Extortion by Duterte in the Philippine's!

[Boats]

Duterte wants US$16 billion for VFA with American military. Fair price for a US ally in the South China Sea, or ‘extortion’?
By: Raissa Robles - This Week In Asia News - 02-21-21
Re: https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/polit...-fair-price-us

* The Philippine president has demanded Washington quadruple its aid to Manila in return for renewing the Visiting Forces Agreement.

* Critics say ‘extortion’ is unlikely to impress the Biden administration; but some think it could be value for money given the country’s strategic location.

Photo link: https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default...es_173518.jpeg
US Marines on exercise in the Philippines. Photo: Reuters

A demand by the Philippine government that the United States quadruple its aid to Manila in exchange for allowing US troops to operate in the country may have shocked Washington, but some experts think the country’s strategic position in the South China Sea justifies the price tag.

Following recent bilateral talks aimed at sealing a new Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) between the two countries, President Rodrigo Duterte put the US on notice that if it wanted a deal it would “have to pay”.

“It’s a shared responsibility but your share of responsibility does not come free,” he said on February 12, the day after the talks ended, in remarks aimed at Washington but delivered in a rambling speech to Philippine soldiers.

Duterte justified the demand by saying the Philippines was the regional nation “nearest to a theatre of war”, adding that the “most convenient outpost [for US forces] would really be the Philippines”. His remarks appeared to be a reference to the territorial disputes China has with various Southeast Asian nations in the South China Sea.

Duterte’s spokesman Harry Roque fleshed out the demands three days later, saying US aid to Manila should be closer to the US$16.4 billion the US gave Pakistan from 2002 to 2017, rather than the US$3.9 billion “pennies” Manila received during the same period.

Roque said he had pulled those figures from a 2018 report by the Stimson Center, a Washington think tank, on US counterterrorism financing.
“Why don’t we bill them so we can use the money to pay for our Covid-19 response, for Universal Health Care, and for free irrigation [for farmers],” he said

Roque added: “That’s not extortion.”

Yet that is exactly how some critics have characterised the move.

Vice-President Leni Robredo, of the opposition Liberal Party, said Duterte’s words were “embarrassing, like we are extorting them”.

The negotiations on a new VFA follow Duterte’s move a year ago to suspend the previous agreement that had been in force since 1999. The agreement, which grants the US jurisdiction over American military personnel accused of crimes while on Philippine territory, had proved controversial after it was invoked in two widely reported cases: one involving four US servicemen accused of rape while visiting Subic Bay, and another involving the killing of a Filipina trans woman, Jennifer Laude, at the hands of US Marine Joseph Scott Pemberton. Critics say the agreement, in effect, makes Filipinos second-class citizens in their own country.

Duterte first threatened to scrap the agreement after the US cancelled the visa of Senator Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa, Duterte’s right-hand man in his controversial war on drugs. The subsequent suspension of the VFA has been popular in some quarters, but Duterte has flip-flopped on the issue, having suspended his own cancellation of the deal on two occasions.

Washington, meanwhile, sees the VFA as essential for it to send forces to the country in support of the Mutual Defense Treaty signed between the countries in 1951. The US currently has fewer than 200 military personnel in the country, mainly involved in counterterrorism work, a far cry from the decades when it operated both a naval station and an airbase in the country.

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Comment by PI: In South China Sea, Philippines fights itself over Beijing’s coastguard law
Re: https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/polit...-over-beijings
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Now, his critics accuse him of attempting to cash-in on Washington’s insecurities over China’s increasing influence in the region.

“For me, when we say we do not want to renew the VFA, then let’s lay down the reasons. Let us show [the US] why it will not be good for us. Money should not be the consideration,” said Robredo.

Senate defence committee chair Panfilo Lacson took a similar line, saying the president “may have given the impression that the Philippines is a nation of extortionists [when] there is a more civil and statesmanlike manner to ask for compensation from a long-time ally using the usual diplomatic channels and still get the same desired results”.
Duterte slammed both Lacson and Robredo as “know-nothings”

Duterte’s withdrawal of support for the VFA has been seen by many as part of a wider move by him into China’s orbit and away from the Philippines traditional ally.

Now, his critics accuse him of attempting to cash-in on Washington’s insecurities over China’s increasing influence in the region.

“For me, when we say we do not want to renew the VFA, then let’s lay down the reasons. Let us show [the US] why it will not be good for us. Money should not be the consideration,” said Robredo.

Senate defence committee chair Panfilo Lacson took a similar line, saying the president “may have given the impression that the Philippines is a nation of extortionists [when] there is a more civil and statesmanlike manner to ask for compensation from a long-time ally using the usual diplomatic channels and still get the same desired results”.

Duterte slammed both Lacson and Robredo as “know-nothings”.

JUST LIKE OLD TIMES?

Critics say the Philippines has tried a similar negotiating track before and it ended badly.

The 1987 Constitution had stipulated that when the Military Bases Agreement (MBA) expired in 1991 it could be replaced only with a new treaty agreed by the Philippine Senate.

