How to Reinvigorate the US-Philippine Alliance

In March, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo visited Manila, the capital of the Philippines. Publicly, and in no uncertain terms, he declared that the United States would honor its commitments under the Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT) should any Philippine vessel or aircraft be attacked anywhere in the South China Sea. Pompeo’s comments came amid uncertainties with respect to the alliance under Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, including talk of a potential review of the alliance.

Though international focus was on the U.S. commitment itself and its significance, Philippine responses to Pompeo’s comments were more mixed due to a range of factors and in spite of Washington’s best efforts to boost collaboration with Manila. But beyond this, the hope is that Pompeo’s commitment will jumpstart a broader effort by the two allies to reinvigorate the U.S.-Philippine alliance in the coming years.

The State of the U.S.-Philippine Alliance 

While there is often a focus on the troubles of the U.S.-Philippine alliance under Duterte, some of the more prominent issues in the alliance date back decades. Among these issues were repeated – and unsuccessful – Philippine attempts to extract a U.S. commitment to protect its South China Sea claims. Since 1979, through a letter of the Secretary of State Cyrus Vance, and reiterated in 1999 by U.S. Ambassador Thomas Hubbard, the United States quietly stated only that it considered MDT obligations to apply to all Philippine public ships and aircraft “in the Pacific,” which included the South China Sea, and that these did not have to be in the “metropolitan area” of the Philippines mentioned in the treaty’s Article V as well.

Some of these concerns have only deepened in recent years amid the rising threat of China to Philippine interests in the South China Sea. In particular, China’s taking of Scarborough Shoal in 2012 despite U.S. intercession during the presidency of Barack Obama loomed large in the mind of the security sector as an example of abandonment, irrespective of Washington’s own calculations at the time.

The Duterte administration has only intensified these doubts about the alliance. Since 2016, the Duterte administration has accommodated and at times echoed China’s positions on the South China Sea matter while touting an “independent foreign policy” whose principal feature appeared to be dissociation from the United States. This has been accompanied by calls from Philippine officials, including Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana, to review the alliance itself. This has also come in spite of ample demonstrations of U.S. support, including support for the Philippine military to end a siege by Islamic State-linked militants in Marawi, and assistance with respect to modernization, capacity-building, intelligence, and maritime domain awareness.

Pompeo’s Comments and the Philippine Response 

Pompeo’s March comments in Manila were apparently meant to directly address Lorenzana’s criticisms last year about the MDT’s relevance and ambiguity, reiterating long-standing complaints about U.S. neutrality on the sovereignty claims over the Spratlys that have been raised before. Seen from that historical perspective, Pompeo’s statement constitutes one that is consistent with this position rather than departing significantly from it. To the extent that it constitutes a change, it is a slight improvement only in that his comments were more pointed, direct, and made very publicly.

If Pompeo’s comments were meant to assuage Philippine concerns about the alliance, it’s unclear that he has succeeded in that respect. The Philippine response was mixed. While Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. quickly welcomed the assurance and said he thought it made an MDT review unnecessary, Lorenzana responded that while the United States did not lack in giving assurances, he was more concerned about the possibility of being dragged by the United States into an unwanted war. Duterte added, rather unhelpfully, that he was still not assured of automatic U.S. retaliation in case of an attack on the Philippines due to the MDT’s requirement that allied self-defense be subject to constitutional processes.

To be sure, part of the ambiguity in the Philippine response is rooted in the current dynamics in Manila. On the one hand, it is clear that Duterte himself remains suspicious of the U.S.-Philippine alliance, and that sentiment can filter down into the rest of the administration. Indications are that Pompeo’s comments have not entirely eliminated doubts about the utility of the U.S.-Philippine alliance for the advancement of the current government’s priorities.

But on the other hand, with the approach of the midterm elections in May, the Duterte administration is also treading carefully because it is vulnerable to wide-ranging criticisms of handing the country over to Chinese influence, be it with regard to the handling of the South China Sea issues, fears of a massive influx of Chinese workers into the country, or the loan agreements that stoke fears of a so-called debt trap that the Philippines is falling into. Chinese actions, including the swarming of vessels around Pag-asa (Thitu) Island, have only contributed to an intensification of this dynamic. In that context, U.S. support for the Philippines is quite notable. In contrast to the sunny rhetoric we saw when Locsin was in China shortly after Pompeo’s visit, the Philippines has issued a string of strongly worded statements designed to reinforce its interests and criticize Beijing’s actions.

The Philippine response rested on classic fears of either abandonment or entrapment within the U.S. alliance. Lorenzana, who served in Washington as a defense attache from 2002 to 2004, is intimately familiar with the modern workings of the alliance. The old fears – abandonment or entrapment – date back as far as 1954, just three years after the MDT had been signed. Then, as now, Manila questioned what exactly the United States would do in case of an armed attack. The Philippine response and current alliance dynamics suggest that there will need to be more work put into developing the alliance beyond Pompeo’s comments.

