Countering China: Back to the Philippines
U.S. military aircraft stationed in Luzon would help keep the peace by denying Beijing the prospect of winning even a short campaign.
For the past two years, Chinese territorial encroachment in the South China Sea has surged to unprecedented levels. Last week the Philippine Supreme Court handed down a decision that could provide the ideal way for the U.S. to respond.
In April 2014, Washington and Manila signed an Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement permitting the U.S. to construct facilities in the Philippines and rotate forces through the islands. On Jan. 12 the Philippine Supreme Court ruled that the “executive agreement” signed by Philippine Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmindoes not require Senate approval. This clears the way for the return of U.S. forces to help counter China’s growing military power and territorial aggressiveness.
China has engaged in a campaign of creeping encroachment against its neighbors for almost two decades, but two years ago it accelerated the pace. Since January 2014, China has reclaimed at least 2,900 acres of land on seven maritime features—reefs, shoals and islets—in the South China Sea. Beijing insists that 85% of the sea belongs to China, conflicting with the claims of six other nations including the Philippines.
The U.S. naval base in Subic Bay was once America’s largest overseas naval base, and Clark Air Base, also on the main island of Luzon, was home to a wing of U.S. fighters. Both bases were closed in the early 1990s against the backdrop of an ending Cold War and a negligible threat from China.
That threat has grown exponentially and helped to prompt what the Obama administration calls its Asia Rebalance. To bolster this policy, Washington should send a fighter wing, air-refueling tankers and P-8 maritime patrol aircraft, as well as naval vessels and ground units, back to the Philippines.
Stationing these aircraft on Luzon would prove useful in any of the three most likely conflicts with China. In the event of a conflict over the Spratly Islands, they would augment the 48 fighters that would sail into the theater on a U.S. carrier, more than doubling the combat aircraft on hand. They would add a third location near Taiwan from which to operate fighters if China launches an assault on the island, and they would add more forces within reach of Japan’s disputed Senkaku Islands.
Such a move would show that the U.S. intends to remain a protector of international law in the region and reinforce its ability to deter aggression. Despite China’s slowing economic growth, its defense budget—officially $132 billion in 2014 but estimated by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute to be as high as $216 billion—continues to grow at 10% annually, as it has for 20 years. Beijing’s temptation to settle disputes by force will only grow as it closes the military balance.
To ensure that disputes in the South China Sea and throughout the region are settled peacefully, Washington needs to increase its own military spending and station enough forces locally to deny Beijing the prospect of winning even a short campaign. Re-establishing fighter forces in the Philippines would be a good start.
Mr. Katz is the director for defense analysis at Aviation Week Intelligence and Data Services. He previously served in the Defense Department and in the U.S. Army as a special- f
