FPRRD BREAKING THE WAVE OF HISTORY

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐁𝐄𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄𝐃 𝐎𝐋𝐃 𝐌𝐀𝐍 𝐁𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐖𝐀𝐕𝐄𝐒 𝐎𝐅 𝐇𝐈𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐘

“I therefore call on the stakeholders in the South China Sea…: 

if we cannot be friends as yet, then in God’s name, let us not 

hate each other too much.” 

— President Rodrigo Duterte, UN General Assembly Speech,

22 September 2021

𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝒘𝒂𝒗𝒆 𝒐𝒇 𝒉𝒊𝒔𝒕𝒐𝒓𝒚

When Davao City’s Mayor Rodrigo Duterte spoke during the June 2015 Asia CEO Forum, I was surprised at his stance on the South China Sea (SCS) crisis. He understood the dangerous geopolitical position of the Philippines. During the 2016 presidential campaign, Duterte kept on mentioning his proposed conciliatory approach towards China. I was thrilled because, for me, he would turn the tide of history.

Historians of international history have warned that a new world war is looming, with the SCS being one of the potential flash points. In her 2013 essay 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑹𝒉𝒚𝒎𝒆 𝒐𝒇 𝑯𝒊𝒔𝒕𝒐𝒓𝒚: 𝑳𝒆𝒔𝒔𝒐𝒏𝒔 𝒐𝒇 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝑮𝒓𝒆𝒂𝒕 𝑾𝒂𝒓, historian Margaret MacMillan drew a parallel between the present conflicts of China and the United States and “the national rivalries [that] led to mutual suspicions between Britain and the newly ascendant Germany before 1914.”

At that time, Germany was controlling Belgian ports. Since these ports were close to their coasts, the British saw this as a threat to their trade routes. So when Germany attacked France in 1914 and gained more access to the maritime throat of the British economy, Britain declared war.

The SCS is the throat of China’s maritime-dependent economy. 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑪𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒆𝒓 𝒇𝒐𝒓 𝑺𝒕𝒓𝒂𝒕𝒆𝒈𝒊𝒄 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝑰𝒏𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒏𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒂𝒍 𝑺𝒕𝒖𝒅𝒊𝒆𝒔 (𝑪𝑺𝑰𝑺) 𝑪𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒂 𝑷𝒐𝒘𝒆𝒓 𝑷𝒓𝒐𝒋𝒆𝒄𝒕 shows how this sea is existentially important to China: In 2016, “nearly 40 percent of China’s total trade … transited through the South China Sea;” and about 80 percent of its oil imports pass through it. Since the SCS is critical to China’s survival, it will do everything to protect that trade route, just as Britain sought to protect theirs in 1914.

The United States is currently involved in an ever-escalating trade war with China. Destabilising the SCS is an attractive option to disrupt China’s economy. The U.S. doesn’t need to launch conventional warfare. Encouraging a low-intensity conflict would do. Or it could even clandestinely encourage military adventurism by its ally, the Philippines. Both schemes could get out of hand.

In the 1950s, during the Cold War, the great advocate of neutral Philippine foreign policy, Claro M. Recto, once warned about our “dangerous and provocative entanglements” with the interests of the United States. “It exposes our people to the fearful consequences of another war,” he stressed. “A war which will be fought on Asian soil with only expendable and bewildered Asians for sacrificial victims on the altar of power politics and international intrigue.”

MacMillan highlighted the role of public opinion, “fanned by the new mass-circulation newspapers,” in pushing the relationship of Britain and Germany “in the direction of hostility than friendship.” And just as in World War 1, Macmillan observed, “public opinion can make it difficult for statesmen to maneuver and defuse hostilities.”

Philippine mainstream media, the Catholic Church, the Liberal Party and its allies, their social media propagandists, and the Left have been shaping a dogmatic brand of nationalism in the consciousness of Filipinos. To use a term by sociologist Zygmunt Bauman, these political forces are promoting the “religionization” of international politics. Politics is conducted as if it’s a battle between good and evil rather than between conflicting interests that can be reconciled through compromise.

