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Philippines' Duterte says can't stop China developing shoal

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A

Apt101

Member
China got that little despot in their back pocket.

Big tough guy until it comes to the hand that's currently feeding.
 
M

Madness

Member
Xando said:
I mean he's not wrong
Click to expand...

And yet so many here want the US to arm Ukraine offensively etc. You can be against China and still not make such defeatist statements essentially saying hey if we do anything we'll be killed. What does that say about the Filipino people and their nation? You might as well let the Chinese take Manila too, because hey, if they declare war they will lose...

This also says a lot about China. That they will steal land because they know they will slaughter anyone who would rise up against them who isn't the US, Russia, UK, Japan, India etc.
 
F

F!ReW!Re

Member
SgtCobra said:
Nothing, he's 100% right there. China would screw them up really quick.
Click to expand...

Even if that's true, no world leader with an ounce of sense would declare that in a public interview.

You basically gave China the opportunity to do whatever they want....
 
J

Jacob

Member
Drazgul said:
But the internet told me that China's navy is puny and can't therefore project power beyond its borders.
Click to expand...

China's navy does not compare to the US or second-tier naval powers like the UK and France, but that doesn't mean they're "puny" or incapable of operations relatively close to home.

Jackpot said:
No he isn't. There's plenty in between "do nothing" and "declare war".

And even you think that in private, you absolutely do not state it publicly. He's just given them carte blanche to do whatever they want.
Click to expand...

The Philippines has already tried the diplomatic approach and the international courts and it didn't work. It's not like this is a new issue, or that the Philippines being a close US ally stopped China's land grabs in recent years. I agree that Duterte's burning of bridges has weakened his position and his public defeatism on this is pretty weird, but ultimately he's answerable to domestic voters who feel the effects of economic restrictions from China so I think his more pragmatic approach is at least understandable, even if it's not necessarily the best one.

None of this takes away from the fact that Duterte is an insane mass-murderer and that his War on Drugs is a moral outrage, but any Filipino President would be in an unenviable position vis-a-vis China right now, and the ability of the US to stop PRC expansionism in the South China Sea is very questionable.
 
I

Iksenpets

Banned
Huh, boy, sure would be good to have some kind of powerful friend who could help out with these conundrums. If Duterte had one of those, I bet he would be so grateful and would never call them a son of a whore.
 
F

F!ReW!Re

Member
Jacob said:
The Philippines has already tried the diplomatic approach and the international courts and it didn't work. It's not like this is a new issue, or that being a close US ally stopped China's land grabs. I agree that Duterte's burning of bridges has weakened his position and his public defeatism on this is pretty weird, but ultimately he's answerable to domestic voters who feel the effects of economic restrictions from China so I think his more pragmatic approach is at least understandable, even if it's not necessarily the best one.
Click to expand...

Nah this isn't understandable;
- spitting your biggest ally for the last decades in the face.
- proclaiming to be a friend of China and looking for a diplomatic solution.
- China uses it's power to do whatever they want.
- Then as the political leader of the Philippines publicly roll over and declare that you're basically China's bitch because you're too weak/they are too strong.

This is just Trump levels of: I didn't think this through and my verbal diarrhea is biting me in the ass.
 
C

Chaos2Frozen

Member
F!ReW!Re said:
Nah this isn't understandable;
- spitting your biggest ally for the last decades in the face.
- proclaiming to be a friend of China and looking for a diplomatic solution.
- China uses it's power to do whatever they want.
- Then as the political leader of the Philippines publicly roll over and declare that you're basically China's bitch because you're too weak/they are too strong.

This is just Trump levels of: I didn't think this through and my verbal diarrhea is biting me in the ass.
Click to expand...

Alternatively he could just be a Chinese puppet.
 
J

Jacob

Member
F!ReW!Re said:
Nah this isn't understandable;
- spitting your biggest ally for the last decades in the face.
- proclaiming to be a friend of China and looking for a diplomatic solution.
- China uses it's power to do whatever they want.
- Then as the political leader of the Philippines publicly roll over and declare that you're basically China's bitch because you're too weak/they are too strong.

This is just Trump levels of: I didn't think this through and my verbal diarrhea is biting me in the ass.
Click to expand...

I already said that I think Duterte burning bridges with the US has hurt his position, but I'm curious what specifically you think he should be doing right now, given that the Philippines already got a decision in their favor from the Hague which didn't do jack, and that the US has not been able to deter China from making land grabs.
 
