US announces $500 million military investment to Philippines as China threat rises

The U.S. on Tuesday announced a $500 million investment in the Philippines to help modernize the Filipino armed forces and coast guard as Manila faces a rising threat from China in the disputed waters of the Indo-Pacific.

The half-billion dollars in foreign military financing, which the U.S. called an unprecedented investment, comes from the supplemental package for the Indo-Pacific, Israel and Ukraine passed in April.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who is in Manila with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, called the new funding a “once-in-a-generation investment” in Filipino security.

“Our relationship between the United States and the Philippines is the strongest that it’s ever been,” he said at a Tuesday press conference. “We are living in an incredibly complex moment, and as a result, the partnership between our countries is more important than ever.”

Blinken added that the investment would help the Philippines “focus on external defense” and to “be better positioned to defend their sovereignty.”

Blinken and Austin, who met with their Filipino counterparts in Manila just a day after reaching a historic agreement with Japanese officials in Tokyo to boost military ties, also agreed with the Philippines to double spending on bases that host a rotation of U.S. forces on the Pacific archipelago, as well as to share information on defense modernization and technology and increase exercises and interoperability.

Austin said the U.S. and the Philippines also pledged to work more closely with other allies in the region, including Japan and Australia, in what he described as a “new convergence in the Indo-Pacific.”

“The United States, the Philippines, and our other allies and partners are operating together more closely and capably than ever,” he said at the Tuesday press conference.

The agreements are likely to infuriate China, which has long pushed back against growing U.S. alliances in the Indo-Pacific designed to counter Chinese influence.

China has, in the past couple of years, frequently clashed with the Philippines in the South China Sea, over which Beijing claims nearly complete sovereignty despite a 2016 international ruling. The Chinese coast guard has hit Filipino crews with water cannons and even attacked them with machetes.

An agreement reached this month between the Philippines and China allows Filipino crews to resupply a beached ship at the Second Thomas Shoal reef, where most of the clashes have taken place, that Manila has used to maintain its presence in the South China Sea.

Philippine Secretary of Foreign Affairs Enrique Manalo said Tuesday they would continue the resupply missions after an initial mission after the agreement was reached had succeeded.

“It’s something that we are committed to pursue in succeeding supply missions, provided, of course, China also adheres to the understanding,” he said.

Blinken also said he supported the diplomatic agreement.

“It’s very important that that be the standard, not the exception,” he said. “And as I said to the Chinese foreign minister when we met in Laos a few days ago, China must uphold its commitments to not obstruct the Philippines in their resupply missions.”