Armed with the chauvinistic mindset, they have been transforming “a conflict of interests calling for negotiation and compromise (the daily bread of politics) … into an ultimate showdown between good and evil that renders any negotiated agreement inconceivable and from which only one of the antagonists can emerge alive.”

When he became president, Duterte stayed the course of a statesman who refuses to be a slave to public opinion shaped by a media engaged in shameless yellow journalism and rampant sinophobia. His brand of diplomacy is devoid of dogmatism — it’s prudent, and pragmatic. He refused to poke the dragon as these ignoramuses want him to do.

For those infected with infantile nationalism, Duterte’s rapprochement with China is cowardice. To the learned, Duterte’s Recto-like foreign policy is protection against tragedy, the tragedy of the Philippines being used by the U.S. as its proxy belligerent against China. Duterte has done the rest of the world a great service, preventing a crisis that would seriously undermine the global economy and world peace.

Two international observers praised him for this.  Graeme Dobell, a journalist and fellow of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, highlighted in an article for The National Interest in October 2016, entitled 𝑹𝒐𝒅𝒓𝒊𝒈𝒐 𝑫𝒖𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒕𝒆 𝑯𝒂𝒔 𝑨𝒄𝒉𝒊𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒅 𝒂 𝑺𝒕𝒓𝒂𝒏𝒈𝒆 𝑭𝒆𝒂𝒕 𝒊𝒏 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝑺𝒐𝒖𝒕𝒉 𝑪𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒂 𝑺𝒆𝒂. 

While hurling insults at Duterte, Dobell recognised that “Duterte has given Washington one big gift — the SCS crisis that didn’t happen. The new Philippine president immediately changed the tone of the SCS argument at an otherwise dangerous moment.” This change of tone, Dobell argues, “creates an important pause in a dangerous chain of events. The volatile president met a volatile moment in the SCS and actually brought the temperature down.”

In a similar tone, Ashley Townshend, Director of Foreign Policy and Defence at the United States Studies Centre, observed the same thing in an October 2016 article he wrote for CNN entitled 𝑫𝒖𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒕𝒆 𝑫𝒆𝒂𝒍 𝒘𝒊𝒕𝒉 𝑪𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒂 𝒐𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝑺𝒄𝒂𝒓𝒃𝒐𝒓𝒐𝒖𝒈𝒉 𝑺𝒉𝒐𝒂𝒍 𝑬𝒙𝒑𝒐𝒔𝒆𝒔 𝑼𝑺 𝑭𝒂𝒊𝒍𝒖𝒓𝒆. “By cozying up to China and trash-talking America,” Townshend observed, “Duterte has achieved something that Washington couldn't deliver: a peaceful resolution to the Scarborough Shoal standoff.”

𝑫𝒖𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒕𝒆’𝒔 𝒅é𝒕𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒆 𝒎𝒊𝒔𝒔𝒊𝒐𝒏

 Dobell and Townshend wrote those comments as a reflection on the significance of the historic state visit of Duterte to China in October 2016. It was a visit that thawed the icy relations between China and the Philippines, which started during the previous Aquino Administration. 

Duterte’s détente mission meant to rekindle centuries of cordial relations between our peoples, which had been dashed by episodes of tension in just the last 40 years. It was a visit as significant as Nixon’s to Beijing in 1972. The purpose of both missions was the same: to bridge over diplomatic barriers. Duterte’s airport welcome recalled Nixon’s own by China’s foreign minister at the time, Zhou Enlai, one of Asia’s finest statesmen.

This moment stand in equal dignity to the other fine episodes in Philippine diplomatic history, such as Felipe Agoncillo’s objection to the 1898 Treaty of Paris between Spain and the US; President Ferdinand Marcos’ opening of relations with the Soviet Union and pact with Vietnam not to allow the Philippines to be used by the US to attack it and other foreign countries in the region; and President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s decision to pull out troops from Iraq to save the life of Angelo dela Cruz to the ire of the U.S.

