SEOUL, South Korea — Manila is turning Beijing‘s gray-zone tactics on their head as it shows off its own information warfare muscles in the intensifying territorial battles in the South China Sea.
While China‘s much larger forces hold the physical advantage, the Philippines, which has held the legal high ground in its struggle against Beijing since 2016, is putting its opponent on the back foot in the court of global public opinion.
Just days after China fired water cannons on a Philippine Coast Guard vessel carrying teams from global media – which relayed the news around the world – President Ferdinand Macros Jr. took to the moral high ground, saying he would not permit Philippine vessels to return fire with fire – or rather, water with water.
“What we are doing is defending our sovereign rights and our sovereignty in the West Philippine Sea,” he said in televised remarks Monday, referring to the local name for the body of water west of his nation. “We have no intention of attacking anyone with water cannon or any other such offensive … er … you’d have to call them weapons. That is not something that is in the plan.”
To vigorous nodding from aides, he added, “The last thing we would like is to raise the tensions. … We will not follow the Chinese vessels down that road,” he continued. “It is not the mission of our Navy or our Coast Guard to start or to increase tensions: Their mission is precisely the opposite, it’s to lower tensions.”
After last week’s events, China finds itself on the defensive in the battle of messaging in the dispute.
On April 30, a Philippine Coast Guard vessel and an accompanying vessel loaded with supplies for Philippine fishermen approached the tense waters of Scarborough Shoal. A long-running, low-key confrontation is underway there, as China seeks to control the waters, which lie 137 miles west of the Philippines — within the country’s 200-mile deep exclusive economic zone — and some 450 miles south of China.
In media footage captured by drone and from the deck of the Philippine Coast Guard vessel, two larger Chinese Coast Guard ships flanked it, then opened fire with high-pressure water cannon. As Philippine crewmen on deck dashed for cover and slammed hatches, and journalists scrambled to report, water cannon obliterated a metal-plastic canopy on the fantail of the Philippine ship.
Beijing is not apologetic: Gan Yu, a spokesperson for China’s Coast Guard, said last week that the Philippine vessels ignored China‘s repeated warnings so the coast guard forces had taken “necessary measures” that were “reasonable, legitimate, professional.” He alleged that the Philippine vessels “infringed on the sovereignty of the Chinese side.”
It is just the latest brinkmanship between the two nations in a long-running dispute that includes Chinese vessels using water cannon, rammings and even alleged use of non-lethal laser weapons.
A 2016 international legal arbitration under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea found for Manila, not Beijing, in multiple complaints over the Scarborough Shoal and Mischief Reef, but China has rejected the verdict.
The clash captured by the international media was just the latest brinkmanship between the two nations. Officers of the Philippine Coast Guard admitted both their frustration at the non-escalation policy and their determination to obey their orders.
“The public is already demanding that the Philippine Coast Guard use water cannon, because we are equipped with water cannon,” the command’s spokesman, Commodore Jay Tarriela, told Sky News. “That is not part of the procedure that we do, because the guidance of the president is very clear: We should not be provoked, we should maintain our temper, we should deal with them professionally.”
He added, “But all Philippine Coast Guards are front-liners and are really angered.”
If Manila had sought to spring an information-war ambush on China’s Coast Guard, it succeeded. Reportedly, the reporters onboard the Philippine vessels last week — including teams from the BBC, the Daily Telegraph, Sky News and local outlets — had long sought to join the Coast Guard patrol and had finally been green-lighted by Manila.
“What China is doing is operating in the grey zone, below the threshold of conflict, and ships getting doused with water cannon do not make headlines around the world, but this time they had a media contingent on board,” said Alex Neill, an expert on China‘s armed forces and a research fellow at Pacific Forum. “This looks like plain bullying.”
Mr. Tarriela said that the Philippines is “the lead country in telling the world that China is a bully country, a law offender and it undermines the rules-based order. This is not just our own fight. China is a rising power that is challenging the international law, our global order.”
Australia and Japan, which have their own issues with Beijing, have been edging closer to Manila. Canberra on Monday issued a formal protest to Beijing, claiming a Chinese fighter jet performed an “unsafe and unprofessional” maneuver that endangered an Australian navy helicopter operating in international waters off the coast of North Korea.
Washington maintains a mutual self-defense treaty with Manila, which could, feasibly be invoked if Philippine servicemen are killed. Philippine and U.S. troops are currently drilling together in and around the Philippines in their annual “Balikatan” exercises.
Though China looks reluctant to escalate militarily, there are plenty of other weapons at its disposal in the clash.
“Marcos is digging in his heels with the Chinese, but at what cost to the Philippine economy?” said Mr. Neill, referring to the power of China‘s economy, the world’s second-largest. “It begs the question if we will see fruit imports cut, or tariffs increased or infrastructure deals suspended — all of which China is well known to do.”