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Jeoffrey Maitem

A senior Philippine Navy official has detailed China’s extensive militarisation of around 3,000 hectares of reclaimed land in the South China Sea, including bases built on artificial islands within Manila’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ).
Beijing’s build-up of military bases in the heavily disputed waterway over the last 13 years represents a major strategic challenge for the Philippines, analysts say, as the country lacks the capacity to counter such developments militarily.
They argue Manila must now rely on diplomatic and legal measures to push back against China’s expansionism.
Navy spokesman Commodore Roy Trinidad said in a press briefing on Tuesday that China had built bases on Gaven Reef, Zhubi Reef, Fiery Cross Reef, which are outside the Philippines’ EEZ; and on Mischief Reef and Johnson South Reef, within the EEZ.
Trinidad said such bases had everything from airstrips and seaports to fuel depots and resting facilities for troops, giving Beijing the ability to easily position warships and aircraft in the West Philippine Sea, Manila’s term for the part of the South China Sea that lies within its EEZ.

“It will be easy now to project their forces in the West Philippine Sea,” Trinidad said, noting that the Chinese vessels deployed to interrupt Manila’s rotation and resupply missions to an outpost on the nearby Second Thomas Shoal had come from those bases.
“If they didn’t have that staging area, they would have to come all the way from mainland China. That’s about 600 nautical miles going to the Philippines EEZ. It’s far. and their capability to stay longer at sea would be less,” he said.
Abdul Rahman Yaacob, a research fellow in the Southeast Asia Programme at the Lowy Institute based in Sydney, said from a political point of view, China’s fortification of bases in the South China Sea reinforced its claims to that territory.
“At the military level, the bases project China’s military power across the South China Sea and sustain their naval presence in those waters. Therefore, it challenges the claims of other claimant states,” he told This Week in Asia.
Don McLain Gill, a geopolitical analyst and lecturer at the Department of International Studies at De La Salle University, told This Week in Asia that the point of China’s militarisation was total access denial to deter other forces from entering the disputed waterways, including Western powers.
Response options
Gill said it would be difficult for the Philippines to challenge Beijing’s base-building activities militarily, meaning it must rely on other countermeasures.
“We need to have a clear approach to apply more pressure on China’s activities. It has to be a combination of different elements. We could further raise the environmental concerns in the West Philippine Sea and ensure that China is painted as expansionist,” Gill said.
China has been able to transform reefs in the South China Sea into artificial islands using a method that involves extracting coral from reefs, pulverising them and piling these up to create elevated artificial land. In May, the Philippines announced plans to file formal complaints over the extensive environmental damage caused by these activities.
Another option to deter China’s actions, Gill said, was for President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr to sign the Maritime Zone Act, which was passed in Congress on July 17. The law defines the Philippines’ maritime zones and entitlements within each area in line with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (Unclos), an international treaty that provides legal guidelines to define coastal states’ territorial waters.


Unclos was the basis of a 2016 UN arbitration court ruling upholding the Philippines’ territorial boundaries in the South China Sea. The court found that China’s historical claims to much of the maritime region were invalid, but Beijing has rejected the ruling as illegitimate and continued to assert it sovereignty over the disputed waterways.
However, even if the act was passed, Gill said it could not be used to simply evict Beijing from its bases.
“Frankly speaking, forcing China to let go of their bases there is difficult because they have already established them. What we are trying to do is to avoid more occurrences. Because China is continually expanding. They are expansionist. They will not stop,” Gill stressed.
“We have to understand that this is not an overnight thing for the Philippines, it will take a long time for us to establish a credible level of push back when it comes to China’s island building measures. Because, head-to-head, I do not think that we would be able to match the capacity that China continuously shows and unfolds in the greater South China Sea, including areas in the West Philippine Sea,” he added.

Lawyer Aldrin Alba, a legal expert at the Political Economic Elemental Researchers and Strategists think tank, said the bill’s enactment would put the Philippines on better legal footing with allied nations and the international community to ask for support from the UN in enforcing it.
“It will delineate the country’s geographical extent, providing a legal basis for the effective exercise of rights in said maritime areas,” Alba told This Week in Asia.
Gill said it would require a collective effort from allied countries just to prevent China from undertaking further militarisation efforts in the region.
“What we need to do is coordinate with our partners in applying more pressure, making it clear to China that they cannot have a free run in monopolising the South China Sea,” Gill said.
“We have to make sure that we are ready to position ourselves with our partners to ensure that we can slow down their continuous expansion. What we are trying to do is to defend what is left of the status quo,” he said.
Yaacob agreed, noting “Manila has also stepped up defence diplomacy and signed defence agreements with several countries”.
The Philippines has increased security ties with a number of other countries in recent months including Japan, which it signed a Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA) with in July that enables the two nations to jointly train troops and provide mutual aid during natural disasters. It is seeking RAAs with Canada, France and New Zealand as well.
“The aim is likely to anchor as many external powers as possible in Southeast Asia to counterbalance China, as Asean (the Association of Southeast Asian Nations) is unable to support the Philippines in its disputes with China in the South China Sea,” Yaacob said.

