinese tactics continue to escalate.

At present, the Marcos administration’s policy of assertive transparency will continue. However, as Marcos appears to be on his own and lacking in diplomatic support from the US, his rivals from the coalition of former president Rodrigo Duterte will have a better chance of returning to power, and with it a return to Duterte’s policy of appeasement. China will get everything they want in the West Philippine Sea and the gradual process of Chinese encroachment into all remaining aspects of the Philippine political establishment and the economy will resume in earnest.

• Featured image: President Joe Biden, President Ferdinand Marcos of the Philippines, left, and Prime Minister Kishida Fumio of Japan are briefed in the Blue Room of the White House, Thursday, April 11, 2024, before their trilateral meeting in the East Room. (Official White House Photo by Adam Schultz)
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• Note: This article gives the views of the author, and not the position of USAPP – American Politics and Policy, nor of the London School of Economics.  
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