The latest NATO summit proved a surprising success following a surreal bromance between top leaders. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, a veteran politician and former Dutch prime minister, pulled out all the stops to charm US President Donald Trump, who was visibly pleased with all the obsequious talk over his “Daddy” status in the global pecking order.
But the leaders of top US allies in Asia, namely Japan and South Korea, stayed away, reportedly due to disagreements over defence spending, trade tensions, as well as military action against Iran.
For now, it seems that Europeans are confident of winning over Trump with a combination of flattery and long-term burden-sharing reassurances. I got an inkling of this charm-offensive strategy when a diplomat at the Quai d’Orsay emphatically told me earlier this year: “We have no issues with him. We have an excellent relationship with Trump!” The context of my recent conversations with diplomats in several major European capitals was the seeming divergence in Washington’s approach to allies in Asia and Europe.
Key foreign policy camps within the Trump administration tend to agree that Asia should be a top strategic priority, largely because of the emergence of China as a peer rival. Enter the curious case of frontline US allies such as the Philippines, which, unlike countries in Europe, has actually been at the receiving end of the Trump administration’s flattery. Top US officials have not only heaped praise on Manila’s growing role in constraining Beijing’s expansionist activities, but have also pushed for increased defence aid to and military presence in the Southeast Asian nation. In many ways, the Philippines has rapidly emerged as a reliable and consequential element of a US-led integrated deterrence strategy against a revanchist China.
In fairness, Philippine-US bilateral ties experienced a renaissance under the first Trump administration, which not only managed to prevent a breakdown in bilateral ties under the Beijing-friendly Rodrigo Duterte presidency, but also steadily expanded the US naval presence in the South China Sea through joint drills with regional allies, regularised freedom of navigation operations, and clear defence commitments under the Philippine-US mutual defence treaty. In fact, then US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo became the first top cabinet member to publicly clarify that the United States is obliged to aid Manila in the event of an attack on Philippine public vessels, aircraft and troops by a third party in the South China Sea.
The Biden administration and its West-friendly Filipino counterpart Ferdinand Marcos Jr simply built on this earlier effort. Far from breaking with precedent, the second Trump administration has shown even greater commitment to cementing a new era of bilateral cooperation with the Philippines.
During his visit to Manila earlier this year, the US Defence Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth reiterated his country’s “iron-clad commitment” to Manila and also emphasised the need for jointly enhancing “deterrence” capabilities in the face of “Communist China’s aggression in the region”. The US defence chief also underscored how the second Trump administration is “truly” prioritising a shift to Asia in “recognition that for the 21st century to be a free century” Washington needs to “stand alongside our allies and partners shoulder to shoulder.”
The second Trump administration’s empathetic approach to the Philippines has come with a catch.
Accordingly, Hegseth announced the deployment of the Navy-Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System (NMESIS) for this year’s US-Philippine Balikatan exercises, which happened to be one of the biggest on record. The Pentagon also gave a green light to the sale of up to 20 fighter jets – 16 F-16Cs (single-seat, single-engine) and four F-16Ds (dual-seat jets for training purposes) – under a $5.58 billion contract in order to “improve the security of a strategic partner that continues to be an important force for political stability, peace, and economic progress in Southeast Asia.”
While top US officials have been pressuring US allies to ramp up their defence spending, they have shown tremendous strategic sympathy for the Philippines, which has historically spent barely over 1 per cent of its Gross Domestic Product on the military. If anything, the Trump administration has not only exempted defence aid to Manila amid the ongoing overseas aid freeze, but is even expected to increase foreign military financing assistance to the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) with an eye on China.
The second Trump administration’s empathetic approach to the Philippines, however, has come with a catch. As the Pentagon’s top strategist Elbridge Colby told me prior to his return to service, frontline allies like the Philippines will have to forego any strategic hedging in favour of full-fledged alignment with America, especially on the China question. Eager to maintain its room for manoeuvre, the Marcos administration initially sent mixed signals, most notably on the brewing conflict over neighbouring Taiwan. The Philippines also wavered on sensitive infrastructure projects, including a proposed new port facility to be built by the Pentagon in the northernmost Philippine province of Batanes, which is only 160 kilometres from Taiwan’s southern shores.
Over the past year, however, the Philippines has increasingly embraced a more active Taiwan strategy, since, as one influential Filipino naval strategist put it, “[I]f we lose Taiwan, then China becomes our neighbour. And our [entire] northern territories will be under threat.” Accordingly, the Philippines has expanded its own naval facility near Taiwan, welcomed joint drills with the United States near the Bashi Channel, and is hosting advanced US military hardware such as the Typhon missile system. Most recently, the Philippines has also expressed openness to hosting more forward-deployed US presence, including a new weapons production and storage facility in Subic, which hosted the largest overseas American base during the Cold War period.
Overall, the second Trump administration’s bearhug of the Philippines may have strengthened its Southeast Asian ally’s hand vis-à-vis a resurgent China. But this could come at the cost of steadily diminishing Manila’s room to manoeuvre and, potentially, its overall geopolitical autonomy.