B

Buddha Beam

Banned
This is another instance of the world re-alignment towards the BRIC nations, unfortunately. It's not a good future. Just look at how countries like China treats their own people and imagine that being exported to the countries aligned with them. Really sucks.
 
N

nephilimdj

Member
USA thought it could bribe government officials into opening a new military base, despite it being against the Philippine constitution.
And people are sitll shocked the new government hates USA.
 
M

Mumei

Member
ClosingADoor said:
And that is why you need good relations with the US. No country on its own there can stand up to China, so you build alliances.
Click to expand...

Right. The Philippines was actually the largest recipient of U.S. funds in the region under the FMF program; it received $50 million, which frankly is a pittance. Still, the U.S.–Philippines military relationship also includes training exercises and support for maintenance, plus the presence of U.S. bases. The U.S. has also insisted that China abide by the decision of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague and that any future discussions must have that decision as its basis. India has also backed the Philippines' (circa-mid-2016) position. Japan and Australia have also expressed their opposition to coercive unilateral actions in reference to this dispute. Of course, this isn't enough, but these are important signals.

It is true that getting China to abide by it would be difficult. It would require a lot of working together, with the U.S. playing a significant role in shaping the regional environment.

In his recent book, The End of the Asian Century: War, Stagnation, and the Risks to the World's Most Dynamic Region, Michael R. Auslin suggests that the U.S.'s regional role should be to help draw America's current allies closer together and to encourage deeper relations and by consequence great cooperation and coordination, which he says can be described as a set of concentric triangles:

CemTCa3.png


Quoting at length:

The outer triangle links Japan, South Korea, India, and Australia; the inner one connects Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Singapore, with participation by Thailand and outreach to Vietnam. Among these states are Asia's largest and oldest democracies, some of its leading economies, and most strategically located nations. Washington's goal should not be an inflexible new alliance system, which is infeasible in the Indo-Pacific, but the construction of a community of interest based on a common set of rules, norms, behaviors, and coordination among the region's leading nations. The objective is to increase transparency, build trust, and make it easier to defend the maritime and aerospace commons.

While multilateralism and contemporary international law are based on the concept of equal sovereignty among nations, the United States should encourage larger nations to play a more significant role in protecting the rules-based order. The outer triangle of Japan, South Korea, India, and Austrlaia should serve as the anchor for political and security cooperation as well as for U.S. policy in the region. The political stability, liberal social system, and military capability of each state in the outer triangle place them at the core of ensuring regional security.

Washington should also aim at enhancing its political and military cooperation with these pivotal nations. No matter how many troops, ships, and planes the United States places in Asia, they will always be comparatively few, operating at a great distance from the homeland, in countries where there may be significant public opposition to their presence. American military effectiveness thus depends on creating a community of security interests with Asia's major liberal nations.

Security cooperation does not begin with fighting side-by-side. Indeed, the goal of such cooperation is to avoid fighting by shaping the security environment. As a first step, then, Washington should organize regular security summits with Tokyo, Seoul, Canberra, and New Delhi, to address significant security issues and try to set regional standards and norms. Then, the nations should agree on a division of labor. Each country should agree to take the lead responsibility for providing the first response to problems in the geographic areas closest to them. These responses can include such things as disaster relief, combating piracy, attempting crisis mediation, and preventing proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

Each outer triangle nation, moreover, has particular strengths that can be leveraged when needed. Japan, for example, has one of the world's best coast guard and disaster relief capabilities, as it showed during the Indonesia tsunami in 2004 and its own earthquake and tsunami disaster in 2011. The Australian military is almost completely interoperable with American forces and has perhaps the highest level of combat capability and training, which it can use to work with regional states. South Korea's military is also one of the best-trained in the world and is a model for states moving from military authoritarianism to democracy and civilian control over the military.

India, not being a formal U.S. ally, occupies a different position from the three other outer triangle countries. But Prime Minister Modi wants to play a larger regional role, and Washington should give him the opportunity. It should push for greater political and security cooperation with New Delhi in the Indian Ocean and the Strait of Malacca, and in Southeast Asia generally. Expanding the scope of current military exchanges, such as the Malabar naval exercise, is a way for India to partner with the United States and other leading Asian nations, such as Japan, to create a security network. The United States should seek to pool intelligence with India and Japan to gain a comprehensive awareness of threats and conditions from the Indian Ocean to the western Pacific.

