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| Image: Flickr User The White House |
By James R. Holmes
Despite Beijing’s concerns, the U.S. couldn’t contain China even if it wanted to.
So Philippine and American officials formally inked a basing agreement during President Obama’s visit to the archipelago. Rather than reestablish permanent bases, the deal will allow U.S. military units to rotate through three to five Philippine facilities — the details are still being sorted out — and to stage equipment and munitions there for combat and disaster-relief missions. Huzzah!
The complexion of the U.S. deployment will depend on the details — as always, the devil’s lair. Either the American presence will be intermittent as forces rotate in and out of places like Subic Bay or the former Clark Air Base, or, more likely, the U.S. presence will be constant while the units anchoring it change. Fresh forces coming from North American bases will relieve those on station in the Philippines, allowing them to return home to rest and refit.
The latter has been the pattern for decades, ever since U.S. leaders decided it was better to keep forces in place along the Eurasian rimlands than to withdraw them after a conflict and return when trouble loomed. The ghost of Douglas MacArthur will confirm how hard it is to return to the Philippine Islands under conditions of extreme duress, and how many lives fighting your way into the theater can cost.
Read the full story at The Diplomat