Typhoon Haiyan revealed some glaring weaknesses in the Philippine
military. Can it defend its own territory?
November’s
Typhoon Haiyan (known in the Philippines as Typhoon Yolanda) tragically killed
thousands of Filipinos and brought extreme hardship to hundreds of thousands
more. It also wiped away any veneer from the country’s military, revealing the
Philippines, a country of almost 100 million people, to be without any
meaningful self-defense capabilities. This may not be news to the government of
China, whose recent claims on the near-entirety of the South China Sea have
placed it in an escalating dispute with the Philippines and its neighbors, but
Beijing is undoubtedly making note of the sheer scale of the Philippines’
feebleness.
The day
before the typhoon struck on November 8, Philippine president Benigno Aquino
III sent his ministers of defense and interior to Leyte Island, which was to
bear the brunt of the storm. But for crucial hours after the storm, according
to reports in multiple national newspapers, neither of the two ministers could
communicate with the president’s office because they were wholly reliant on cell
phone communications, which had been knocked out by the typhoon. The lack of
more resilient communications such as satellite phones and weather-safe radios
extended beyond the Philippine military and interior department; the country’s
disaster relief agency acknowledged that it did not have a single satellite
phone, and was largely without communications in critical areas for days after
the storm.
In the
immediate aftermath of the typhoon, as its devastation became more apparent by
the hour, the U.S. mobilized an entire aircraft carrier strike force of more
than 5,000 sailors along with five KC-130 aircraft to provide relief supplies
and transport injured victims. Other nations, including Japan, Australia,
Taiwan, and Singapore soon followed suit. (Eleven days after the typhoon,
following sharp international and domestic criticism, China offered to send a
hospital ship and medical personnel.)
Remarkably,
the two lead ships of the Philippine navy were inactive during the critical
week following the typhoon. The Gregorio del Pilar and the Ramon Alcaraz, two
1960s-era former U.S. Hamilton-class coastguard cutters transferred to the
Philippine navy in the past two years, were moored at Subic Bay in the northern
part of the country, the site of a former U.S. naval base. (See photos taken
November 13th, five days after the typhoon, showing no deployment loading of
the ships.)
Not
until November 14th, six days after the typhoon struck, did one of the ships,
the Ramon Alcaraz, leave port – not to hurry toward hard-hit Leyte and Samar
islands in the country’s Visayan region, but to sail to Manila, for a brief
christening ceremony on November 22 that had been postponed from October, when
the ship was already operational. The Ramon Alcaraz finally anchored near the devastated
town of Tacloban, Leyte Island, on November 24. It carried 200 tons of relief
supplies and equipment, but this was sixteen days after the typhoon had struck.
The
sister ship Gregorio del Pilar remained tranquilly docked at its Subic pier
until November 15, arriving at Tacloban on the 17th, nine days after the
typhoon, according to a Navy spokesperson. The Gregorio del Pilar carried no
additional relief supplies or equipment. When asked why, as dozens of vessels
from foreign navies were arriving to help the devastated region, the
Philippines kept its most advanced ships at dock, the navy spokesperson said
“we had lots of ships already there, in the Visayas,” and he had no clear
explanation of why, then, the two Philippine ships were eventually deployed to
the same region when the crisis was less severe.
Nor did
the Philippine air force shine in the crisis. The New York Times reported that
due to a lack of spare parts, the nation’s fleet of C-130 cargo planes,
heavy-lift transporters useful for relief efforts (as well as defense), had
been whittled down to two or three aircraft. IHS Jane’s Defense Weekly reported
that of the Philippine air force’s 44 Huey helicopters, only 28 were
functioning. The New York Times also noted, in an understatement, that “the
military budget itself has been pilfered by corrupt government officials in
previous administrations.”
As the
extent of the typhoon tragedy unfolded in the Visayan Islands, another story
unfolded in the national prosecutor’s office in Manila. Numerous legislators
were implicated in a $230 million scheme to pocket government poverty-reduction
funds. On November 21, thirteen days after more than 5,500 people were killed
by the storm surge and 195-mph winds of Haiyan, a government ombudsman placed
three lawmakers under investigation, including Juan Ponce Enrile, the
89-year-old Senate Minority Leader.
Enrile,
who has stated he is innocent, previously served for fifteen years as Secretary
of Defense during the 1965-1986 Marcos administration, now recognized as one of
the most corrupt regimes of the twentieth century. A week after the ombudsman’s action against Enrile,
the Philippine Supreme Court upheld an anti-graft ruling against former Armed
Forces Chief Lisandro Abadia in a 2005 case alleging accumulation of
“unexplained wealth.”
Although
the recent anti-corruption investigations are encouraging, the continuing
culture of defense-crippling graft stemming from the Marcos years will likely
require generations to remedy. This must give comfort to geopolitical planners
in Beijing. But Beijing’s effective annexation of the South China Sea (the
largest territorial expansion since Japan’s acquisitions leading up to World
War II) must also carry calculations of the willingness and ability of the
United States to act as a defense backstop for the Philippines, as enshrined in
a 1951 mutual defense treaty.