I was smiling when I saw Duterte’s solemn and intimate conversation with Wang Yi, China’s foreign minister. Why? Because their body language had so much more spontaneity, warmth, and sincerity than that between Nixon and Zhou. Nixon’s and Zhou’s was clearly between two powers; Duterte’s and Wang’s was more closely between two brothers.

Wang warmly welcomed Duterte at the airport. Wang offered his hand; Duterte took it. Wang cupped Duterte’s lower arm; Duterte reciprocated with a double handshake, conveying a message of confidence and trust.

The handshake was firm. It was not released quickly, signifying interest, sincerity, attention. Wang’s face was so close to Duterte’s. Both their faces were solemn, as Wang whispered something to Duterte. Then Wang gripped Duterte’s upper arm. At that moment, Duterte’s eyes closed for a few seconds, as if relishing the intense proximity. And I understood why: Wang’s grip brought him well within Duterte’s personal space. In Chinese culture, this proximity is only reserved for people you trust. 

In the early morning of February 8, 2017, during a meeting in Malacañang Palace, I asked Duterte a question that was never asked by mainstream media: “Mayor, for me, one of the most important moments in Philippine diplomatic history was the intimate conversation you and Wang Yi had when you arrived in Beijing. Wang Yi was telling you something during that time. I don’t know if you can divulge it, but what did Wang Yi tell you?”

While I was asking this, Duterte rested his face on his fist, listening intently. His answer, while smiling and speaking with a solemn tone: “Welcome to China, Mr. President. You are welcome here. Here you can relax. We are brothers. We are Asians.”

Every conflict in international relations can be resolved through negotiation. Even wars. But no negotiation can be successful if there is no mutual trust among the parties involved. The trust between China and the Philippines deteriorated so badly during the Aquino administration. But the tactile exchange between Duterte and Wang Yi signaled that years of icy relations had begun to thaw — a diplomatic climate change, the start of an age of rapprochement between China and the Philippines.

After that encounter, Duterte was greeted with a bouquet of flowers by a little Chinese girl wearing a red coat.

During the 2008 Beijing Olympics, one of the performances was of two giant marionettes: an ancient Chinese warrior accompanied by a little girl symbolising Modern China. David J. Davies explains in Qin Shihuang’s 𝑻𝒆𝒓𝒓𝒂𝒄𝒐𝒕𝒕𝒂 𝑾𝒂𝒓𝒓𝒊𝒐𝒓𝒔 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝑪𝒐𝒎𝒎𝒆𝒎𝒐𝒓𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝑪𝒖𝒍𝒕𝒖𝒓𝒂𝒍 𝑺𝒕𝒂𝒕𝒆 (2012) that the cheerfulness and playfulness of the little girl were said to symbolize “timeless values of caring, peace, and friendship.” And in China, red is the color of happiness and good fortune. In that light, Duterte, a modern Filipino warrior, was welcomed by Modern China in October 2016, in a spirit of caring, peace, and friendship, and with wishes of happiness and good fortune.

𝑨 𝒏𝒆𝒘 𝒍𝒆𝒂𝒇

This turned a new leaf in our relationship with China. From a dragon poker, our country has now become a dragon whisperer. Thanks to the visionary leadership of Duterte, we’re veering away from the dangerous path down which the Aquino administration took us, to a better, saner, and more peaceful geopolitical path.

Duterte’s foreign policy shift reframed China from an enemy we must destroy into an adversary we must win over.

Former President Benigno Aquino III compared China’s stance in the South China Sea to Nazi Germany’s annexation of Sudetenland. He didn’t do it just once, but twice: first in 2014, during an interview with The New York Times; and second in 2015, while delivering a speech before businessmen in Nazi Germany’s ally in Asia during World War 2,  Japan.

This framing of China invites a very belligerent policy. How else should the world respond to another Nazi Germany other than with the use of force?