Next Steps for the Alliance

Given recent changes in the geopolitical landscape, a joint review of the MDT is arguably timely and needed to address the sources of Philippine insecurities and the perceived uncertainties about American commitment. These uncertainties have historical roots either in the nationalistic political discourses between the political elites or untested operational scenarios without consideration of foreign policy and grand strategy. Unfortunately, these often spring from a rather simplistic understanding of alliance management as little more than the question of whether a treaty ally will stand with one without question or hesitation in a crisis. These are woefully inadequate for today’s inordinately complex security environment, especially in Southeast Asia, and it is a credit to the current Philippine defense leaders that they recognize the gaps.

Part of reinvigorating the alliance involves addressing Philippine concerns of abandonment and entrapment. On abandonment: Unlike the 1970s or 1980s when ambivalence about U.S. commitment occurred in a context where Washington saw no plausible external threat to Philippine security at the time (the communist threat was internal), and its war plans contemplated no major regional conflict scenarios other than either Taiwan or Korea, China today poses a clear threat to Philippine security. The Philippines does perceive an actual external threat to its far-flung island territories, and the situation in Pag-asa has provided the backdrop for considering the principal challenges to the alliance.

In that context, it is important to keep in mind that concerns over a possible repeat of the Scarborough debacle, given U.S. neutrality over the South China Sea disputes, still weigh heavily on perceptions of U.S. reliability. China’s grey zone tactics and “cabbage strategy,” combining civilian, paramilitary, and military forces, pose very serious security challenges for which traditional arrangements do not yet have a solution. They also represent a new mode of adverse but nonmilitary territorial acquisition that the MDT was never designed for.

The entrapment side of the equation also needs to be addressed. It has come to the forefront as Chinese and U.S. military units operate more and more frequently in the South China Sea, and differences between the two major powers sharpen over matters such as freedom of navigation, trade, and Taiwan. This sharpening of tensions arguably increases the chances of an incident that could spark a conflict. Philippine military leaders are faced with a looming dilemma, since the current leadership has directed the pursuit of closer, friendlier ties with China, the potential adversary. They are also anxious of the fact that any conflict between superpowers would turn the Philippines or its waters into a mere battleground, absorbing collateral damage from external causes.

Both sides also need to move beyond immediate concerns to address structural issues in the alliance. At the heart of this issue is the fact that the alliance will need to modernize and move beyond the Cold War milieu of the 1951 MDT and the business-as-usual attitude of the current modus vivendi, incorporating contemporary experiences and evolving challenges. At the highest policy levels, the two allies must engage in serious and continuing strategic dialogues that establish a common understanding of the security environment at global, regional, and national scales. Their respective viewpoints on national security needs to be actively and properly contextualized. This will permit the identification of both mutual and divergent security interests, so that expectations and understandings can be set as to each other’s respective needs and goals. Most important, it will enable the parties to more realistically determine what they can do together, and what each will have to do on their own.

For the Philippines, especially, there is a need to articulate a broad, long-term, and regional geopolitical framework that enables the country to decide upon its own security strategy vis-à-vis the U.S. global security strategy. Manila needs to understand clearly where their interests may converge or clash with those of Washington. This will enable better complementation between the two allies’ respective foreign and defense policies, which can then be implemented at the operational level by coordinative guidelines and rules of engagement. Such operational guidelines, similar perhaps to those between the United States and Japan, can address the ambiguities in interpretation and uncertainties in operations that frequently raise abandonment or entrapment fears.

Finally, the two allies should also have crisis anticipation, prevention, management, coordination, and de-escalation mechanisms that enable them to jointly address incidents with conflict-escalation pathways. Fears of sudden escalation to war may be greatly exaggerated: Since the end of World War II, many U.S. reconnaissance or patrol ships and aircraft have been casualties of incidents with antagonistic nations such as Russia and China, but swift and effective operational crisis management and high-level diplomacy have consistently prevented the outbreak of hostilities. The U.S.-Philippine alliance would benefit greatly from having coordinated response mechanisms that can generate multiple options other than forceful retaliation in any given situation.

Ironically, by staking out an “independent” foreign policy initially defined by a colorful and widely-reported “separation from the United States ” and “alignment” with China and Russia, the Duterte administration also effectively isolated itself from coordination with U.S. regional security policy, strategies, and activities. This created even more uncertainty for Philippine defense planning. Addressing this challenge is necessary if both allies are to think seriously about managing the security challenges they aim to confront together.

It is important to note that these actions can improve the alliance without need for another treaty directly amending or modifying the MDT. Indeed, treaty-making has become a far more difficult task for both the Philippines and the United States, as their respective Senates have come to play more active roles. Given Duterte’s erratic attitude toward Western countries, and U.S. President Donald Trump’s open disdain for military alliances, it may not be a good idea to bring up treaty renegotiations at this time.

After all is said and done, the two allies have demonstrated that they have at least one clearly identifiable and consistent mutual security interest: That a single power should not gain absolute control of the entire South China Sea. This is likely to be one of the keystones for the future evolution of Philippine-U.S. alliance relations. Such an evolution is absolutely necessary for the two parties to be able to manage and balance their competing and complementary security interests for a long time to come.