Casually calling it “blatant racism and sinophobia” gaslights the red flag raised by the influx of Chinese students in Cagayan Valley, belittling the province’s unique strategic importance in a crisis.

Saying, therefore, that “the presence of Chinese students in the city’s universities poses a threat to national security is not only baseless but also deeply offensive,” as four Cagayan higher education schools recently insisted, is blatant ignorance.

This costly ignorance all the more calls for a serious investigation into the mysterious surge of Mainland Chinese students studying in the province’s colleges and universities.

Granting there is still confusion as to the extent of this so-called “creeping invasion” involving Chinese students, this doesn’t mean these colleges and universities can’t quickly come clean.

School officials, for instance, can help quickly dispel suspicions of Chinese spies or “sleeper cells” by quickly showing these students’ detailed credentials and where they are specifically staying, as one newspaper suggests.

Crying “blatant racism and sinophobia,” of course, is relevant if it’s largely raised against Mainland Chinese students studying all over the country. If that were the case, we should condemn the coupling of national security and schools.

But as it so happens, Mainland Chinese students aren’t enrolled in large numbers in colleges and universities in other parts of the country, only in Cagayan.

A factor that now makes it all the more important that Cagayan educators must be made to realize that protecting their private interests may not be as innocent as they believe.

As such, the relevant question for Cagayan educators and local officials, as well as for the rest of us, is: Why is the presence of a large number of Chinese students in Cagayan province a security issue?

In answering the question, a senator and some security officials raised fears the location of the Chinese students is near two crucial Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) sites that are particularly related to the Taiwan issue.

Those two Cagayan EDCA sites are just around 200 miles from the southern coast of Taiwan, and a security study says that “in a Taiwan contingency, the Philippines’ strategic location could greatly assist the United States’ ability to respond to a crisis.”

The sites, however, have less value militarily. Instead, the real strategic value of the two sites rises exponentially when seen as humanitarian staging areas in the event of a Taiwan crisis.

Undoubtedly, the country’s proximity to a potential conflict involving Taiwan directly puts Philippine territory and citizens in harm’s way.

President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. himself even suggests that Taiwan’s proximity to Luzon makes it “hard to imagine” that the country could avoid the conflict. The administration’s National Security Policy 2023-2028 also largely echoes Marcos’ statements.

Nonetheless, the Marcos government is carefully treading on the Taiwan issue, primarily because a crisis there would directly affect nearly 200,000 Filipino workers in Taiwan.

“As the nearest potential safe harbor, the volume of refugees escaping the conflict would likely quickly overwhelm Philippine capacity. The Philippine government would not only be consumed by the need to evacuate its own citizens but also likely face pressure to act as a staging point for the evacuation of hundreds of thousands of overseas workers from the rest of Southeast Asia and farther afield who reside in Taiwan,” points out one Southeast Asian analyst.

A contingency on or around Taiwan, therefore, presents an economic and humanitarian crisis for the Philippines, even if the country isn’t involved in potential hostilities. A contingency that makes it all the more urgent that the Marcos administration adequately prepares itself.

Since Cagayan province is the nearest safe harbor, imagine, therefore, what complications to preparedness could arise if the Chinese suddenly have a large presence in Cagayan.

Complications that undoubtedly could risk the safety and welfare of thousands of overseas Filipino workers and other nationalities escaping from a Taiwan humanitarian crisis should a conflict erupt.