For Aquino and his followers, our conflict with China is a battle between good and evil. Mention “negotiated agreement” with China to anyone supporting Aquino’s foreign policy line and you’ll be accused of being anti-Philippines.

Duterte framed China differently. He didn’t see China as an evil we must destroy but a neighbor with whom we must co-exist peacefully, a market we must tap, and a possible partner to further develop our country.

For Aquino, our conflict in the SCS seems to define our entire bilateral relationship with China. For Duterte, that conflict is just one of its aspects. The joint statement of the Philippines and China after Duterte’s détente (easing of hostility) mission to Beijing in October 2016 emphasized it: “Both sides affirm that contentious issues are not the sum total of the Philippines-China bilateral relationship.”

Vice President Leni Robredo sang the same belligerent tune of her party mate.

In a speech she delivered on June 12, 2018, during a forum on the South China Sea disputes at the University of the Philippines, Robredo stated that China is the most serious external threat to the Philippines since World War 2: “If China successfully solidifies its presence within its nine-dash line, the Philippines will lose effective control over its exclusive economic zone, which is larger than the land area of our country. This is why China’s encroachment on Philippine territories is the most serious external threat to our country since the Second World War,” she said.

Such statement is both ignorant and dangerous.

There’s no such thing in international law as “effective control” of the exclusive economic zone since this area of the sea cannot be appropriated as territory. That’s what makes Robredo ignorant.

What makes her dangerous is her identification of China as an enemy, not just a rival, but an enemy equivalent to what Japan was to us during World War 2.

With that identification, one can easily infer that the framework of Robredo’s foreign policy strategy is like Aquino’s, which supports not just the containment but the rollback of China from the South China Sea.

This opposes the foreign policy strategy of rapprochement and engagement with China that the Duterte administration has been pursuing.

Duterte’s track is one of conciliation built on identifying China as a friend with whom we have a disagreement. Issues that arise along the way are to be ironed out with the persistent pursuit of diplomacy. Compromise is the desired goal.

Meanwhile, Robredo’s track is one of confrontation, with China seen as a threat. As such, issues that arise along the way aren’t wrinkles that can be ironed out but further evidence that China is an ever-growing threat. Hence, we must act to stop that threat. No compromise.

Her historical invocation of World War 2 is quite telling. Despite her call for “peaceful protest,” we all know what policy was used to deal with the most serious threat our country faced at the time: war. The United States pursued war against Japan in the 1940’s to roll back its presence from the South China Sea region.

Fortunately, Duterte is our president and not Robredo’s running mate, Mar Roxas, who vowed to continue Aquino’s foreign policy line. Instead of poking the dragon, Duterte coaxes it. And in a span of just two years, he seems to have found the proverbial soft spot of every dragon. The improved situation in  Scarborough Shoal is evidence.

Fishermen were operating freely in Scarborough Shoal since he began fishing there in 2000, said one of the fishermen presented by Presidential Spokesman Harry Roque in a June 11, 2018 press briefing. 

Then April 2012 happened: A seven-week naval stand-off between China and the Philippines ensued as a result of the miscalculation and poor conflict management by the Aquino foreign policy regime. Scarborough Shoal remained inaccessible to our fishermen until Duterte changed our country’s approach toward China — from being a dragon poker to its whisperer.

The Scarborough Shoal incident could have been better managed had the Aquino administration already strengthened the bilateral consultation mechanism and continued the confidence-building we had with China. The Philippines v. China arbitration decision on jurisdiction, released in October 2015, tells of how our country apparently rejected China’s offer to pursue both diplomatic measures.

On January 14, 2012, Undersecretary Erlinda Basilio of the Department of Foreign Affairs and her Chinese counterpart, Assistant Foreign Minister Liu Zhenmin, had a consultation meeting.

