Editorial: Revisiting RP-US relations

Saturday, February 11, 2012

REP. Walden Bello of the party-list group Akbayan was correct when he urged the House of Representatives and the Senate to closely monitor talks between officials of the Philippines and the United States.

US Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs Andrew Shapiro is in the country consulting with Philippine officials on how to further enhance Philippine-US defense and security cooperation.

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“Talks between Philippine officials and their American counterparts are all over the news, but information about what is happening, and what is being agreed on, is very rare to come by,” Bello said.

Indeed, if the country wants to firmly grasp the lessons of decades of Philippine-US relations, a well-informed populace is essential. Whatever agreement is reached should not be hidden from public view like what happened in the past.

There is no question about the need for the Philippines to maintain a strong relation with the US especially with the country’s ability to stake its claim to a portion of the Spratlys hampered by the lack of resources.

In a way, US officials must have sensed a certain degree of vulnerability in the Philippines for them to intensify their effort to strengthen ties and to ward off the influence of China in Southeast Asia’s economic and military affairs.

There are reports that, aside from plans to strengthen US military presence in some countries in Asia, the setting up of a small US military base in the Philippines has been countenanced. That rekindled the old debate on how far we will go in accommodating the needs of an old “ally.”

Beggars can’t be choosers, true, but Philippine sovereignty is something that can’t be bartered for, say, swallowing what the country has already vomited. Consider how we would look if, after dismantling the US bases in the country two decades ago, we will allow the setting up of such bases on our shores again.

This is a tricky balancing act for the administration of President Noynoy Aquino considering the upside of RP-US relations. The US, for example, is providing the country a second ship after the Hamilton-class vessel Gregorio del Pilar was acquired last year.

Still, the bottom line is never to enter into one-sided military pacts again.