We certainly are currently in the midst of a new challenging reality as a people and as a nation.
It’s either we keep our pro-US policy in the West Philippine Sea under the Marcos administration or we entertain the school of thought that advances an independent, non-aligned posture reminiscent of the Duterte leadership’s pivot to China insofar as maritime border conflict is concerned.
Clearly, this present administration has reverted to the old posture aligning our best interest with that of the US especially under the aegis of the much-ballyhooed RP-US Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT) and has re-energized its ties with other Western powers via the recent holding of joint military exercises.
This reconfiguration presupposes that in the event of a major conflict erupting in this part of the region and the world, it goes without saying that we will definitely find ourselves on the side of the US and its allies in a large scale military conflagration.
So where will this leave us in our multi-pronged socio-cultural, economic and trading partnership with China and the rest of its strategic partners in the Indo-Pacific region in the event of a shooting war scenario?
We are not military experts yet it goes without saying that it does not take a complicated mind to decipher where we will ultimately be situating ourselves in a shooting war.
Should a war of attrition occur between two military and economic superpowers, it will be our great misfortune to find ourselves miserably caught in the middle of nowhere, this part of the sea becoming a theater of conflict, this nation becoming another Ukraine or another Gaza, God forbid.
But I have great faith still in the inherent goodness of the hearts of men, even of the contending parties and the protagonists.
While we see some kind of military adventurism masquerading as bullying through water cannons of our resupply ships by Chinese militia fleet, I see this as an aggressive posture they are trying to test the strength of their maritime presence and power to the degree that they can wield.
If we ally with the West in directly confronting these intrusive Chinese actions against our vintage vessels, I know these sea intruders will definitely backtrack strategically.
Above all, there has never been a closure to our diplomatic ties with China despite the series of mishaps on high seas. Our diplomatic channels still stand, only that we need to speak or voice out our vehement objections to these bullying tactics in the process gain the support of equally-minded nations of the world.
Better still perhaps we may send, once and for all a high level mission to speak directly to Xi Jinping or his trusted lieutenants and subalterns to help thaw the situation, de-escalate the region since we face mutually larger considerations like our common survival as a race and the flourishing of our intertwined cultures and inseparable futures.
Deep inside me, I have this inkling that leaders, even despots understand fully our myriad lessons in history: That no zero sum strategy can ever ensure commanding victory in the battlefield, that in war, there are no real victors, only casualties on both sides of the armed attack.
The stakes are high and I don’t think it will be of help for any of us to fan the flames of conflict by igniting unwarranted Sinophobia and conjuring worst-case scenarios when all the peaceful options are still within our very reach.
For our policymakers, it will serve us well if we retrace what used to be our unchanging guidepost on foreign policy: That under the 1987 Philippine Constitution, we have embarked on an independent foreign policy — friend to all and enemy to none — while safeguarding our national interest, territorial sovereignty and integrity and renouncing war as an instrument of national policy.
