President Joe Biden has stressed the U.S. will defend the Philippines following recent showdowns between the Southeast Asian ally and China that left several injured.
Biden on Thursday reaffirmed that Washington's "ironclad" commitment to its seven-decades-old Mutual Defense Treaty with Manila covers "armed attacks on Philippine armed forces, public vessels, or aircraft—to include those of its Coast Guard— in the Pacific, including anywhere in the South China Sea, according to a White House statement.
Biden met with Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. ahead of the pair's landmark summit with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, a first for the country as the U.S. seeks to rally its Asia-Pacific partners to counter China's increasingly muscular presence in the region.
Biden and Marcos discussed new initiatives on economic and energy security, investments in "critical infrastructure" and maritime collaboration, according to the statement.
In an about-face from his pro-Beijing predecessor President Rodrigo Duterte, Marcos has overseen a concerted pushback against China's expansive territorial claims within the Philippines' internationally recognized exclusive economic zone.
The Chinese and Philippine foreign ministries did not immediately respond to written requests for comment.
China asserts sovereignty over upwards of 90 percent of the South China Sea, pitting its claims against those of the Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Taiwan.
A 2016 decision from the Hague-based Permanent Court of Arbitration dismissed the Chinese government's sweeping claims, citing a United Nations treaty on maritime law signed by both China and the Philippines. However, Beijing claims the ruling was void, citing "historical rights."
Manila has been stepping up government patrols in contested waters and publicizing China's incursions, in a strategy Ray Powell, director of Stanford University's SeaLight program, has called "assertive transparency."
In response to Manila's assertiveness, China has deployed its coast guard and paramilitary vessels to confront Philippine missions in nearby waters, hundreds of miles from the nearest Chinese shores.
This has been particularly true of Philippine supply missions to the Spratly Islands' Second Thomas Shoal, where the Southeast Asian country stations a contingent of marines aboard a grounded 80-year-old warship the BRP Sierra Madre.
Twice last month, Chinese maritime forces confronted Philippine supply boats and their coast guard escorts as they made their way to the atoll, conducting risky up-close maneuvers and firing water cannons that injured Philippine sailors.
Despite his defiant language, President Marcos has said the incidents did not warrant invoking the defense treaty with the U.S.
Uncommon Knowledge
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Micah McCartney is a reporter for Newsweek based in Taipei, Taiwan. He covers U.S.-China relations, East Asian and Southeast Asian ... Read more
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