Manila mistaking dirty-work tool for security

A meeting designed to build trust through inclusion should not be a stage for bloc politics or amplifying unfounded allegations against a particular country.

Yet the Philippines, Japan and the United States engaged in an orchestrated attempt to turn the 13th Association of Southeast Asian Nations Defence Ministers' Meeting-Plus, held in Cebu, the Philippines, last week, into an instrument of geopolitical exclusion.

That Manila allowed a certain politician to abuse the country's chairmanship to obstruct China's participation in what is intended to be an inclusive regional security forum has seriously violated ASEAN's principle of consensus through consultation and runs counter to the open character of the ADMM-Plus mechanism.

As China's National Defense Ministry spokesman Zhang Xiaogang stressed, such moves do not conform to basic diplomatic protocols and undermine China's legitimate rights as a member of the mechanism.

China's decision to send a defence attache to the meeting demonstrates the country's firm support for ASEAN centrality and its responsible approach to regional defense and security cooperation, Zhang pointed out.

The military courtship between Tokyo and Manila is particularly troubling. Japan's agreement to facilitate the transfer of Abukuma-class warships, after decommissioning, to the Philippines together with training, maintenance and logistical support, marks a significant expansion of Japan's military-equipment provision in Southeast Asia. The reciprocal access agreement, joint exercises and discussions on intelligence-sharing are turning political warmth into operational integration. While Japan's deployment of combat units to Philippine territory, taking advantage of the 2026 Balikatan exercises earlier this year, marked a key step for it to rebuild its foothold in Southeast Asia after World War II.

For Manila, the danger is that the strengthened military ties may become a strategic burden. Japan is seeking to extend its military reach southwards, while the US is encouraging a more integrated posture linking its allies across the "Indo-Pacific". Japan increasingly serves as a bridgehead connecting the US alliance system with NATO-oriented security thinking and the wider region. The Philippines, meanwhile, is being positioned as a southern outpost linking the East China Sea and the South China Sea, at the southern end of the First Island Chain.

This is not an arrangement that will enhance Philippine security. It risks turning the country into a forward platform for other powers, exposing its territory and people to the consequences of a confrontation in which Manila would have little control over the timing or terms. The transfer of military equipment may make the Philippines better armed, but it does not make it safer. A country that allows itself to be pushed to the front line may find that it is being handed tools to do another power's dirty work. The problem is compounded by those bad apples in the Philippine defense establishment who appear more interested in serving external agendas than protecting the country's long-term interests.

By connecting the East China Sea and the South China Sea in a single military framework through the Philippines, Washington and Tokyo are encouraging a security architecture that treats separate disputes as parts of one strategic contest. Such maneuvering invites outside powers deeper into regional affairs and weakens ASEAN's ability to manage differences through dialogue.

There is an especially disturbing historical dimension to Japan's growing military role in the region. The participation of notorious Yasukuni Shrine-linked figures in recent commemorations in the Philippines has raised legitimate questions about Manila's attitude toward history and the postwar international order.

At the Oct 25 ceremony marking the Battle of Surigao Strait, the presence of Yasukuni's "chief priest", a former vice-admiral, and an artist associated with the "war-criminal shrine" lent the occasion an unmistakable political undertone. Accounts posted by Japanese participants described a ritual bow by the Japanese personnel toward Yasukuni and offerings to the "war-criminal" spirits "honored" there. A memorial intended to remember the dead should not become a platform, provided by Manila, for sanitizing Japan's wartime record or glorifying its militarist past.

Yasukuni's enshrinement of 14 convicted Japanese Class-A war criminals from WWII makes attempts to present it as "an uncomplicated symbol of peace" deeply offensive to the victims of Japanese aggression. Philippine officials and politicians who choose to associate themselves with such figures should ask what historical message they are sending. To welcome representatives of Japan's neo-militarist tradition while overlooking the suffering inflicted across Asia is to abandon a basic moral responsibility.

The region does not need a new military front, still less a hierarchy of patrons and proxies. It needs restraint, respect for historical truth and an ASEAN-centred approach to security. Politicians in Japan and the Philippines who, for narrow domestic or strategic interests, steer the region toward confrontation are being reckless with the peace and prosperity of their own peoples. No country should mistake military alignment for security, or another power's strategic ambitions for its own national interest.