In that meeting, the Philippines proposed the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Zone of Peace, Freedom, Friendship, and Cooperation as an actionable framework to address China’s nine-dash line claim. We also insisted on multilateral talks that would include ASEAN countries - not all of which figure in the territorial conflicts in the South China Sea. One agendum of our country was to define together with China which areas were disputed and non-disputed.

China expressed worry that non-bilateral mechanisms would “only add to the mistrust” between the Philippines and China. It repeated: “It is our long-standing position that the dispute in the South China Sea should be properly resolved among parties directly involved through peaceful negotiations.”

As a counter-offer, China invited the Philippines “to start negotiations … in a bilateral way and take stock of the current dispute and problem,” and for the two countries to start discussing “the establishment of a China-Philippines maritime consultation mechanism or resume the confidence-building mechanism.”

Instead of exerting efforts to find the middle ground, which is the purpose and essence of diplomacy, this is what Basilio said: “As enunciated by our Foreign Minister when he met with Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi, they agreed then to keep the matter to rest, to put the matter to rest because obviously, the Chinese position, is diametrically opposed to the Philippine position.”

So, after explaining the divergent positions of the Philippines and China, Basilio just said: “Let’s leave it at that but as our Foreign Minister has always stressed that we set that aside, we set the West Philippine Sea issue aside …”

Three months after that meeting between Basilio and Liu, the Scarborough Shoal incident took place. If we had an established bilateral mechanism with China, it could have been activated to de-escalate the tension. And if there were confidence-building measures prior to the incident, China and the Philippines would have already developed a sufficient level of trust necessary to make the bilateral mechanism work.

Aquino would not have needed to resort to backdoor diplomacy headed by a senator whose own history is marked by conflict escalation.

Even during the previous administration, there was already an opportunity to be a dragon whisperer. But its foreign policy regime resorted to poking the dragon.

Duterte started turning the situation shortly after he won as president, before his inauguration.

As reported by Aksyon News 5 on May 25, 2016, Zhao Jinhua, China’s ambassador to the Philippines, said that during his meeting with Duterte, the latter “raised the issue [of Filipino fishermen]to [him], personally.”

Zhao’s impression of Duterte was that “he cares about the poor people —  the fishermen.” And as confirmed by the fishermen that News 5 interviewed at the time, the Chinese Coast Guard no longer chased them away.

One of the fruits of the 2016 Duterte’s détente mission to China was the establishment of a bilateral consultation mechanism, which was activated during a Scarborough incident in 2018.

Reacting to that incident, Zhao said: “In English there is a saying, ‘Even in the best-regulated families, accidents happen.’ So, we always have bad apples,  but if we have bad apples, you know what I’m going to do, I’m going to throw into the South China Sea and feed to the fish.”

This statement shows that the bilateral consultation mechanism is actually working. Instead of China just downplaying or ignoring the incident, as it did  during the previous administration, the Chinese ambassador released a strong statement, categorizing some of China’s citizens as “bad apples” that should be thrown into the sea and fed to the fish. We never heard the Chinese ambassador to the Philippines speak this way before towards his fellow citizens. Only during Duterte’s administration.

𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑫𝒖𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒕𝒆 𝑭𝒐𝒓𝒆𝒊𝒈𝒏 𝑷𝒐𝒍𝒊𝒄𝒚 𝑫𝒐𝒄𝒕𝒓𝒊𝒏𝒆

For a long time, our country has been in an enmeshed relationship with the US. We have depended on US support, adopted their views of the world, and relied on their approval. In the process, we have failed to develop our own identity as a geopolitical actor. 

A strong geopolitical identity is rooted in a deep understanding of one's own diplomatic history, values, and aspirations. We can't fully position ourselves in a strategic context if we don't have a strong sense of self. 

Time to reflect as a nation:

1. Who we are without the Americans? 

2. How does the world look like to us if we're going to look at it with our own history, values, and aspirations?

The Philippines remains an ally of the United States. It has not withdrawn from its Mutual Defense Treaty (1951) with Washington. Duterte has not also cancelled EDCA. The US still enjoys all the privileges under that agreement. 

