McCain, 3 other US senators tackle Spratlys in Manila visit
MANILA, Philippines - Four US senators led by John McCain met with local officials in Manila on Tuesday kicking off a 3-day courtesy call promoting bilateral relations, including the issue on the troubled South China Sea borders.
Aside from McCain, Senators Joseph Lieberman, Sheldon Whitehouse and Kelly Ayotte met with the Philippine Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert Del Rosario to discuss economic and security development, and possibilities of augmenting the border security in the contested Spratly Islands.
McCain told reporters at a news conference that they are considering placing a stronger presence in Asia to protect the other weaker claimants like the Philippines, and provide them with military assistance and training to protect their borders.
"Neither the government of the Philippines, nor the government of the United States, nor the United States senators believe that we will, nor need to have any kind of confrontation with China. But we also feel that it's important that we reaffirm and strengthen our ties. We think that it's important for us and other ASEAN nations, as well as the Philippines, to emphasize that we will do whatever we need to do to protect the principle of freedom of navigation, particularly in the West Philippine Sea (South China Sea). So, greater cooperation on all levels between the united states and the Philippines is very much in order," he said.
U.S. Senator Joseph Lieberman answered the issue of the United States' hand in the South China Sea dispute and said it affects the global economy as it is a valuable trade route to Asia.
"Ideally what we're talking about is maritime security. I mean the fact is, that the waterways here are critically important, not only the economies of the nations here, but the economies of the world. We simply cannot allow one nation, in this case China, to exercise disproportionate control over these waterways," he said.
Lieberman said they do not want to confront China or any other Asian country vying for the territories, but the best way to protect each country's claim is to increase their security in the borders.
"If we both strengthen the Philippine military and we continue, and I hope we can expand our presence here on the waters. Somebody once said that the best way to secure peace is to prepare for war, which is to say to remain strong," Lieberman said.
China, the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, Vietnam and Taiwan have conflicting claims in the Spratlys, an area believed to contain huge deposits of oil and gas in the South China Sea.
Manila refers to the South China Sea as West Philippine Sea to strengthen its claims on parts of the Spratlys. Philippine troops occupy nine islands and shoals in the Spratlys.
Printer-friendly version
Send to friend
Share your views
For self-defence
Northrop Grumman has been wanting to sell its F-20 technology to US allies for 20 years. The technology is still good for the Philippines. It costed US$1.2B twenty years ago. We should negotiate to buy it at one tenth the price and pay it for ten years. The technology will allow us to refurbish and upgrade our F-5 and then eventually build our own modern fighter like what Taiwan and Singapore has done. It is good for us in the long term. It is much better and cheaper than buying new but limited number of F-16s which could only get obsolete or be crashed leaving us nothing again later on.
Read www.f-20a.com
For self-defence
Northrop Grumman has been wanting to sell its F-20 technology to US allies for 20 years. The technology is still good for the Philippines. It costed US$1.2B twenty years ago. We should negotiate to buy it at one tenth the price and pay it for ten years. The technology will allow us to refurbish and upgrade our F-5 and then eventually build our own modern fighter like what Taiwan and Singapore has done. Ot is goo for us in the long term. It is much better and cheaper than buying new but limited number of F-16s which could only get obsolete or be crashed leaving us nothing again later on.
Slow down the modernization of China's military
I hope that we will not have a military conflict with China but China wants a "sphere of influence" that is inconsistent with our alliances. China wants to build a military that would intimidate us out of the region and to abandon our alliances without actually having to fight. Rather than spend ourselves into the poor house trying to keep up, the best thing we could do is slow down the modernization of the Chinese military. Our universities and corporations are transferring military and dual use technology to China at an alarming pace. Our government needs to change the incentives and pass some laws that will slow this down. Read more at www.china-threat.com
What the Republicans really think about the Philippines
"Our troops in the Philippines...look upon all Filipinos as of one race and condition, and being dark men, they are therefore 'niggers,' and entitled to all the contempt and harsh treatment administered by white overlords to the most inferior races."
-- Boston Herald correspondent in the Philippines
"It may be necessary to kill half the Filipinos in order that the remaining half of the population may be advanced to a higher plane of life than their present semi-barbarous state affords."
-- US General William Shafter
"I personally strung up thirty-five Filipinos without trial, so what was all the fuss over Waller's 'dispatching' a few 'treacherous savages'? If there had been more Smiths and Wallers,the war would have been over long ago. Impromptu domestic hanging might also hasten the end of the war. For starters, all Americans who had recently petitioned Congress to sue for peace in the Philippines should be dragged out of their homes and lynched."
-- US Colonel Frederick Funston.
"The Philippines are ours forever...And just beyond the Philippines are China's illimitable markets. We will not retreat from either...The Pacific is our ocean...Where shall we turn for consumers of our surplus? Geography answers the question. China is our natural customer...The Philippines give us a base at the door of all the East...It has been charged that our conduct of the war has been cruel. Senators, it has been the reverse...Senators must remember that we are not dealing with Americans or Europeans. We are dealing with Orientals."
-- US Senator Albert Beverige, Republican
"Hold a moment longer! Not quite yet, gentlemen! Before you go I would like to say just a word about the Philippine business. I have been criticized a good deal about the Philippines, but don’t deserve it. The truth is I didn’t want the Philippines, and when they came to us, as a
gift from the gods, I did not know what to do with them."
-- US President McKinley, Republican
"In one hand the (Republican) party in power held aloft before our people the dazzling and misleading promise of commercial advantage (by conquering the Philippines) and the glory of rivaling monarchical expansion, while with the other it slaughtered thousands of the abject possessors of the soil it coveted, and sent messages of death and disease to thousands of American homes."
-- US President Grover Cleveland, Democrat
"You seem to have about finished your work of civilizing the Filipinos. About 8,000 of them have been civilized and sent to Heaven. I hope you like it.”
-- Andrew Carnegie, American Industrialist, To the US Republican government under McKinley, referring to the assassination of Filipino civilians by US troops
"Take up the White Man's burden--
Send forth the best ye breed--
Go, bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait, in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild--
Your new-caught sullen (Filipino) peoples,
Half devil and half child."
-- Rudyard Kipling, The White Man's Burden: The United States and the Philippine Islands
"The White Man's Burden has been sung. Who will sing the Brown Man's?"
-- Mark Twain, author of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn
"For back then, Pinoys like [Carlos] Bulosan couldn’t even venture into parts of San Francisco without being harassed or beaten. In some California cities, they would have encountered signs saying, 'No Dogs and Filipinos allowed.'
"There’s even that more infamous one in Stockton:
'Positively No Filipinos Allowed.'
"A photo of that sign has been reproduced in posters, books andt-shirts. It’s such a powerful image. I can imagine the Pinoys of Bulosan’s time seething with rage every time they saw such signs"
-- Benjamin Pimentel, Inquirer Global Nation
"The United States is evil. There's this axis of evil. What about the allies of evil - the United States, England, Japan, Australia? These are the evildoers."
-- Bobby Fisher, the only American chess grandmaster who renounced his citizenship in favor of Iceland
"I say death to [Republican] President Bush, I say death to the United States. Fuck the United States...Cry, you crybabies! Whine, you bastards! Now your time is coming! The US is getting what is coming to it. This is just the beginning."
-- Bobby Fisher, Speaking on Bombo Radyo (Philippines) on September 11, 2001 after the 911 attacks.