On Wednesday, the navies and air forces of the Philippines, United States, Canada and Australia held a two-day “maritime cooperative activity” to press for freedom of navigation and overflight in the South China Sea, the same day China conducted its own military exercises in the disputed region.
However, Gill expressed doubt that such exercises would translate into allies helping Manila directly confront Beijing’s expansionism.
“They are joining us in maritime patrols but their political will is limited when it comes to being upfront with China.”
He said the recent agreement between Vietnam and the Philippines to hold their first joint maritime drills could prove more decisive, since Vietnam was another neighbouring country that also had overlapping territorial claims with Beijing in the South China Sea.
“Beijing’s main argument to external powers is to let Asean countries handle the dispute and not to interfere. In this regard, if we continue what we are doing with Vietnam, we will be able to create better confidence-building measures. And then it will be more difficult for China to expand.”


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South China Sea

South China Sea: what can the Philippines do to counter Beijing’s island-building?

Buildings and structures on the artificial island built by China in the South China Sea’s Fiery Cross Reef in October 2022. China has progressively asserted its claim of ownership over disputed islands in the South China Sea by artificially increasing the size of islands, creating new islands and building ports, military outposts and airstrips. Photo: Getty Images

In this photo from 2017, Chinese structures and an airstrip on the man-made Subi Reef in the South China Sea are seen from a Philippine Air Force C-130. Photo: AP

Chinese structures and buildings at the man-made island on Mischief Reef. Photo: AP

Philippine Coast Guard personnel wave flags as the Vietnam Coast Guard CSB-8002 patrol ship makes a port call at the Port of Manila on August 5.  Photo: EPA-EFE

Philippines turns to maritime law for legal teeth against China

Chinese structures and buildings at the man-made island on Mischief Reef in the South China Sea. Photo: AP

Philippine Senator Francis Tolentino. Photo: Facebook

The artificial island Hughes Reef in the South China Sea. Photo: Reuters

A Philippine flag on a dilapidated Philippine Navy ship that has been aground since 1999 and became a Philippine military detachment on the disputed Second Thomas Shoal in the South China Sea. Photo: Reuters

South China Sea: Sabina Shoal may be new hotspot as Philippines, Beijing spar over sovereignty

Philippine Coast Guard divers and marine scientists surveying part of Sabina Shoal in the waters of South China Sea in June. Photo: Philippine Coast Guard / AFP

Philippine coastguard boats help distribute fuel assistance in Sabina Shoal on Monday. Photo: Philippine Coast Guard

A Chinese coastguard member holds an axe as they approach Philippine troops on a resupply mission in the Second Thomas Shoal at the disputed South China Sea on June 17. Photo: Armed Forces of the Philippines via AP

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A Vietnam Coast Guard patrol ship makes a port call in Manila on August 5. Photo: EPA-EFE

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US Secretary of State Antony Blinken (centre) attends the Asean Regional Forum Ministerial Meeting in Vientiane, Laos, on July 27. Photo: AP

A Philippine soldier guards a US military hovercraft during an annual “Balikatan” bilateral military exercise in May. Washington announced US$500 million in foreign military financing to help modernise the Philippines’ armed forces. Photo: Kyodo

US Vice-President Kamala Harris speaks during an event in July in Washington. Photo: TNS

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(From left) US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Philippine Foreign Secretary Enrique Manalo and National Defence Secretary Gilberto Teodoro pose for a photo during a joint news conference after a foreign and defense ministerial meeting at Camp Aguinaldo in Manila, the Philippines, on July 30. Photo: AP

Philippine coastguard personnel prepare rubber fenders after Chinese coastguard vessels blocked their way to a resupply mission at the Second Thomas Shoal in the South China Sea on March 5. Photo: Reuters

Dust billows as Philippine Army fires Atmos 155mm howitzers during a joint military exercise in May in Laoag, Ilocos Norte, northern Philippines. Photo: AP

Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr (centre left) walks with military chief General Romeo Brawner Jnr at Camp Aguinaldo military headquarters in Quezon City on July 4. Photo: Malacanang Presidential Communications Office via AP

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Observers believe the Philippines has limited military options to dislodge Chinese bases built on reclaimed land in their maritime territory


Observers believe the Philippines has limited military options to dislodge Chinese bases built on reclaimed land in their maritime territory.


South China Sea: what can the Philippines do to counter Beijing’s island-building?

.css-1mniedq{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;}Observers believe the Philippines has limited military options to dislodge Chinese bases built on reclaimed land in their maritime territory

Observers believe the Philippines has limited military options to dislodge Chinese bases built on reclaimed land in their maritime territory