WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s visit to the Philippines this week is predicted to bring an announcement of expanded U.S. access to military bases within the country, a senior Philippines official said on Tuesday.
Washington is desirous to extend its security options within the Philippines as a part of efforts to discourage any move by China against self-ruled Taiwan, while Manila desires to bolster defense of its territorial claims within the disputed South China Sea.
U.S. officials have said Washington hopes for an access agreement during Austin’s visit, which began on Tuesday, and that Washington has proposed additional sites under an Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) dating back to 2014.
“There is a push for an additional 4 or five of those EDCA sites,” the a senior Philippines official said. “We’re going to have definitely an announcement of some sort. I just don’t know the way many can be the ultimate final result of that.”
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The official declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the matter.
Manila and Washington have a mutual defense treaty and have been discussing U.S. access to 4 additional bases on the northern land mass of Luzon, the closest a part of the Philippines to Taiwan, in addition to one other on the island of Palawan, facing the disputed Spratly Islands within the South China Sea.
EDCA allows U.S. access to Philippine bases for joint training, pre-positioning of apparatus and constructing of facilities corresponding to runways, fuel storage and military housing, but not a everlasting presence. The U.S. military already has access to 5 such sites.
The Philippines official said increased U.S. access needed to learn each countries.
“We don’t desire it to be directed to simply for the usage of america purely for his or her defense capabilities … it needs to be mutually useful,” he said.
“And clearly, we would like to ensure that that no country will see … anything that we’re doing … was directed towards any conflict or anything of that kind,” he added.
Manila’s priorities in its agreements with Washington were to spice up its defense capabilities and interoperability with U.S. forces and to enhance its ability to deal with climate change and natural disasters, the official said.
He said that after cancelling an agreement for the acquisition of heavy-lift helicopters from Russia last yr, Manila had reached a take care of Washington to upgrade “a pair” of Blackhawk helicopters that might be used for disaster relief.
“The take care of Russia was very attractive because for a certain budget we were capable of get something like 16 of those heavy-lift helicopters,” the official said. “Now with america, obviously their helicopters are costlier, so we’re taking a look at how we will fit within the budget that we have had.”
Gregory Poling, a Southeast Asia expert at Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank, said access to sites in northern Luzon would help U.S. efforts to discourage any Chinese move against Taiwan by putting the waters to the south of the island inside range of shore-based missiles.
He said the U.S. and Philippine marines were pursuing similar capabilities with ground-based rockets, with Manila’s particular interest being to guard its South China Sea claims.
The Philippines is amongst several countries at odds with China within the South China Sea and has been angered by the constant presence of vessels in its exclusive economic zone it says are manned by Chinese militia. China can be Manila’s essential trading partner.
(Reporting by David Brunnstrom; additional reporting by Idrees Ali in Washington and Neil Jerome Morales and Karen Lema in Manila. Editing by Gerry Doyle)
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