Is the Philippines ready for Trump?

The incoming Trump administration in the US has promised that it would be radically different from the Biden administration. The primary concern of the Philippines is whether the foreign policy towards Asia and China will remain the same or will take a different direction.

In other foreign policy issues, president-elect Trump has already indicated he will not follow the same direction as Biden. He has said that he wants an immediate ceasefire in Ukraine. This means that Russia will be allowed to retain part of the Ukrainian territory that it is now occupying.

President Zelensky of Ukraine has repeated several times that they will never negotiate while Russia holds some of their territory. However, the United States has been the biggest source of military assistance for Ukraine. If this aid is cut off, the question is whether the European nations will be able to provide the necessary aid as a substitute for this assistance. If the EU is unable to fill in this vacuum, then Zelensky might have no choice except to negotiate while Russian troops continue to occupy Ukrainian territory. This will be a clear deviation from the present American policy of providing Ukraine the support that it needs.

In the Middle East, Trump has recently said that he does not intend to interfere in Syria. In fact, he has gone further by announcing that the events in Syria are of no interest to the United States.

These are examples of the United States seemingly following an isolationist policy under Trump. The question is whether this isolationism will also be the policy in Asia, especially with China.

It is true that Trump and his new Secretary of State Marco Rubio have publicly stated that they consider China as the major competitor of the United States. The question is whether they will be willing to confront any territorial challenge from China. It should be noted that China’s territorial claims in Asia are challenging US allies in Asia, from Japan to the Philippines to India and Vietnam.

The potential flash point is, of course, Taiwan. China has been threatening to attack Taiwan. So far, a certain state of equilibrium has existed between Beijing and Taipei. The biggest question is how the United States would react to a Chinese invasion or even a blockade of the island nation.

China’s military modernization has been impressive and is continuing to accelerate. This country now has the largest navy in the world with over 370 ships and submarines. China’s nuclear arsenal is also growing. This potential for conflict has become more dangerous with the addition of an arms race in revolutionary technology. This includes the use of artificial intelligence, quantum computing, synthetic biology, robotics, advances in space and others.

In 2017, Xi Jinping made a speech in which he declared that China would surpass the United States in these new technologies by 2035. The United States must now face the possibility that it could lose the technological race to its main adversary.

The early signs of Trump’s China policy show that it is aware of the challenges that China poses for its national security.

However, the China challenge is increasingly complicated by its growing cooperation with Russia, Iran and North Korea. This is one aspect that we will have to wait and see how the United States can develop closer relations with Putin and Russia and, at the same time, consider China as its main adversary.

As far as the Philippines is concerned, the main question is to what extent the Trump administration would be willing to act on the Mutual Defense Treaty. There was a time when the United States was willing to go to war in the struggle against communism. I still remember when president John F. Kennedy said that their country was willing to “pay any price, bear any burden, in the defense of freedom.”

The United States is a different country today. The isolationist message of Trump seems to be more acceptable to a nation exhausted by several decades of international leadership and military conflict.

This period has seen the rise of populism, isolationism and protectionism all over the world, including the United States.

Whatever is the direction of the US foreign policy, the Philippines will have no choice except to continue to assert its sovereign rights, especially in the West Philippine Sea. It must reinforce its alliance with neighboring countries who are also victims of China’s aggression. These countries include Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia and Australia. Even countries in Europe are potential allies now that they have become aware of the potential danger of China’s imperialist expansion.

The Philippines can also learn lessons from Ukraine: how a small nation can successfully fight a superpower. When Russia invaded Ukraine, it thought that the war would be over in three days.  But it has now been more than two years and the Ukrainians have remained unconquered.

While we hope that the Western world, including the United States, will continue to support our fight for our territorial sovereignty, we must learn the lessons from countries like Ukraine, Taiwan and Vietnam – that we must continue the struggle against China’s aggression.