Duterte is not pushing the Americans away. He is setting the limits of their influence in our country. And defining the limitation of America's or any country's influence in our country is a valid exercise of our standing as an equal sovereign nation of any State and a rightful exercise of the power of the President as the chief architect of our foreign policy. 

Certainly, through his shocking antics, Duterte isn’t only asserting the independence of our country in the international arena, he’s also showing his resolve in our domestic politics — and such brazen display of power seduces and awes.

By setting the limits of US influence in our country, Duterte is demonstrating to other nations that we are no longer America's “little brown brother.”

We are America’s equal; sovereign in our own domestic affairs. And just like any sovereign nation, we will chart our own destiny rooted in our understanding of our own history, guided by our own values, and shaped by our own political struggle.

Two interrelated elements accompany Duterte’s delimitation of America's influence in our country: policy of diversification and policy of détente. The diversification element is about broadening our diplomatic relations. It’s best exemplified by forging relations with Russia. Meanwhile, the policy of détente is about easing our tensions with China.

Through diversification, the Philippines balances America's influence in its affairs by engaging with other major regional powers (e.g. Russia, India), and deepening ties with middle powers (e.g. Indonesia).

Détente with China isn't only about diversifying our diplomatic relations, it’s also a necessary step in order to resolve our disputes with them. 

Resolving inter-State disputes always involves reconciling the interests of the contending parties. We will not be able to fully pursue our interests in the South China Sea and reconcile them with the interests of China if we aren’t going to have amicable relations with them. 

In October 2016, Duterte was put on the spot by a Japanese journalist. She asked which Duterte love more between the two regional rivals --- China or Japan.

Duterte chose the side that matters the most: The Philippines. And that’s the very essence of the foreign policy of neutrality, a consequence of Duterte’s eloquent foreign policy doctrine: Friends to all, enemies to none. 

Under Duterte, we have started to become a country that refuses to make its interests a derivative of the power rivalry of other countries. We are becoming more an adult in international relations as we continue to seek our independence from Mother America. As we continue to do this, we will have a clearer understanding of our own interests and what we must do in order to realise and reconcile them with our rivals in our own strategic context. Duterte made us stop sitting on the shoulders of Uncle Sam, so we can start standing on our own feet, seeing the world from where we are, charting our own destiny, breaking the waves of history… 

𝑩𝒖𝒕 𝒏𝒐𝒕 𝒇𝒐𝒓 𝒍𝒐𝒏𝒈

Duterte was on the road to disentangling the Philippines from its over one century colonial bondage with the United States. In 2020, he terminated the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) with the United States. And with the termination of VFA, the military base agreement would consequently end, as that agreement is anchored on VFA.

However, the pandemic happened. The Philippines was in dire need of vaccines. China donated millions of vaccines. Following US propaganda line, Philippines mainstream media demonized vaccines coming from China. Gullible Filipinos believed it. They wanted Pfizer. The West, however, was prioritizing their own people. Philippine Ambassador to the United States, Babe Romualdez, pleaded to Duterte to reinstate VFA. Otherwise, he said, Filipinos wouldn't have vaccines from the United States. Though he is not admitting this, it is not farfetched that Duterte pardoned the U.S. marine who murdered a Filipino transgender who had sex with him but did not divulge that her trans status, as part of the deal. Duterte reinstated VFA, in order to get vaccines for Filipinos.  

