US, Philippines update defense guidelines

tional and non-conventional domains.” training exchanges, exercises and other operational activities.

THE U.S.-Philippines Mutual Defense Treaty, nearly 75 years old now, is being dusted off in the light of “current and emerging threats” to the two countries – read: China’s increasing belligerence about Taiwan and its own maritime claims over almost the entire South China Sea.

Last May 3, newly-crafted Bilateral Defense Guidelines (BDG) were released by the U.S. State Department, which assert the treaty’s “enduring relevance” by “modernizing alliance cooperation in the service of the… shared vision for a free and open Indo-Pacific region.”

Specifically, the BDG reaffirm that an armed attack in the Pacific, “including anywhere in the South China Sea,” on either of their public vessels, aircraft or armed forces – which include their Coast Guards – “would invoke mutual defense commitments under Articles IV and V of the (MDT).”

Such attack threats include land, sea, air, space and cyberspace – through “asymmetric, hybrid and irregular warfare and grey-zone tactics.” Big words that need to be explained by experts, for which the guidelines would “chart a way forward to build interoperability in both conven-

To strengthen U.S.-Philippine “combined deterrence in an evolving security environment,” the guidelines set the following objectives:

• Foster common understanding of roles, missions and capabilities within the alliance framework to face regional and global security challenges (which are mainly U.S. concerns);

• Unify efforts across all areas of bilateral security and defense cooperation to sustain focus on principal regional security concerns; and

• Guide priority areas of defense cooperation to address both conventional and non-conventional security challenges of shared concern.

To advance these objectives, the guidelines say they need to:

• Modernize defense capabilities – Closely coordinate on the AFP modernization program by completing a Security Sector Assistance Roadmap; identify priority “defense platforms and force packages” that would bolster combined deterrence and capacity to resist coercion [presumably from China]; prioritize procurement of interoperable defense platforms (weaponry) “sourced from U.S. programs” and the Philippines’ national defense procurement and funding initiatives and expand investments in non-weaponry defense capacity-building, via education and

• Deepen interoperability –Orient bilateral exercises and activities around improving/ combining ability to counter armed attacks on either country as well as threats in space and cyberspace, while expanding the scope, scale and complexity of exercises; expand cooperation on maritime security and maritime domain awareness, by continued conduct of maritime activities, including but not limited to joint patrols (in the SCS/WPS); under the EDCA, strengthen interoperability, through infrastructure improvements, enhanced joint use of facilities, advancing additional maritime security, maritime domain awareness and humanitarian assistance and disaster relief capabilities; and rotational U.S. access to EDCA sites.

• Enhance bilateral planning and information sharing – Conduct coordinated analysis, tabletop exercises and training/ exercises to reinvigorate bilateral planning and coordination efforts; assess bilateral requirements and advance common objectives and approaches to shared challenges; develop adaptable decision-making processes and communication procedures to support flexible, timely, whole-of-government bilateral coordination and action to respond to conventional and non-conventional warfare.

Broaden information-sharing on early indications of threats to