So much for the larger players. Successfully implementing the other half of this strategy will require a more dramatic break with the past. The "inner triangle" of Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Singapore—with the participation of Thailand and Vietnam when their domestic political situations have both stabilized and liberalized, respectively—needs a more localized set of responsibilities. Given their security concerns, it may be easier to engage these countries in enhancing martime safety in the "inner commons" of the lower South China Sea, including the key waterways of the Malacca, Sunda, and Lombok Straits. All of these countries are concerned with instability engendered by territorial disputes with China, even if they have no direct disagreements with Beijing.

These states have cooperated through the ASEAN framework, but linking them with the larger powers of the outer triangle is a way to start building a new security architecture in the region. Such actions do not have to conflict with ASEAN's initiatives, and should be seen as complementary. Washington should focus on building up the individual capabilities of each inner triangle nation, so that they can play a larger regional role in the future. When done in concert with political discussions, that can help them shape ASEAN's deliberations as well as form a nascent Southeast Asian community among themselves.

As with the outer triangle states, there should be regular security summits among the U.S., Indonesian, Malaysian, Philippine, and Singaporean heads of state. The group should attempt to engage Vietnam in these discussions, the more so as Hanoi shows a commitment to gradual liberalization at home. Vietnam's strategic location and security differences with China, as well as its growing economic role, make it an important member of the inner triangle. Thailand, too, should be welcomed once its democratic political system is restored.

The inner triangle nations should be a particular target for upgraded exchanges of young military and police officers, joint military training, and capacity building. The 2015 Southeast Asia Maritime Security Initiative, a U.S. pilot program to provide funding for building up coast guards and establishing surveillance systems and exercises, is a good start. It should be funded, however, to the full $425 million originally proposed by the Senate Armed Forces Committee, which was cut during congressional negotiations. Adding to the resources of Japan, in particular, could increase the scope and impact of this type of program.

Reducing Asia's security risks can happen only if these two triangles are brought together. There are numerous ways to do this without threatening any nation's sense of security or making it feel it has to choose between the United States and China. Joint maritime patrols in sensitive waterways among both outer and inner triangle nations, with participation by the U.S. Navy, are a way to build community and deter countries, like China, that seek to coerce other states over territorial disputes. Both Japan and the Philippines have broached the idea of joint patrols with the U.S. Navy in the South China Sea. The same can be done with air patrols over contested or strategic territory. Sharing more maritime information, as well, will build confidence and trust.

There is an obvious objection to this approach: won't a concentric triangles strategy only increase the risk of conflict, since both China and North Korea will feel more threatened?

It is of little use to argue that the goal of this strategy is not to contain China. The worldview of Beijing's leaders has become increasingly rigid in recent years, as shown by their rhetoric, their continued development of offensive military systems, and their unwillingness to compromise on maritime territorial issues. Yet Beijing is well aware that peace in the Indo-Pacific is what has allowed it to become a trading powerhouse and to build its own military without the need to use it. It is not naive to appeal to China's rational self-interest.

At its best, the concentric triangles strategy will encourage Beijing to adapt its policies around accepted rules and norms. The coordinated patrols, information sharing, and other aspects of this strategy may make it clear to Beijing that its assertive behavior will cause it to be increasingly isolated in Asia and that its neighbors will act in concert to promote stability. Over time, we may hope that China's leaders will come to appreciate the benefits of constructive engagement that goes beyond trade or aid packages. If and when China's leadership chooses to help reduce the tensions it has done so much to create, it will find partners who have already created a community of interests.
Click to expand...

Of course, this analysis, focused as it is primarily on security and political cooperation, misses another method of coercion which is discussed in another recent book, War by Other Means: Geoeconomics and Statecraft, and features extensive discussion of China's virtuoso use of geoeconomic tactics in its regional disputes. With regards to the Philippines, for instance, China in 2012 responded to responded to a Philippine naval ship's attempts to arrest Chinese fishermen by refusing to allow 150 containers of bananas to enter the country, slowed inspections of papayas, mangoes, coconuts, and pineapples from the Philippines, set out directives to travel agencies that tours to the Philippines were strongly discouraged, and announced an annual ten week fishing ban around the disputed area allegedly to replenish the fishing stock. The Philippines relented within a few weeks; when it pulled its ships from the Scarborough Shoal, Beijing dropped the economic coercion.

