The Significance of Ending the US-Philippines Visiting Forces Agreement

Interesting read this morning. The Philippines seem to want to go their own way but that might not be a good decision in the long run.

Be a good idea to start teaching their children Chinese in their schools.

I think President Duterte made a questionable decision to terminate the Visiting Forces Agreement (which acted like a SOFA to delineate what government had legal jurisdiction in case U.S. troops misbehaved). With no legal protection, U.S. forces will be withdrawn (must be gone 180 days from the date of VFA termination notice to the U.S. government), joint military exercises and naval port visits will be cancelled, and the U.S. (depending how pissed our government gets) will likely cancel financial military and other aid. When the Philippine Senate voted not to extend the Military Bases Agreement in 1992 and the U.S. had to abandon Subic Bay Naval Base and Clark Air Base, that's what happened, and the loss of all that money hurt the Philippines (at the bottom of everything that happens in the Philippines is money). Duterte seems to have a preference for the Chinese, and I'm sure the Chinese government would be very willing to fill the vacuum that's left when we leave (so would the Russians), but I don't think the Philippines as a whole realizes what a deal with the devil they could be making if they invite the Chinese in, request aid, and so forth. Of course, in announcing the VFA termination, the Philippine spokesman said that the agreement would be ended in 180 days - unless some other agreement is made. So Duterte may be playing dangerous games to try to work some kind of more favorable deal with the U.S., but I don't expect our government to bite on that. Meanwhile, the Philippines will have to deal on its own with its terrorists and insurgents - probably not too successfully without U.S. help - and be careful in its dealings with its neighbors (the Philippine military probably couldn't fend off an invasion by a well-equipped battalion of Ghurkas). The Philippines is already a sick man of SE Asia WITH U.S. aid - imagine how that will go without it. I'm confident that the U.S. will find other places (like Australia) to exercise and make port visits - I'm not sure how the Philippines will turn out under this new arrangement.