Over
the past year, the Philippine government has haltingly opened the door to
renewed U.S. navy visits at Subic port, twenty-two years after the U.S. navy
and air force were ejected by the Philippine legislature in a convulsion of
nationalism. U.S. navy vessels, including aircraft carriers, submarines and
destroyers, have been visiting Subic, on average, once a month during 2013 for
fuel, resupply, and occasional joint exercises. Early in the year a U.S.
aircraft carrier and a companion cruiser docked at Subic, along with a U.S.
submarine. Four Osprey aircraft made maneuvers off the carrier’s deck, and an
amphibious vessel launched from the carrier made a hovercraft-style landing on
the beach near a tourist hotel. The local Subic press is buzzing with the
prospect of ramped-up U.S. naval activity and the economic infusion it might
bring.
The
further opening of Subic to U.S. navy ships was signaled in 2012, when the U.S.
company Huntington Ingalls Industries signed an agreement with South Korea’s
Hanjin corporation to service U.S. navy vessels at Hanjin’s new
state-of-the-art shipyard on the west side of Subic Bay (see photo). The Hanjin
facilities dwarf the U.S. Navy’s old Subic docks, and would provide a boost to
U.S. naval operations in the region, yet their location is not especially close
to the naval action that would occur in a confrontation between the Philippines
and China.
Aside
from the Scarborough Shoal, a disputed fishing area with no habitable land 160
miles west of Subic Bay, the main stage for clashing South China Sea interests
between Manila and Beijing is the Spratly islands, approximately 400 miles to
the southwest of Subic, off the Philippines’ sword-shaped island of Palawan.
Running as close as 25 miles from Palawan’s coast is the imaginary “nine-dash
line” that Beijing has promulgated as defining its territory. Within this
border lie islands claimed by China and the Philippines as well as Malaysia,
Taiwan, Vietnam and Brunei. China has quickly augmented its footprint
throughout the South China Sea.
Navigators
have historically called the region of the Spratlys “Dangerous Ground” because
of the numerous ships sunk by its shallow reefs. The same title applies today,
but for different reasons. This is where Beijing’s naval patrols and
installations on barren islands pointedly reinforce the ongoing annexation of
the South China Sea. Close to the Philippines’ Palawan Island, the smattering
of islets is also the most likely ignition point for a military confrontation
between the two countries.
But as
Typhoon Haiyan demonstrated, any confrontation would be one-sided, unless the
Philippines can count on the U.S. to answer its calls for military assistance.
Herein lies the crux of the Philippines’ security dilemma. Twenty-two years
after it expelled the U.S. military, and after decades of failing to create any
credible defense capability of its own, can the country count on the U.S. to
protect it from China’s aggression?
So far
are the flashpoints from U.S. naval bases at Guam and Okinawa, and even from
the tenuous berthing station at Subic, that the Philippines has begun to
develop a new deep-water naval base at pristine Oyster Bay on the west coast of
Palawan, facing the South China Sea, which Manila calls the West Philippine
Sea. Oyster Bay, 220 miles from China’s installations at Mischief Reef,
currently hosts only a shambles pier, but a road is being built to support
construction of a more substantial facility that could host the Philippine
navy’s two frigates, the Gregorio del Pilar and the Ramon Alcaraz, as well as
other ships. There is vocal opposition from nearby communities who loathe the
idea of a repeat of the U.S. naval base at Subic, with its history of
accompanying prostitution, as well as from environmentalists trying to protect
the rare ecosystem of Palawan.
Commodore
Joseph Rostum Peña, commander of the Philippines’ western navy, nevertheless
said in October that the base would be “a mini-Subic” that could accommodate
“at least four large naval vessels.” He added that planned new radar facilities
running the length of Palawan would provide a coastal watch program that
“should allow us eventually to monitor our seas in real time.”
When a
Philippine navy officer was asked on local television in October if there was
“a possibility that U.S. warships could be able to have access to the port,” he
replied “not only U.S.; we have allied forces, allied countries’ navies.” The
1987 Philippine constitution bans permanent foreign military bases in the
country, but allowing “transit” by foreign air and sea forces is an established
way to circumvent this constraint, as the recent U.S. presence at Subic
illustrates.
So far
the U.S. government has not commented on any plans for a Philippines-sponsored
“mini-Subic” at Oyster Bay, but even if such plans are in place, they may
amount to little, as Beijing banks on the same advantage it has long had
vis-à-vis the Philippines: pervasive corruption that keeps this beautiful,
welcoming and typhoon-pummeled nation of 7,100 islands utterly defenseless
against not only natural disasters, but state-sponsored aggression as well.
Victor
Robert Lee
Victor
Robert Lee is the author of the espionage novel Performance Anomalies, set in
Asia (Perimeter Six Press, 2013).
Business & Investment Opportunities
Saigon Business Corporation Pte Ltd (SBC) is incorporated
in Singapore since 1994.
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