With the explosion of the Israeli-Iran War in the first week of June amid the raging bloodletting in Ukraine and the Gaza genocide, the world seems to enter a truly perilous stage. In the Philippines, the long-running conflict in the South China Sea/West Philippine Sea seems to have reached boiling point when the U.S. installed missiles in the islands capable of reaching mainland China. This was confirmed by former Secretary of State Antony Blinken and ex-Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin (Birnbaum 2024). President Marcos Jr. has allowed not only the return of U.S. military bases but also their expansion to nine, increasing joint military exercises, and spending billions to modernize the Armed Forces of the Philippines (Reid 2025). This aligns with U.S. preparation to counter the predicted invasion of Taiwan by China, violating the mutually agreed One-China policy, and converting the Philippines into a Ukraine-like arena for endless carnage.
With Trump ready to impose a hefty 20% tariff on Philippine exports, Marcos Jr. is hastening to Washington this July to plead for mercy. His entourage will beg for more weapons used for fighting rebels, following strict treaties binding the former colony to Washington-Pentagon dictates. Defense Secretary Hegseth’s call for more missiles and logistics as deterrence against China signals imminent war preparations (Arkansas Democrat Gazette 2025). The long-running dispute over islands in the South China Sea and the perceived threat of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan has placed the neocolony in crisis, already a basket-case in Asia with its agriculture totally wiped out and industry reduced to call centers. Only the remittances of millions of overseas contract workers–cheap domestic labor, sailors in merchant ships and cruises–are helping pay its enormous foreign debt and keep the oligarchs playing in their luxurious casinos and business ventures outside the country (e.g., Defense Secretary Teodoro was recently exposed as a Malta citizen with huge dollar investments in Malta).
Credits: E.San Juan, Jr.