Locsin: PHL should invest in weaponry instead of ‘throwing money at poverty’

Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. on Thursday called for bigger defense spending instead of “throwing money at poverty” amid China’s increasingly assertive behavior in the South China Sea.

Locsin issued this remark after Senator Panfilo Lacson called his attention to a 2013 China Daily Mail report, which published the transcript of a television interview in which retired rear admiral Zhang Zhaozhong of the People's Liberation Army spoke about a strategy on how to seize Philippine-occupied features in the disputed sea.

“SFA [Secretary of Foreign Affairs] Teddy Boy, a wide reader that you are, I just thought you might have skipped this one which shows the mindset of China on WPS [West Philippine Sea],” Lacson said as part of Twitter exchange between the two officials on Thursday.

“For whatever it is worth, I hope it will further enrich your perspective from the point of view of foreign policy,” Lacson added.

Locsin responded, saying it is a “free world now after the CIA defeated the USSR.” CIA stands for the Central Intelligence Agency of the US, whose rival Russia was an integral part of the now defunct Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

“Every country can speak whatever is on its mind,” the Cabinet official said.

The country’s top diplomat said China’s pronouncements should not determine the Philippines’ foreign policy “but it should inform the national budgetary process that we gotta stop throwing money at poverty and throw it at weaponry.”

It is a Free World now after the CIA defeated the USSR. Every country can speak whatever is on its mind. What it says should not determine foreign policy but it should inform the national budgetary process that we gotta stop throwing money at poverty and throw it at weaponry. https://t.co/l6RLsvJOg7

— Teddy Locsin Jr. (@teddyboylocsin) April 18, 2019

Lacson said he agrees with Locsin’s view except that what Zhang said six years ago was “exactly how they are conducting maneuvers” in the West Philippine Sea, a part of the South China Sea being claimed by Manila.

The senator then paraphrased Sun Tzu, a legendary military strategist in ancient China, who said one need not fear the result of a hundred battles “if you know your enemy and yourself.”

“I’m no expert in foreign policy but I feel it is my duty to  inform and help,” Lacson said.

President Rodrigo Duterte, whose rapprochement with China since taking office in June 2016 has led to improved ties between the two countries, is against any military action to assert the Philippines’ sovereign rights over some features and islands in the South China Sea.

Duterte has repeatedly said the Philippines was no match for China’s military might. However, he told China recently to lay off Pag-asa or else he would deploy troops there for a “suicide mission.”

Palace spokesperson Salvador Panelo said on Thursday that Duterte believes the best way to resolve the maritime dispute is through “peaceful and diplomatic negotiations with China, a mode that avoids a violent confrontation to resolve international disputes.”

Duterte on Wednesday said the Philippines and China should “meet halfway” in resolving the maritime row. — BM, GMA News