“WHAT is our fight with Taiwan? Why are these new bases all in northern Luzon, where we are doing all these military exercises a stone’s throw from Taiwan, if the purpose is really as stated, for calamities and humanitarian assistance? fighting for another country, the US…is that right?” Senator Imee Marcos asked the Foreign Relations Committee hearing if the US intends to use the new EDCA sites to join a fight for Taiwan and not to help the Philippines.
When EDCA was expanded, the Americans celebrated, saying the additional EDCA sites would provide additional targeting challenges for China. What does it mean? It’s simple… that China must also target the Philippines, apart from Guam and Okinawa… even the US media is talking about it,” revealed international relations expert Sass Rogando Sasot
None of the defense officials responded when video of US bombers flying from northern Luzon en route to Taiwan, produced by the White House think tank CNAS, was shown. The video showing plans for a future US war scenario with China in Taiwan aired in mid-2022 on an NBC program and was first reported by Dr. Dan Steinbock in The Manila Times August 2022. Was the Department of Defense (DND) or Foreign Affairs (DFA) briefed by the US on this?
Foreign Affairs Secretary Enrique Manalo and Defense Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr. EDCA sites will be used more as staging platforms for humanitarian activities, than Senator Marcos and Governor Cagayan. asked Manuel Mamba.
Governor Mamba disclosed that it was only recently that the Americans did. “The United States gave two second-hand rubber boats and some boxes of supplies and tissues. It was demeaning, as if we couldn’t buy these things on our own. If they really want to train us, they should have started then, no . only now.”
“Many nations have given and given us aid without asking us to install their military bases,” another lawmaker said.
Emergency arms donations by China and Russia at the height of the Marawi crisis also prevented the Philippines from becoming a failed IS state and saved countless Filipino soldiers, the president recalled of IDSI, George Siy. “The US, during the Marawi siege, blocked the acquisition of rifles for the PNP. They did not help us,” recalled Senator Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa, who was then PNP chief.
“The geopolitical situation of the Philippines is very complex and it suffers especially from economic problems such as recession, inflation, etc. The Philippines is not at the same economic level or position or even structure. Some say that its economy (U.S. ) is based on war, our economy is not based on war,” Senator Koko Pimentel recalled.
Minced meat and cannon meats
Senator Marcos also expressed concern that the EDCA sites could become a target for attack, especially by any of the US’s enemies. The Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces, General Andrés Centino, admitted that “military camps will always be a target for adversaries.”
“Under the Caroline test under customary international law, a neutral state’s territory, such as the EDCA sites in northern Luzon, which is the location of a bell state’s stockpiles of weapons systems such as the US, may be a legitimate military target. of another belligerent state, such as China, North Korea, Russia or Iran. And under Article 4(1) of the EDCA , the US has the absolute right to stockpile not only supplies for humanitarian aid but also military weapons,” recalled Dr. Melissa Loja. , expert in constitutional and international law.
Also, unlike other US EDCAs with Poland, Bulgaria, and Australia, where there are express provisions in their EDCA that require prior notification and consent regarding the type of weapons that will be stored at their sites EDCA, there are no such provisions under the EDCA. philippines
These foreign military bases and installations in “Philippine” military bases have not been subjected to any full inspection by any Filipino, not even the Philippine President.
The US maintains its position that it will never confirm or deny the presence of nuclear weapons at all its military bases and installations around the world, including its submarines, ships and aircraft. This US stance violates the anti-nuclear weapons provisions of our Constitution.
Also, in contrast to what DFA and DND officials told senators at the Foreign Relations hearing on EDCA, when Gálvez himself told Senator Marcos that additional locations are still under negotiation, in November 2022 , the former head of the Armed Forces of the Philippines. Gen. Bartolome Bacarro said there were five additional proposed sites under the EDCA, which include two in Cagayan, one in Palawan, one in Zambales and one in Isabela. Sources said one of the proposed five additional EDCA posts was not approved due to a “political issue”.
Local governments are apparently often not consulted, for example, Ilocos and Cagayan; US officials just go in, report that bases are being set up, ask for help, and if there isn’t full support from some official, those officials are just ignored.
EDCA also poses serious threats to our environment as it happened to the former US military bases in Subic, Zambales and Clark, Pampanga.
American military pollution in the Philippines is linked to the deaths, reported by the Americans themselves in Travis J. Tritten’s “Stars and Stripes,” who wrote about it as early as 2010.
“The U.S. military is long gone from bases in the Philippines, but its legacy remains buried here. Toxic waste was spilled onto land, pumped into waterways, and buried in landfills for decades on two sprawling Cold War-era bases. Today, ice cream shops, Western-style horse ranches, hotels and public parks have sprung up on land once used by the Air Force and Navy; a benign facade built on land that the Philippine government said is still contaminated with asbestos, heavy metals and fuel.
“Records from about 500 families who sought refuge at the deserted bases after a 1991 volcanic eruption indicate that 76 people died and 68 others were sickened by contaminants at the bases. A 2000 study by in the Philippine Senate also linked the toxins to an “unusually high occurrence” of skin diseases, miscarriages, stillbirths, birth defects, cancers, heart disease and leukemia.’
“Philippines President Joseph Estrada formed a task force in 2000 to address the issue, but it was left dormant and unfunded after he was impeached a year later.
“The Navy was pumping 3.75 million gallons of untreated sewage every day into local fishing and swimming waters in Subic Bay. The bases were dumping fuel and chemicals from firefighting exercises directly into the water table and used underground storage tanks without leak detection equipment, according to a 1992 report from what was then known as the General Accounting Office.
“At least three sites at the Subic Bay Naval Base, two landfills and an ordnance disposal area, are dangerously contaminated with materials such as asbestos, metals and fuels, the Philippine government found after an environmental survey there.
“Clark Air Force Base was a staging area during the Vietnam War. Its aviation and vehicle operations contaminated eight sites with oil, petroleum lubricants, pesticides, PCBs and lead, according to a 1997 environmental survey of the Philippine government.
“Before the United States closed the bases, it drew up a rough bill to clean up the hazardous contamination… The Air Force and Navy estimated that cleanup at each could cost as much as $25 million…. [but] Any real chance for an environmental cleanup was dashed by the two governments in a deal that absolves the United States of any responsibility for the pollution.”
What is the guarantee that these things will not happen again at the “Philippine” military bases that are now designated under the EDCA as sites for the establishment and stationing of US military bases, troops and installations , more particularly in the Cagayan Valley, the so-called last frontier of the Philippines with its lush forests and pristine waters?
Dr. Mario Ferdinand Pasion is the president of Filipino Nationalists Against Foreign Intervention.
New Worlds by IDSI. For intelligent and progressive readers who want to see the world beyond the headlines (idsicenter@gmail.com).