As a result of these tactics, other countries by have taken notice; Vietnam has notably softened its position. And it's not just small countries; China uses these tactics on its larger neighbors as well. After escalations over the Senkaku/Diaoyu islands, Japanese exports to China fell by 14 percent in September 2012 from the previous year, and Japan's overall exports sank 10.3 percent year-on-year. Toyota saw a 48.9 percent drop on year in September 2012 (Honda fell by 40.5 percent and Nissan by 35 percent in China, too), and China decreased the number of rare earths permits by 41 percent.

The book discusses multiple ways that the U.S. can improve its own geoeconomic practice—in recent decades, the U.S. has forgotten its historical practice of geoeconomics and today only uses sanctions (trade policy, investment policy, cyber, aid, financial and monetary policy, energy, and commodities are also tools that the U.S. uses to economic ends, but not to geopolitical ends)—and help countries resist these coercive tactics. For instance, the U.S. should increase State Department funds, pass TPP Round 1 (well it was published in 2016l), lead in the creation of a Pacific Energy Zone that would include North America, Japan, South Korea and perhaps China if its external policies permit to create a comprehensive energy framework for the region by bringing North American supplies to Asian markets in order to alleviate supply insecurities, set norms, and begin to close disparities in gas prices, and hopefully defuse tensions between China and its neighbors which often "begin and escalate thanks to the actions of state-owned energy companies," refocus U.S. alliances to be as engaged on geoeconomic as on political and military challenges, including developing common responses to geoeconomic coercion.

In particular, they recommend working with regional states to identify economic vulnerabilities and assisting in efforts to diversify to improve resiliency and plug these vulnerabilities, as well as developing a common policy with U.S. treaty allies in the region "to ensure that if one ally suffers economic coercion, another doesn't take advantage by filing in behind." And there is some promise here: experts have looked at instances where countries on China's periphery have realized their vulnerabilities and come up with targeted policy responses. By helping to facilitate this, the U.S. can further increase regional stability and support for a rules-based order in conjunction with the security and political efforts suggested before. And speaking of the rules-based order, they also recommend shoring up the rules governing geoeconomic playing fields to deal with new problems that our existing rules and institutions were not designed for and they talk about the ways in which the current system falls short and starting points for solutions.

So, there are a lot of ideas for dealing with the regional challenges presented by a coercive China evidently intent on Finlandizing its neighbors. The Duterte Method (alienate key allies supporting your claims, align yourself with the country coercing you, roll over) is perhaps not the worst option (they could commit an act of war, which would indeed be dumber), but certainly does not advance their interests or the interests of any other state with an interest in supporting a rules-based international and economic order.

On the other hand, the U.S. itself is also starting from, ahem, a questionable place in terms of basic competence, which is sadly perhaps a relief given that the philosophy presented is at complete odds with an engaged, supportive U.S. policy. Personally, I'm hoping that incompetence in enacting a fundamentally bad foreign policy vision leads to the U.S. mostly muddling through with a slightly-worse-than-status quo. I think it's the absolute best case scenario right now. :x
 
N

numble

Member
Mumei said:
Right. The Philippines was actually the largest recipient of U.S. funds in the region under the FMF program; it received $50 million, which frankly is a pittance. Still, the U.S.–Philippines military relationship also includes training exercises and support for maintenance, plus the presence of U.S. bases. The U.S. has also insisted that China abide by the decision of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague and that any future discussions must have that decision as its basis. India has also backed the Philippines' (circa-mid-2016) position. Japan and Australia have also expressed their opposition to coercive unilateral actions in reference to this dispute. Of course, this isn't enough, but these are important signals.

It is true that getting China to abide by it would be difficult. It would require a lot of working together, with the U.S. playing a significant role in shaping the regional environment.

In his recent book, The End of the Asian Century: War, Stagnation, and the Risks to the World's Most Dynamic Region, Michael R. Auslin suggests that the U.S.'s regional role should be to help draw America's current allies closer together and to encourage deeper relations and by consequence great cooperation and coordination, which he says can be described as a set of concentric triangles:

CemTCa3.png


Quoting at length:



Of course, this analysis, focused as it is primarily on security and political cooperation, misses another method of coercion which is discussed in another recent book, War by Other Means: Geoeconomics and Statecraft, and features extensive discussion of China's virtuoso use of geoeconomic tactics in its regional disputes. With regards to the Philippines, for instance, China in 2012 responded to responded to a Philippine naval ship's attempts to arrest Chinese fishermen by refusing to allow 150 containers of bananas to enter the country, slowed inspections of papayas, mangoes, coconuts, and pineapples from the Philippines, set out directives to travel agencies that tours to the Philippines were strongly discouraged, and announced an annual ten week fishing ban around the disputed area allegedly to replenish the fishing stock. The Philippines relented within a few weeks; when it pulled its ships from the Scarborough Shoal, Beijing dropped the economic coercion.

