The 31st Association of Southeast Asian Nations summit was outstandingly successful. We have to give credit to the ASEAN National Organizing Council headed by Ambassador Jun Paynor and the entire Department of Foreign Affairs. No doubt there was special focus on President Donald Trump and the bilateral meeting with President Rodrigo Duterte. (See photos in This Week on PeopleAsia at the Allure section of the PhilSTAR today).
In all my years in the media business, I have seen the arrival of many US presidents and how they travel, starting with Richard Nixon who visited Manila in 1969. Of course, the most recent one prior to the 31st ASEAN summit was that of Barack Obama who was here for a two-day state visit in 2014 and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in November 2015. There was the eight-hour state visit of George W. Bush in October 2003 where the security arrangements were quite extensive, with F-15 fighter jets escorting Air Force One because US operations in Iraq had just been launched following 9/11.
Whenever a US president travels abroad, preparations are extremely elaborate. But with the recent visit of President Donald Trump – I can probably say that there was nothing like it. The US Secret Service “pulled out all the stops” in the security arrangements for the 12-day, five-nation Asia tour with the Philippines being the last leg.
There were two highly modified VC-25A (the military version of the Boeing 747) – with one designated as Air Force One while another served as a decoy and spare in case of maintenance problems. I was very pleased to see Miascor – a Filipino company run by Ricky Delgado Jr. and founded by my friend, Ricky Sr. – providing ground support as well as catering services for Air Force One and other aircraft that landed at NAIA for the 31st ASEAN summit.
Not known to the public, a squadron of aircraft accompanies the US president during trips overseas. Aside from several C-17 Globemaster and C-5 Galaxy aircraft (to transport presidential limousines including “The Beast”), there are also MV-22 Ospreys (primary assault support aircraft) and several helicopters that include VH-60N White Hawks and VH-3D Sea Kings which can serve as Marine One whenever the US president needs to move around by air.
Considering the threat coming from North Korea and the recent Marawi crisis, it’s not surprising that an E-4B Nightwatch aircraft shadowed the US president all throughout his Asian tour. Nicknamed the “Doomsday Plane,” the E-4B can serve as a command and control aircraft – actually a “war room in the sky” – in case a nuclear war suddenly breaks out. It was also rather unusual that three aircraft carriers were sent to the Asian region for the duration of Trump’s Asian tour.
Judging from the body language of both President Trump and President Duterte, it was obvious that both leaders like each other – which should put to rest the apprehensions of many that the relationship between the US and the Philippines was going downhill at the height of President’ Duterte’s anger at what he called US meddling on what should be a domestic issue.
Everything went smoothly like a well-choreographed play, with President Duterte even singing a Filipino love song and joking that he did it “upon the orders of the commander-in-chief of the United States” – indicating that President Rody was in a jovial mood.
A slight hitch was the confusion regarding the joint communiqué and the statement of presidential spokesperson Harry Roque regarding the issue of human rights. The way I see it – it was really just a matter of interpretation since it was evident from the joint communiqué that both sides regard human rights and the dignity of human life as essential – which tells you that the issue was touched on.
However, there was no direct question coming from the US president about human rights, and it was President Duterte himself who provided the narrative to give the whole picture regarding the government’s war against the drug menace – which is what I assume Harry, who was also present at the bilateral meeting, meant when he said the issue of human rights was “not brought up.”
The president has recognized that there have been major lapses by the Philippine National Police in conducting the campaign against illegal drugs. Which is why right after the killing of the two teenagers, President Rody made the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency take the lead in the anti-drug war. There is no doubt that the real culprits are the corrupt PNP officers including the nine generals identified by the President.
The drug network is so deep that it will take some time for the intelligence community to ferret out the identity of the narco-politicians and police officials who are involved in the illegal drugs trade and most likely are the ones responsible for the so-called extra-judicial killings. PDEA may be much smaller in manpower, but it currently has a high credibility rating. The PDEA agents are all highly trained and supposedly have more experience.
President Rody explained the context of the country’s anti-drug campaign to President Trump, with the US president recognizing the wisdom of listening first and not making assumptions without knowing the entire picture. There are other ways to look into the issue of human rights without making it look like the US is stepping on the sovereignty of our country. One thing for sure, we were all happy to see that the personal relations between the US president and our president are very good.
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