Then Bongbong Marcos happened. Marcos rode on the wave of the popularity of Duterte. He promised continuity. The team of Marcos surrounded himself with people close to Duterte, even forming a team with Duterte's daughter, who could have won as president if she was just greedy enough to succeed her father.  I was one of those people. Through the suggestion of RJ Nieto of Thinking Pinoy, the biggest political blog in the Philippines, I was hired by Liza Marcos, the wife of Bongbong, to be a consultant on the South China Sea issue. It wasn't a hard decision as I know Marcos' foreign policy stances since he was a senator - he was against EDCA, he was against the Aquino administration's foreign policy, he supported Duterte's foreign policy, and he promised continuity. I had given Marcos several memo, even on other foreign policy matters. And in his interviews, I could recognize traces of what I had written. One can just revisit all his interviews during the 2022 Presidential elections to check this out. Marcos was elected president by an overwhelming majority. As foreign policy was such a huge issue during the 2022 Presidential Elections,  it isn't a farfetched idea that he was elected because of how his foreign policy approach was different from his main rival - Leni Robredo. 

Now the cat is out of the bag. Election reform advocate Glenn Chong, who was once of the ardent supporters of Marcos' crusade against Smartmatic that supplies the vote counting machine the Philippines uses during elections. Chong also revealed that Liza Marcos had a meeting with U.S. State Department Officials during the campaign period. I guess we can read between the lines what that meeting was really about. 

When Marcos became president, he reversed ALL his foreign policy pronouncements during the campaign period. He expanded U.S. military presence in the Philippines, adding four more military bases, and went on a world tour to repeat Western propaganda line on the "China threat," the latest reincarnation of the Yellow Peril grand narrative of the West. 

Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong rhetorically asked last year in an interview whether Filipinos want to be in a war where the Philippines would be the battleground. The Economist Intelligence Unit released a report in 2023, declaring the Philippines as the most geopolitically vulnerable country in Asia.   And meanwhile, Philippine mainstream media are drumming up the war machine. 

Why did Marcos shift in his decade long foreign policy stances? The answer cannot be disentangled from the fact that his family's assets are frozen in banks in Western countries to the tune of several billion dollars. And this is his best shot to recover all of them, which have been frozen for over three decades. It's a tit-for-tat that Marcos surely cannot refuse. 

The wave of history that Marcos wanted to break is linked to his quest to redeem his family's name. His election as president already gave him that redemption in Philippine politics. In a surreal twist, the Philippine mainstream media, which have been traditionally anti-Marcos, are now ostentatiously pro-Marcos. The recent interview of Marcos with Sarah Ferguson of ABC News Australia only stressed this fact. The interview was supposed to be just about Marcos' anti-China crusade. But just like any wily journalist, Ferguson wanted a gotcha moment. She got it. She asked Marcos about the alleged plunder of his family. Marcos nervously laughed. Ferguson asked back why was the question about plunder funny. Later on, Ferguson released in ABC News Tiktok channel the backstory of that moment. She said that as soon as she mentioned the father of Marcos, the minders of Marcos rushed to the producer, seemingly wanted to shut down the interview. The minders then went closer to Marcos and Ferguson, in order to shut down the interview. But too late, Ferguson already got her moment. If the people of Marcos could do such a brazen act in Australia, imagine what else they could be doing to Philippine media.  No Philippine journalist could ever do what Ferguson did to Marcos. 

Yet Marcos' quest to have his redemption arc in the international community continues. For several decades, the Marcoses were a pariah in both local and international scene. The local is settled. Now, the international is next. And the best way to do it is to give the West what it wants: A barking dog against their economic rival, a battering ram against a country the West desperately wants to bring to its knees, just like how they brought the Middle Kingdom to its knees in the 19th century, in order to access its market and divide its resources amongst themselves. And save for the Ferguson moment, Marcos is on his way to redeem glory and gold, breaking the waves of local and international humiliation his family endured since 1986, so he could write a new story to which the Marcos name would be tied: The Filipino David against the Goliath of China. What a heroic tale that would extinguish the Marcos Thief story!

Duterte was a dragon whisperer. Marcos wanted to be a dragon slayer, and it seems Filipinos are too zombified to see how that story will unfold...

This is a reblogged post from the popular blogger/tv host/ DDS/International Law Expert, Sass Rogando Sasot 

source & photo: For the Motherland - Sass Rogando Sasot | Facebook