Ramming dented not only Phl boat, but also China’s world reputation

Beijing wants Manila to abandon Ayungin (Second Thomas) Shoal.

Its ramming of two Filipino resupply boats on Sunday was the latest of graduated pressures to make Ayungin’s marine sentries leave.

In the past, Chinese Coast Guard gunboats perilously, illegally cut across Filipino civilian outriggers approaching Ayungin. CCG demanded that Filipinos leave China’s imagined “territorial waters.”

In February 2023 CCG escalated to firing military-grade laser weapons at Filipino coastguards escorting the resupply bancas. In August it hazardously drew 40 yards too near to water cannon Filipino coast guards onboard a craft half its size.

Five to six CCG gunboats participated in each of those monthly provocations. Chinese maritime militia steel trawlers aided the dangerous maritime maneuvers. People’s Liberation Army-Navy warships hovered nearby.

Beijing’s next attempts to foil marine rotation and re-provisioning will be scarier. Bloodshed can result; lives, limbs, equipment may be lost. China’s communist rulers want Filipino soldiers and civilians to believe that Ayungin is just a reef, and that tide will soon wash away Navy vessel BRP Sierra Madre grounded there. The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting, said the philosopher Sun Tzu.

That will depend on Filipino resolve. Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro, Foreign Secretary Enrique Manalo, AFP chief Romeo Brawner and Philippine Coast Guard chief Ronnie Gavan expressed the termination to defend the WPS against foreign annexation.

In the wake of the ramming, the AFP, which had hired the civilian outriggers, scrambled its Western Command planes and ships. The PCG compiled all videos. The National Task Force on the West Philippine Sea alerted the public.

The DFA protested the ramming and summoned the Chinese ambassador to accept it. When the latter hid in his office, DFA demanded that his deputy show up.

AFP, PCG, NTF-WPS, DFA regrouped on Monday to brief the press. Malacañang convened a defense-security command conference.

Beijing’s application of Sun Tzu flopped. Even Mao Zedong’s dictum failed it: “The enemy advances, we retreat; the enemy camps, we harass; the enemy tires, we attack; the enemy retreats, we pursue.” Manila harassed, attacked, pursued; Beijing retreated.

China’s embassy was reduced to issuing two statements. The first lied that the puny Filipino wooden outrigger crossed the path of the 110-meter long steel CCG gunboat. That didn’t wash with archipelagic Filipinos, of course. They’re used to sailing small craft, which they know must steer clear of steel ferries or even their wakes.

The embassy added that the Filipino boats had trespassed Chinese territory. “N? h?o sh?!” Filipino media chorused. Under international law, only a permanently surfaced sea feature can be deemed territory and thus warrant 12-mile surrounding territorial water. Not Ayungin, which surfaces only in low tide.

Still, Ayungin is within Philippines’ 200-mile exclusive economic zone (the WPS) and 700 miles away from China’s closest island, Hainan. Therefore it cannot be Chinese territory.

Lastly the embassy claimed that the CCG and Chinese maritime trawler had exercised caution and restraint. Videos show the opposite.

The second statement dwelt on Beijing’s concoctions of four supposed Manila promises to stop sea provocations, making dangerous moves, slandering China and tow away BRP Sierra Madre. Yet it cannot name which Filipino traitor, if any, vowed those.

A good communist must be a propagandist, Mao commanded. The Chinese embassy’s propaganda is stale. Even its agents in Philippine business, government, academe, media cringed to mouth its line.

The ramming highlighted China’s notoriety. Japan, followed by South Korea and France, instantly denounced China’s incursion in Philippine maritime jurisdiction. They warned it against breaching Freedom of Navigation.

America was sharper, calling Beijing’s actions “dangerous and unlawful” – “By conducting dangerous maneuvers that caused collisions with Philippine resupply and Coast Guard ships, the People’s Republic of China Coast Guard and maritime militia violated international law by intentionally interfering with the Philippine vessels’ exercise of high seas freedom of navigation.

“China’s conduct jeopardized Filipino crew members’ safety and impeded critically needed supplies from reaching service members stationed at the BRP Sierra Madre. Obstructing supply lines to this long-standing outpost and interfering with lawful Philippine maritime operations undermines regional stability.”

Previous Chinese harassments of Ayungin resupplies drew rebukes from Great Britain, Canada, Australia, India, Germany and the European Union. China’s aggression has scared small countries from trusting Beijing’s communist overlords.

Beijing cut its nose to spite its face. It broke Sun Tzu’s tenet to “know the enemy and know yourself in a hundred battles you will never be in peril.”

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