President Corazon Aquino’s government started talks over a new treaty in 1989 and began by demanding the US pay US$1 billion for the bases to remain in operation for a further five years. This prompted the US to accuse Manila of engaging in “cash register” diplomacy.

Talks degenerated from there even though, according to a 1989 Los Angeles Times report, US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger had previously made the US$1 billion offer to President Ferdinand Marcos (the dictator was said to have “foolishly” turned the offer down and later had to settle for a much lower “rental” feed).

Greg Poling, a South China Sea expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said, “Of course the US understands that security and economic assistance factors in to the discussion. It did so in every negotiation about the [Mutual Defence Treaty] and the [Military Bases Agreement], so why should the VFA be different?

“But Roque is framing the alliance as a purely one-sided affair in which the US pays for the privilege of being a Philippine ally. That is a dangerously transactional way to frame the relationship, but luckily one that I don’t think is shared widely.

“I doubt anyone is going to take US$16 billion as the starting point,” he said, adding, “that appears to be an estimate of what Pakistan received in both security and economic aid over the last 20 years. If that’s the case, it’s pretty close to what the US already gives the Philippines annually.”

He said that, according to the US government, the Philippines received US$428 million in aid last year, topping the list of recipients in East Asia.

“Should that be US$500 million, US$600 million more? That’s for negotiators to figure out. But a stable alliance has to rest on mutual recognition that it serves both nations’ national security. If it becomes only about dollars and cents then it’s in serious trouble.”

Derek Grossman, a national security and Indo-Pacific analyst for Rand Corporation, disagreed.

“I do think Duterte is serious as he has consistently stated that Washington needs to be prepared to make concessions in exchange for military access to the Philippines. Now, whether US$16 billion is a non-negotiable figure is debatable, but that at least is the starting point.”

Grossman doubted that the Biden administration would “entertain an extortion-like negotiating tactic”. Even so, he thought that the “opportunity for Manila to squeeze some sort of concession from Washington at this point in time, as China’s power continues to grow in the South China Sea, seems particularly high right now”.

“The US should always take what Duterte says seriously because he is not only president, but also enormously popular throughout the Philippines,” Grossman added.

‘A BARGAINING CHIP’

Aaron Jed Rabena, research fellow at the Asia-Pacific Pathways to Progress, a think tank on foreign policy in Manila, said Duterte was using “the VFA as a bargaining chip” and he had been emboldened by the success of previous demands.

“When President Duterte criticised the US for always giving hand-me-down military hardware to the Philippines, the US started to give brand new military assets. Also, when the Duterte government expressed its desire to get arms from Russia, the Americans were alarmed and dissuaded the Philippines from doing so.

“Similarly, when President Duterte threatened to abrogate the VFA, the US reissued Senator Bato’s visa and urged the Philippines to iron things out with them,” Rabena said.
Statistics obtained from the US government appear to support Rabena. In 2016, Duterte insulted US President Barack Obama, calling him a “son of a whore”. Despite this, Congress appropriated for the Philippines’ “peace and security sectors” US$126.58 million for 2017 – the biggest sum for security since 2006.

And even when relations between Washington and Manila had deteriorated, Congress continued appropriating, although smaller amounts.

From 2006 to 2020, the US Congress appropriated US$814 million worth of “peace and security” aid to Manila, but only US$728.6 million was actually “obligated” or became the subject of “a legally binding commitment by the Federal Government that will result in outlays”. Of this obligated amount, US$122 million has been recorded as “spent”.

“It would seem that it’s a bargaining tactic,” agreed Collin Koh, research fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore.

Koh said that the president was serious with his demand and in need of cash to purchase new equipment for the military, particularly after a Vietnam war-era Huey helicopter crashed on February 13, killing seven soldiers.

Koh also thought the price tag was not altogether unreasonable. “Considering the geostrategic importance of the Philippines – it overlooks key waterways such as the Bashi Channel, a favourite transit route for Chinese and American naval and air assets – the role of the [Philippine military] has become more critical.”

He also said that with US forces stretched across the Pacific there would be a greater need for its allies to play a bigger role “in the event of armed conflict in the South China Sea”.

“In this regard, given the Philippines is a claimant [in the South China Sea disputes], the [Philippine military] is expected to play a more crucial role.”

Koh urged Washington to be careful in attempting to “distinguish between mere rhetoric and real business” when it came to Duterte.

He said the fact that no one in the US government had reacted to Duterte’s offer might “mean the Biden administration is simply assessing how the situation unfolds before making any move”.
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A late post added by others with this comment: Duterte should get the US money, and then make a separate deal with China! - Win win!
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Personal note: As long a Duterte remains in power this is the game that will be played by
him 24/7. He has deep money pockets and his people will suffer more under the Chinese rule -
after an agreement is made. Eventually someone will attempt to take Duterte out - if that fails
- he will take all the money he can and setup retirement elsewhere. Unless the folks in P.I.
don't run him out sooner. He's got a Castro type personality.
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Boats