SUBIC BAY, PHILIPPINES: Once-secret ammunition bunkers and barracks were abandoned, empty and overgrown with weeds – remnants of the American shelling that used to be the United States’ largest overseas naval base in Subic Bay in the northern Philippines.
But this may change in the near future.
More than 30 years after the closure of its major bases in the country, the US is taking steps to rebuild its military strength in the Philippines and strengthen military alliances in Asia in the post-Cold War era. That new regional threat is an increasingly belligerent China.
On 2 February, the longtime allies announced that rotating batches of the US military would be given access to four more Philippine military camps, in addition to five local bases where US-financed construction of barracks, warehouses and other buildings would continue. The cherished constructions have gained momentum. accommodate an as yet unspecified but expected significant influx of troops under the 2014 defense agreement.
Manila-based political scientist Andrea Chloe Wong said the location of the Philippine camps would give the US military a presence it needs to be “a strong deterrent against Chinese aggression” in the South China Sea, where China, the Philippines and four other governments are increasingly tense. Regional rifts – as well as a possible Chinese invasion of Taiwan, which Beijing sees as its own territory to bring it under Chinese control, by force if necessary.
Around the former US Navy base in Subic, now a bustling commercial freeport and tourist destination northwest of Manila, the Philippine government’s decision to allow an expanded US military presence rekindled memories of an era when Thousands of American sailors pumped money, life and hope into the neighboring city of Olongapo.
“Olongapo was like Las Vegas back then,” Filipino businessman AJ Saliba told The Associated Press in an interview at his foreign exchange and music store, adding that Olongapo used to have a red-light strip.
“In the afternoon the noise went up as the neon lights turned on and the Americans turned around. Women were everywhere. Jeepney drivers, tricycles, restaurants, bars, hotels – everyone was making money – so if they come back, oh my god, you know, that would be the best news,” he said.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said during his visit to Manila last week that Washington was not seeking to reestablish permanent bases, but the agreement to broaden its military presence under the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement was “a big step”. matter”
Austin and his Philippine counterpart Carlito Gálvez Jr. said US military personnel could engage the Philippine military in larger joint combat-preparedness training, help respond faster to disasters, and help modernize Manila’s armed forces. Can
“This is part of our effort to modernize our alliance, and these efforts are especially important as the People’s Republic of China continues to advance its illegitimate claims in the West Philippine Sea,” Austin told a news conference in Manila. “
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Mao Ning said the US military build-up in the region was increasing tensions and threatening peace and stability.
“Regional countries need to be vigilant and avoid being coerced or used by the US,” Mao told reporters at a briefing in Beijing on February 2.
Austin and Gálvez did not disclose the four new locations where Americans would be granted access and allowed to manufacture weapons and other equipment. The Philippine defense chief said local authorities where the Americans would be staying were to be consulted.
In November, then-Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, Lt. Gen. Bartolome Bacaro, revealed that the sites included the strategic Subic Bay, where the naval base was once a boon to the local economy. But two senior Philippine officials told the AP that Subic, where a Philippine Navy base is located, was not on the current list of sites Washington has sought access for its military, although they suggested that talks could continue. may change due to Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the issue publicly.
Subic Freeport Administrator Rolen Paulino said he has not been informed by the government that the former US naval base has been named as a possible site for the US military to visit.
A renewed US military presence in Subic, however, would create more jobs and raise additional freeport revenue at a critical time when many Filipinos and businesses are still struggling to recover from two years of COVID-19 lockdowns and The outbreak of the coronavirus is facing an economic downturn. Paulino said.
“I see them as tourists,” he said of the US military, whose presence could boost economic recovery.
About the size of Singapore, the U.S. in Vietnam in the 1960s and 70s. It was closed in 1992 and converted into a commercial freeport and recreational complex after the Philippine Senate rejected an extension of the US lease.
A year earlier, the US Air Force withdrew from Clark Air Base near Subic after nearby Mount Pinatubo sprung back to life in the second largest volcanic eruption of the 20th century and ash spread over the air base and outlying areas.
The American flag was lowered for the last time and the last batch of American sailors left Subic in November 1992, ending nearly a century of American military presence in the Philippines, which began in 1898 when America ushered in a new colonial era after Spain. The archipelago was seized. Held the Southeast Asian nation as a colony for more than three centuries. Washington granted independence on July 4, 1946, but retained military bases and facilities, including Subic.
China’s seizure of Mischief Reef, a coral outcrop within the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone in the mid-1990s that extends to the South China Sea, “provided the first sign that the allies might be too quick to downplay their relationship”. We can,” said Greg Poling, director of the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, DC.
The Philippine constitution prohibits the permanent base of foreign troops in the country and their participation in local warfare, but allows temporary visits by foreign troops under security agreements such as the 2014 Advanced Defense Cooperation Agreement and the 1998 Visiting Forces Agreement.
The 1998 accord allowed a large number of US forces to be stationed in the southern Philippines to help provide combat training and intelligence to Filipino forces battling the then al-Qaeda affiliated Abu Sayyaf group, which has been accused of deadly bombings. and was convicted of mass kidnapping. Ransom, including three Americans—one of whom was beheaded and the other shot dead in defense of the Philippine Army. The third survived.
Wong said, however, that there is still domestic opposition to the US presence in the Philippines, which has been criticized by left-wing groups as neo-colonialism, reinforced by the 2014 killing of a Filipino transgender woman by a US Marine.
Manuel Mamba, the governor of northern Cagayan province, where Bacaro said the US has reportedly sought access for its military to two local military encampments, vowed to oppose such US military presence. Cagayan Taiwan, located at the northern tip of the main Luzon island, borders the Taiwan Strait and a narrow maritime border with southern China.
“It will be very dangerous for us. If they stay here, whoever is their enemy will become our enemy.
Mamba said, “You can’t really remove any presumption by anyone that the Philippines has a nuclear capability through the Americans, who will be here.”