Daily TribuneBut accidents happen, and China’s use of ‘non-lethal’ weapons and intentional collisions means the world could at any moment learn that Chinese forces had crossed that Rubicon, killed Filipinos and risked direct US-China conflict.
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. said, in his keynote speech at the 2024 Shangri-La Dialogue that should Chinese actions cause the death of a Filipino service member, “we would have certainly crossed the Rubicon.”
Such a scenario would depend heavily on who sits in the White House.
Marcos indicated that the Philippines would call for US intervention under Article IV of the two nations’ Mutual Defense Treaty and that he expects Washington to make good on its treaty commitments.
The United States has certainly put its credibility on the line.
In 2019, then Secretary of State Mike Pompeo flew to Manila and for the first time said publicly that the treaty applied to any attack on Filipinos in the South China Sea.
After every violent incident since, US officials have repeated that commitment.
Vice President Kamala Harris made the same pledge when she became the most senior US official to visit Palawan, the province on the front lines of the maritime conflict.
Former President Donald Trump never spoke publicly about the West Philippine Sea (WPS), but his Cabinet officials strengthened US support, rhetorical and military, for the Philippines during the last two years of his administration.
According to the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), the threat of US intervention has so far prevented China from simply using military force against its weaker neighbor.
It probably helped convince Beijing to reach a limited provisional arrangement with Manila to allow resupply missions to Second Thomas Shoal after the violent clash in June.
But accidents happen, and China’s use of “non-lethal” weapons and intentional collisions means the world could at any moment learn that Chinese forces had crossed that Rubicon, killed Filipinos and risked direct US-China conflict.
More likely, such an incident would not lead immediately to war, as neither the Philippines nor the US would seek to escalate matters disproportionately, according to the CSIS report.
It likely would signal the start of a dangerous new cold war that both sides insist they wish to avoid.
Whether Harris or Trump occupies the White House in January 2025, the Philippines will expect the US to reiterate its commitment to defend Filipino lives and rights in the South China Sea.
Other US allies and partners across the region will also be alert for any sign of weakness or transactionalism.
Whatever their concerns about the risk of escalation in the South China Sea, they will want to know that the new administration will follow through on promises to allies and that the United States will not sell them out in pursuit of a bilateral deal with Beijing.
The best way for the next administration to reassure allies and partners while deterring Beijing, according to CSIS, will be to continue the generational modernization of the US-Philippines alliance underway since 2021.
To that end, the new administration in its first 100 days should focus on concluding the general security of military information agreement if it remains unfinished in January 2025; pledge to seek congressional funding for Philippine military modernization under the recently concluded Security Sector Assistance Roadmap at or near the $500 million level of foreign military financing provided in fiscal year 2024; and seek a trilateral national security advisers meeting or a trilateral cabinet-level meeting with Japan and the Philippines — as occurred for the first time in 2024 — to advance coordination on joint training, military capacity building, and economic support, including through the Luzon Economic Corridor.
The bottom line is that by this December, the Philippines would have to recalibrate its relations with the American government.
What is certain is that the US will be under a new administration that would dash any hope of a business-as-usual mode.