As a result of these tactics, other countries by have taken notice; Vietnam has notably softened its position. And it's not just small countries; China uses these tactics on its larger neighbors as well. After escalations over the Senkaku/Diaoyu islands, Japanese exports to China fell by 14 percent in September 2012 from the previous year, and Japan's overall exports sank 10.3 percent year-on-year. Toyota saw a 48.9 percent drop on year in September 2012 (Honda fell by 40.5 percent and Nissan by 35 percent in China, too), and China decreased the number of rare earths permits by 41 percent.

The book discusses multiple ways that the U.S. can improve its own geoeconomic practice—in recent decades, the U.S. has forgotten its historical practice of geoeconomics and today only uses sanctions (trade policy, investment policy, cyber, aid, financial and monetary policy, energy, and commodities are also tools that the U.S. uses to economic ends, but not to geopolitical ends)—and help countries resist these coercive tactics. For instance, the U.S. should increase State Department funds, pass TPP Round 1 (well it was published in 2016l), lead in the creation of a Pacific Energy Zone that would include North America, Japan, South Korea and perhaps China if its external policies permit to create a comprehensive energy framework for the region by bringing North American supplies to Asian markets in order to alleviate supply insecurities, set norms, and begin to close disparities in gas prices, and hopefully defuse tensions between China and its neighbors which often "begin and escalate thanks to the actions of state-owned energy companies," refocus U.S. alliances to be as engaged on geoeconomic as on political and military challenges, including developing common responses to geoeconomic coercion.

In particular, they recommend working with regional states to identify economic vulnerabilities and assisting in efforts to diversify to improve resiliency and plug these vulnerabilities, as well as developing a common policy with U.S. treaty allies in the region "to ensure that if one ally suffers economic coercion, another doesn't take advantage by filing in behind." And there is some promise here: experts have looked at instances where countries on China's periphery have realized their vulnerabilities and come up with targeted policy responses. By helping to facilitate this, the U.S. can further increase regional stability and support for a rules-based order in conjunction with the security and political efforts suggested before. And speaking of the rules-based order, they also recommend shoring up the rules governing geoeconomic playing fields to deal with new problems that our existing rules and institutions were not designed for and they talk about the ways in which the current system falls short and starting points for solutions.

So, there are a lot of ideas for dealing with the regional challenges presented by a coercive China evidently intent on Finlandizing its neighbors. The Duterte Method (alienate key allies supporting your claims, align yourself with the country coercing you, roll over) is perhaps not the worst option (they could commit an act of war, which would indeed be dumber), but certainly does not advance their interests or the interests of any other state with an interest in supporting a rules-based international and economic order.

On the other hand, the U.S. itself is also starting from, ahem, a questionable place in terms of basic competence, which is sadly perhaps a relief given that the philosophy presented is at complete odds with an engaged, supportive U.S. policy. Personally, I'm hoping that incompetence in enacting a fundamentally bad foreign policy vision leads to the U.S. mostly muddling through with a slightly-worse-than-status quo. I think it's the absolute best case scenario right now. :x
Click to expand...

Your post is extremely US-focused. You acknowledge that Philippines receives a pittance in economic support from the US--$50 million--even when relations are good. You're saying that the Philippines has a lot of options because the US has a lot of options. But the US isn't doing any of those proposed options. Increase State Department funds? Trump's budget proposes decreasing such funds. Passing the TPP? Its dead, Jim.

In the face of the Shoal situation going nowhere, even after a Hague decision and continued American "pressure", economic coercion that has going on for 4 years (you claimed that Beijing dropped the economic coercion after a few weeks in 2012, when in fact the coercive economic measures, including bans on banana exporters, lasted until 2016) and China offering additional economic benefits of $24 billion, the US saying the pivot to Asia is dead and abandoning the TPP (which did not even include the Philippines), is pursuing the status-quo of strongly-worded denunciations of China (with China ignoring) really in the best interest of the Philippines? Asking them to muddle through the next 4-8 years and hoping that the next US President will do better is asking for false hope and is also not in their best interest (and the next President would need to do better than Obama, let alone Trump--the situation from the Shoal has been muddled through since 2012).
 
