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President-elect Joe Biden with former President Barack Obama. Photo: Carolyn Kaster/AP/prospect.org
any Filipino-Americans, especially those living on both coasts of the United States, are glad former Vice President Joe Biden won the election. Many viewed the Trump presidency with dismay. But there was one thing Trump got right. He stood up to China and called it for what it is: an evil, totalitarian state that is hell-bent on dominating its neighbors and eventually the entire world.
During his four years in office, Trump consistently put China in its place. His actions stand in stark contrast with those of the Obama administration. Outwardly, the Obama White House professed multilateralism. In reality, it seemed to care little about long-time allies like the Philippines.
A case in point was the Scarborough Shoal standoff with China in 2012. Despite the Philippines being a former colony of the United States, despite the existence of a mutual defense treaty ratified by both country's legislatures, despite Filipino troops having a history of fighting alongside American forces during World War II, Korea, and Vietnam, the Obama administration effectively turned its back on the Philippines. U.S. State Department employees would not even go on the record to affirm that America was obligated by treaty to defend the Philippines when China occupied the shoal. It was only after Trump became president that high-ranking officials like James Mattis and Mike Pompeo reminded China that the Philippines was a treaty ally and the U.S. would come to its defense.
Seemingly scared of its own shadow, the Obama administration concluded it was not worth angering China over Scarborough Shoal—which a New York Times article described as—"a scattering of rocks in the South China Sea." Obama and his team then went on to stick their heads in the sand while China built up one artificial island after another, turning them into "unsinkable aircraft carriers." Today those "fake" islands threaten the entire region, including U.S. territories such as Guam, the Marshall Islands, and even the state of Hawaii.
When Obama took office, the U.S. Navy's Seventh Fleet could sail its ships anywhere around the Spratly Islands and the South China Sea. Today, its ships navigate those waters with trepidation, thanks to Obama. This sad reality we find ourselves in today might have been different had a more assertive U.S. president been in office.
Today President-Elect Biden is appointing many of the same folks who advised Obama on China. Thankfully, the intervening years have proven beyond doubt that China is not the peaceful, benign country it pretends to be. What is happening in Hong Kong and Xingjian, to name just two instances, has opened all eyes to what a Sino-led world will look like.
Biden's pick to be his National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan served him in the same capacity when he was vice president. Unfortunately, Sullivan appears to believe in the now widely-debunked assumption that as China becomes more prosperous, it will become more open and democratic. Sullivan considers his past efforts to help in China's global rise as one of his significant achievements.
Kurt Campbell is another Biden adviser who will likely play a significant role in his administration. He was Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs in the Obama Administration. In September 2019, he and Sullivan co-authored an article in the highly-regarded publication, Foreign Affairs questioning why America had to compete with China.
"What, exactly, is the United States competing for," they asked. After all, as far as they were concerned, "China is central to the prosperity of American allies and partners." Both further note—almost in awe—that Chinese "factories are the forge for much of the world's advanced technology."
Their article, published in September 2019, shows that both believe China's global leadership is inevitable. They even note that "the United States must accept that military primacy will be difficult to restore, given the reach of China's weapons."
Campbell, Filipinos may recall, was also instrumental in concocting the everyone-should-just-go-home plan during the Scarborough Shoal standoff in 2012. With a typhoon headed for the shoal, Campbell and his crack team of advisers came up with a face-saving strategy to end the standoff by having both Philippine and Chinese ships leave the shoal on the pretext of avoiding the approaching typhoon. The Philippines complied, and its vessels departed. However, something must have gotten lost in translation because China's ships never left. With egg on their faces and their tails between their legs, Campbell and his crack-team of China experts must have shuffled home in stunned silence.
Susan Rice, Obama's National Security Advisor, had been eyeing the Secretary of Defense position in the incoming Biden administration. That position was offered instead to retired Gen. Lloyd Austin. While he still faces confirmation by the Senate, we believe he is significantly better qualified than Rice, who was instrumental in crafting the Obama Administration's head-in-the-sand response to China's island-building in the Spratlys. The U.S. did next to nothing for over a year as China brazenly destroyed natural reefs, shoals, and atolls in the South China Sea, turning them first into artificial islands and then into fortified military outposts.
In July 2016, Rice even flew to China to calm Beijing's frayed nerves, after the Arbitral Tribunal in The Hague tossed out their meritless Nine-dash-line claim to most of the South China Sea. Reuters reported that Obama officials even went so far as to quietly ask claimant countries "like the Philippines, Indonesia, and Vietnam not to move aggressively to capitalize on The Hague ruling."
A President Biden will need advisers who cannot be bullied or hoodwinked by China. Sadly, Susan Rice has shown that she is more a Neville Chamberlain, ready to appease any smooth-talking despot, than a Winston Churchill who will gladly go head-to-head with him.
In fairness, Obama should not get all the blame for the failures and missteps that occurred. We Filipinos share much of that blame. Then Philippine President Benigno Aquino III was either too timid or intimidated by the Americans to demand that the U.S. come to the aid of its treaty ally. America, after all, had signed a treaty with the Philippines. Also, Philippine officials should have immediately protested when some Americans tried to argue that China's occupying of an uninhabited shoal far out at sea might not be reason enough to invoke the treaty. Our point in all this is that the Aquino administration never objected or argued but went along with whatever their American counterparts suggested.
And the current Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte fares no better. Like Obama, Duterte appears intimidated by China, so he does all he can to ingratiate himself with Beijing. He believes that China can easily crush his military, so he does his best to stay on their good side.
Therefore, it falls on Filipino-Americans, to try and help the incoming Biden administration avoid the mistakes and shortcomings of the Obama administration. Having experienced first-hand China's aggression, we must forcefully articulate our unique perspective to America's leaders.
Had Filipinos been more vocal during the Scarborough standoff, the Obama administration might have acted differently. Unfortunately, Philippine officials kept mum, preventing the Obama administration from fully understanding the gravity of the situation, as well as the long-term consequences of inaction.
And over time, it has become apparent that Obama's failure to act in 2012 has made things more unstable today. As we point out earlier, much of the Western Pacific, including U.S. territories like Guam, the Marshall Islands, and American Samoa, are now easily within range of Chinese missiles based on those artificial islands in the South China Sea.
It should be clear to all at this point that China poses an existential threat to liberal democracy everywhere. If it is to survive, freedom-loving people everywhere must unite to protect it.
Despite all his shortcomings, Trump has been spot-on regarding China. Now that Biden and former Obama staffers are back in the driver's seat, Filipino-Americans cannot remain on the sidelines and keep silent. They should stay engaged and make their voices heard. Published 12/12/2020
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