Two senior Republican U.S. senators asked President Joe Biden to provide response options to aid the Philippines in its row with China over a disputed shoal in the South China Sea.
The move came almost a month after a tense standoff on June 17 between Filipino troops and China Coast Guard personnel at Second Thomas (Ayungin) Shoal, which is inside the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone and about 1,000 kilometers [621 miles] from China. A Philippine sailor lost a thumb in the confrontation after the China Coast Guard rammed his vessel.
Philippine military officials said that Chinese personnel, armed with pikes and machetes, punctured Philippine boats and seized firearms during last month's incident, the latest and most serious encounter between Manila and Beijing in the contested waters in recent months.
At the shoal, the Philippines maintains the BRP Sierra Madre, a World War II-era naval ship grounded in 1999 to serve as the country's outpost. Manila runs regular rotation and resupply missions to the shoal.
"We must respond with visible and concrete demonstrations of our support," wrote senators James Risch and Roger Wicker in a July 12 letter to Biden. "Anything short of this risks our appearing unwilling to honor our bilateral commitments."
Risch is the top Republican in the Senate foreign relations committee, while Wicker is the highest-ranking Republican in the Senate armed services committee.
Both requested Biden to “provide a full list of military, diplomatic, and economic options” from the U.S. defense and state departments to help Manila in its maritime dispute with Beijing.
The senators also reminded Biden about Washington’s treaty with Manila, America’s oldest defense ally in the Asia-Pacific region.
The two nations are bound by a 1951 Mutual Defense Treaty, which calls on each to come to the other's aid in times of war or third-party aggression.
"Your administration has repeatedly stated that an attack on Philippine public vessels, aircraft, and armed forces – including its Coast Guard in the South China Sea – would invoke the U.S. mutual defense commitments under Article IV of the 1951 U.S.-Philippines Mutual Defense Treaty," the senators wrote."Limiting our response to verbal assurances of the applicability of Article IV undermines the credibility and value of these commitments."
Earlier, the White House and U.S. State Department condemned China’s actions in the June 17 incident, calling them “escalatory and irresponsible.”
On Tuesday, Manila and Washington’s top military chiefs discussed ways to boost cooperation between the two countries and enhance their joint annual war exercises.
Manila and Beijing agreed on July 2 to “de-escalate tensions” in the waterway following the June 17 standoff.
The two sides “had a frank and constructive discussion on the situation in the South China Sea,” adding that both “affirmed their commitment to de-escalate tensions without prejudice to their respective positions,” according to a statement released by Manila’s foreign affairs department.
Amid the ongoing tensions between Manila and Beijing in the South China Sea, one political analyst thinks regional bodies such as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) could play a bigger role in resolving the disputes.
“What is worthy of also underscoring is [ASEAN’s] silence, right? I think they feel quite cowed by [China],” professor Chong Ja Ian told BenarNews on June 28.
“It should live up to its mandate to try to encourage dialogue. It should use the ASEAN Regional Forum mechanisms to do confidence-building and de-escalation [to address tensions],” said Chong, an assistant political science professor at the National University of Singapore.