Sunster

Sunster

Member
Let's see if China repays the Philippines for that. I've been hearing about how they will help improve infrastructure over there. Has that materialized yet?
 
M

Mumei

Member
numble said:
Your post is extremely US-focused. You acknowledge that Philippines receives a pittance in economic support from the US--$50 million--even when relations are good. You're saying that the Philippines has a lot of options because the US has a lot of options. But the US isn't doing any of those proposed options. Increase State Department funds? Trump's budget proposes decreasing such funds. Passing the TPP? Its dead, Jim.

In the face of the Shoal situation going nowhere, even after a Hague decision and continued American "pressure", economic coercion that has going on for 4 years (you claimed that Beijing dropped the economic coercion after a few weeks in 2012, when in fact the coercive economic measures, including bans on banana exporters, lasted until 2016) and China offering additional economic benefits of $24 billion, the US saying the pivot to Asia is dead and abandoning the TPP (which did not even include the Philippines), is pursuing the status-quo of strongly-worded denunciations of China (with China ignoring) really in the best interest of the Philippines? Asking them to muddle through the next 4-8 years and hoping that the next US President will do better is asking for false hope and is also not in their best interest (and the next President would need to do better than Obama, let alone Trump--the situation from the Shoal has been muddled through since 2012).
Click to expand...

I should have been clearer, I think.

I was not making a post about what the Philippines should do.. I was agreeing (at unnecessary length) with the what ClosingADoor had said, and expanding on it by talking about what I'd read recently about ideas for what the U.S. should be doing to facilitate regional security, economic, and political cooperation in the region—and then concluding that it's all moot, really, because the U.S. leadership is dumb as rocks. I also was not saying that the Philippines should be muddling through, waiting for the U.S. to stop being fuck ups. I was saying that it would be better for the U.S. to muddle through due to incompetence than to competently execute the Trump Administration's vision, because that vision is dumb and destabilizing and hurts allies and helps antagonists. But I honestly don't know what the Philippines should do, given the current circumstances.

And I did not claim that it dropped the economic coercion after a few weeks; I claimed—or rather, the book that I was using as a source claimed—that in the specific situation in 2012 Beijing responded to the Philippines pulling its ships from around the Scarborough Shoal by dropping the banana ban and abandoned the other tactics of slowdowns and directives to travel agencies. I just checked again, and that is indeed what it says. I'm not sure if it is an error in the book, if the banana ban was reinstated later, or something else. But I found an article that might explain it:

In 2012, when the suspension started, China after observing that there were allegedly mealy bugs in the fruit shipments from the Philippines immediately imposed strict phytosanitary measures.

With this, the BPI issued a memorandum in 2012 underscoring that exportation of fruits and vegetables shall only be allowed if the exporting firm is accredited and exporters is prohibited to source fruits and vegetables from non-accredited growers and traders. A revised protocol for the export of fresh bananas and fresh pineapple fruits was also issued to address phytosanitary issues.

Antig added that, originally China’s plan was to ban all the Philippine bananas but with the DA and private sectors and China’s conversation they were able to negotiate that the suspension will only be implemented on a case to case basis per exporting company.
Click to expand...

Earlier it says that "five banana companies have been suspended to export bananas to China due to phytosanity issues since 2012." So perhaps there was a total and complete shutdown on bananas from the Philippines entering China, and then it became something more limited but wasn't totally dropped after 2012, and that took four more years to totally drop? I'm not sure, but I'm interested if you've got a better idea.
 
andythinkpad

andythinkpad

Member
Sunster said:
Let's see if China repays the Philippines for that. I've been hearing about how they will help improve infrastructure over there. Has that materialized yet?
Click to expand...

China will take care of Duterte first.

You want to buy cheap high speed train or submarine, China got you cover too.
 
C

Chaos2Frozen

Member
Sunster said:
Let's see if China repays the Philippines for that. I've been hearing about how they will help improve infrastructure over there. Has that materialized yet?
Click to expand...

Won't that just means the Chinese business would come in and become even more entrenched into the Philippines, making it harder to say no to them?
 
S

sleverfunk

Member
Sunster said:
Let's see if China repays the Philippines for that. I've been hearing about how they will help improve infrastructure over there. Has that materialized yet?
Click to expand...
I've read an article about a railway. But china said that they're not sure yet. How will they will help? Loan? Lmao
 
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