Vice President Kamala Harris on Monday reaffirmed that an attack on Philippine vessels in the South China Sea would trigger a US response under the 1951 Mutual Defense Treaty between the US and the Philippines. The warning to Beijing came as she was visiting Manila.
“An armed attack on the Philippines Armed Forces, public vessels, or aircraft in the South China Sea would invoke US mutual defense commitments. And that is an unwavering commitment that we have to the Philippines,” Harris said while meeting with Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
Harris’ warning came amid reports of a tense encounter between Chinese and Philippine vessels in the South China Sea. The Philippine Navy said a Chinese vessel blocked a Philippine naval boat on Sunday and forcibly seized what appeared to be Chinese rocket debris that the Philippine boat was towing.
![](https://news.antiwar.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Palawan-SCS-880x1024.jpg)
For their part, China denied it was a forcible seizure and said its vessel took the debris after having a “friendly negotiation at the scene.” The incident happened near Thitu Island, a feature of a disputed archipelago in the South China Sea known as the Spratly Islands.
China, the Philippines, and several other Southeast Asian nations all have overlapping claims to the South China Sea. The US has inserted itself into the dispute by sailing warships near Chinese-controlled islands to challenge Beijing’s claims. The US has also formally rejected most of China’s claims to the waters while not picking a side between other claimants.
On Tuesday, Harris will visit the Philippine province of Palawan, an island province on the South China Sea just outside of waters claimed by Beijing. There, she is scheduled to deliver a speech aboard a Philippine Coast Guard vessel. The visit is unusual and is clearly meant as a message to Beijing as Harris will be the highest-level US official to ever visit Palawan.
One purpose of Harris’ visit is to work to expand the US military presence in the Philippines under the 2014 Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA). The agreement allows the US to build military facilities for US and Philippine forces, and Washington is looking to expand construction.
The work to strengthen the US-Philippine military alliance is part of the US effort to expand its presence in the region to counter China, as outlined by the Biden administration’s Indo-Pacific Strategy. Over in Indonesia, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin met with his counterpart to push for stronger military ties.
The Pentagon said that Austin and his Indonesian counterparts agreed “to expand bilateral military training and education, including through hosting new language training courses, expanding cooperation for emerging defense leaders, and enhancing combined exercises.”
Camal Harris making promises that she cannot back up.
She’s also making it clear that she’ll continue Biden’s policies after 2024 if she gets the chance.
She has no chance of getting the nomination and less of getting elected.I put her odds at about 2000 to one. First of all by 2 years from now with the Republicans controlling the House,all of the State legislatures and the SCOTUS and the emascalation of the Dems the chances of any reform to our politics.Just need to look at her past record in SF.She has almost as bad record as Joe Biden in the Senate kissing the ass of the Republicans
The Neocons can get ‘elected’ anyone they want … only look at W, about as close to Alfred E Neuman as a non-cartoon can get.
Fool me once, er, what comes next? Oh yeah, you are either for us or against us…………
Or look at OButthead
Well said! The only difference is that AEN makes me laugh, Bush doesn’t…
My up vote was accidental because I think if she hides in the basement and it takes weeks to count the vote…….
Agree, but she does tell us what The Blob thinks, and what will be the policy of any Democrat who gets into office. Many Republicans too.
No chance that Ms. druggy gets elected
Thank you for making me laugh…!
Why Ms Druggy? I haven’t heard that.
Camel Harris is a pain in my imaginary balls…!
This media opportunity has been brought to you by the same people who used the nationalists in Ukraine to overthrow the elected government there. I’m not sure that it will work in the Philippines though because our former colony doesn’t much like the US.
I am replying to an old article. What a situation we have.The Dems in the Senate want to destroy the Russians as a culmination of the cold war that has been going on since the the end of WW2. Now we have on our hands an oncoming Government led by an ignorant incumbent who never saw a war he would not support.The big problem is this crisis will ,be the last thing anyone on this planet ever sees.China is not the weak sister that the US likes to fight.If Sleepy Joe and his probable successor proceed on this fools errand it is all over for humanity.It will not be Climate Change that ends life on our Planet.
Very apocalyptic…
Everything would be fine if the lesser evil would behave better.
Do you see that mess of a map of South China Sea Islands? How the hell are supposed to “defend” competing claims like that? The only way out of that mess is long term dialogue between all the parties and not empty threats to defend random lines drawn on a map.
pal2002; Peace talks and coexistance with an inferior race(sic)never fucking happen. This country will never survive or flourish until the idea of White Supremacy bites the dust. That ain’t going to happen either. Time for the people on the East and West coasts to duck and cover.
But, a “mess of a map” is the dish most delightful to the Washington palate. It weakens all the parties and increases their dependence on Washington. Clearly, in the ME as well as here, Washington is busy trying to exaggerate the tensions and antagonisms.
Those sand piles will wash away again as soon as China stops investing major resources into piling them up. A couple of typhoons would do it.
This can be solved by Mother Nature and patience. It is hype, on both sides.
Everyone needs to share the S.C. Sea and chill the hell out!
They ever get Clark AB dug out from all that volcanic ash?
No. Various corrupt efforts to redevelop it all failed.
How many warmongering outreach politicians does this administration have? JFC
The U.S. is going to defend the whole world, or at least willing to sanction the entire world.
re: “The US has also formally rejected most of Chinaβs claims to the waters . . . an island province on the South China Sea just outside of waters claimed by Beijing.”
China doesn’t claim any waters. What it does do is occasionally to publish the nine-dash line first used by the preceding ROC government. It’s used by PRC to ring US chimes, but there is no claim to go with it. The US State Department has so ruled.
Meanwhile there is full freedom of the South China Sea for all the commercial ships which use it, most of them coming and going to/from China. The US Navy has the same freedom “of navigation” that they keep yapping about, but not in the territorial waters which they enter.
Comparing two communist countries: China has 7 outposts in the South China Sea.. Vietnam occupies between 49 and 51 outposts (the status of two construction projects on Cornwallis South Reef is unclear) spread across 27 features in the South China Sea.
“The US has inserted itself into the dispute”
But of course. The US foreign policy in a nutshell. It is part of the world after all.
The Philippines ought to remember that in WW2 the US failed to defend them against even Japan, even when Japan decided to attack the whole Western world at the same time and allocated minimal forces to seize the Philippines (about 2 divisions, landing from cargo ships without actual amphib capability, and only one tiny carrier available with about 20 obsolecent aircraft). Japan’s larger forces went against Hawaii and Malaya, and never came back to the Philippines.
Now the US would have far less force there, and the Philippines in reality still has none at all in that world class.
What was indefensible against Japan in 1941 would fare no better against the new superpower of China in the near future.
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