In the aftermath of the summit earlier this month between US President Joe Biden and Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr, one thing is clear: Washington and Manila have leaders who understand the deadly ramifications of a conflict in Taiwan. The alliance, which operated on rocky seas during the administration of former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte, has reinvigorated itself over the past year.
By simply visiting the White House, Marcos has done more than his predecessor in regard to US-Philippines relations. Since he took office in June last year, Marcos has prioritized boosting Manila’s most important relationship. The improvement of this alliance will have immense ramifications for Taiwan.
In the summit’s joint statement, the two leaders “affirm the importance of maintaining peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait as an indispensable element of global security and prosperity.”
One year ago, it was doubtful whether the Biden administration would have been able to secure such a line from Manila. However, a change in leadership, coupled with more intense Chinese military encroachment in the South China Sea and around Taiwan, has resulted in greater focus on these issues — an opportunity that Washington has pounced on.
Beijing, for its part, is not doing itself any favors when it comes to mollifying Philippine concerns. Filipino fishers are regularly harassed by the Chinese in the South China Sea. Last month, Manila accused Chinese vessels of conducting “dangerous maneuvers” near Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙). Those actions occurred only a couple of months after a Chinese coast guard ship pointed a military-grade laser at a Philippine resupply vessel.
Beyond direct Philippine concerns about its most important foreign policy priority — security in the West Philippine Sea and the South China Sea — Manila has seemingly awoken to the dangers of a cross-strait crisis or conflict.
Since taking office, Marcos has seen a ratcheting up in cross-strait tensions. From the Chinese military exercises around Taiwan in response to then-US House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taipei to the more limited exercises in response to President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) meeting with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in California, Marcos is seeing the security situation on his country’s northern border deteriorate.
Chinese Ambassador to the Philippines Huang Xilian (黃溪連) added more fuel to the fire at the Eighth Manila Forum, saying: “The Philippines is advised to unequivocally oppose ‘Taiwan independence’ rather than stoking the fire by offering the US access to the military bases near the Taiwan Strait if you care genuinely about the 150,000 OFWs [overseas Filipino workers].”
This one sentence has directly connected the security of Taiwan to an important issue in the Philippines: its OFWs. And by threatening the OFWs living in Taiwan, Huang has done Washington’s job of highlighting the importance of Taiwan’s security to the Philippines’ own security priorities.
Considering all of the negative developments in the South China Sea, on top of Beijing’s efforts to reduce Taiwan’s sovereignty, Biden likely had an easier time convincing Marcos of the importance of the ongoing US support for Taiwan, which Biden has committed to defending at least three times since coming into office.
In less than a year, the Philippines has gone from essentially a nonfactor in a cross-strait crisis to one that the US is pushing hard to get more skin in the game. After all, Marcos himself has said that “it’s very hard to imagine a scenario where the Philippines will not somehow get involved” in a range of Taiwan-related contingencies due to how close the northern Philippines is to southern Taiwan.
This level of involvement would largely depend on a number of factors, principally China’s continued provocations against the Philippines, the US’ execution of greater training and development of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, and the type of crisis that occurs over Taiwan.
If Beijing continues to instigate crises in the South China Sea to further solidify its nine-dash-line claims, then it would be easier for Manila to sell its “involvement” in a Taiwan crisis as a national security necessity. If the Biden administration truly works to improve the currently poor quality of the Philippine armed forces, then it would create a more capable military partner able to join the fight. At the moment, the Philippine military would not be able to serve as a meaningful partner in a Taiwan crisis. This should be a long-term priority for the US to shore up its ASEAN ally’s ability to defend itself.
Finally, the US needs to be mindful of how the crisis starts — if it can be perceived that the US created the crisis, such as through a high-profile visit by a US official, then Manila and other ASEAN members might argue that it forced Beijing’s hand. Such perception can be changed by having constant contact and explaining US interests in Taiwan.
The past year has shown how the Biden administration has worked toward gently pushing Manila into a greater appreciation for the catastrophic consequences of a Taiwan crisis or conflict for the Philippines. Now, with the Biden-Marcos summit finally having taken place, Washington needs to work on implementation — of bolstering the Philippine military, and of making a stronger, more persuasive and more consistent argument about how Philippine security is directly tied to Taiwan’s. As the past several months have shown, Beijing is doing a lot of that work for Washington by highlighting such risks.
Thomas Shattuck is the global order program manager at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perry World House and a non-resident research fellow at the Global Taiwan Institute. He is a member of foreign policy for the NextGen Foreign Policy Initiative and the Pacific Forum’s Young Leaders Program.
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