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Philippines
Friday, March 29, 2024

Should we undertake an official review of the Mutual Defense Treaty?

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By Ambassador Albert del Rosario

The subject of the Mutual Defense Treaty between the Philippines and the US has been recently revisited leading to certain developments.

The good news is the US official statement that “As the South China Sea is part of the Pacific, any armed attacked on Philippine forces, aircraft or public vessels in the South China Sea would trigger mutual defense obligations under Article 4 of our Mutual Defense Treaty.”

For this development, we commend Filipino and American officials who had contributed in releasing an official statement that we view as one of the most important since the ratification of the MDT in 1951.

Having succeeded in moving forward, the not-so-good-news is the current debate about whether or not an official review of the MDT should be officially undertaken.

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We take the view that any agreement may be improved, but the prevailing circumstances will need to be carefully taken into account and assessed. With the recent clarifying statement by the US on defending the Philippines in the South China Sea, it is our firm belief that for now this is sufficiently appropriate as far as the MDT is concerned.

What we must avoid at all costs is to launch an official review of the MDT while permitting our most powerful northern neighbor to exert both external force and internal influence to achieve results for its sole benefit. We note its inclination not only in defense and security but also in areas of vital and strategic importance.

As adequate as it may already be, our MDT can no doubt be improved, but it is the wrong time to do this—not when we have willingly allowed ourselves to have been made increasingly weakened by our northern neighbor’s doctrine of domination.

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