On April 11, the United States and its important ally, the Philippines, will perform their largest war battle exercises in decades, with over 17,600 military personnel from both nations expected to participate in and around the island country.
According to a US press release, the combined exercise, known as "Balikatan," will go through April 28. The Philippine embassy.
Approximately 5,400 AFP members and 12,200 US military personnel will train "shoulder-to-shoulder, developing interoperability and improved capability in the areas of maritime security, amphibious operations, live-fire training, urban and aviation operations, cyber defense, counterterrorism, and humanitarian assistance and disaster relief preparedness," according to officials.
This year's exercise, the 38th in the series, will include a bilateral command post-exercise designed to "strengthen the Allies' capacity to organize, coordinate, and provide command and control of troops together against a range of scenarios and realistic difficulties."
The training will also assist the AFP and the US military "refine tactics, techniques, and procedures related to marine security, as well as deconflict firing and maneuver in a shared and disputed battlespace," according to the embassy.
Humanitarian Civic Assistance (HCA) programs aimed at repairing infrastructure, increasing medical response, and developing connections between local residents and Filipino and American military forces will also be carried out by military personnel from both countries.
The HCA projects include the construction or renovation of three community health centers and multipurpose halls, as well as training in sophisticated emergency rescue and lifesaving skills, according to the embassy.
The drills come as the Biden administration seeks to expand ties across the Indo-Pacific region to better resist China's growing threat, which has grown increasingly assertive in its operations against Taiwan, which it regards as part of its territory that must be unified with the mainland.
The drills began on Tuesday, barely three days after Beijing concluded three days of military exercises near Taiwan, which included testing integrated military capabilities under actual battle scenarios, rehearsing precise attacks, and blockading the self-ruled island.
These military drills came after Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen met with US President Barack Obama in Los Angeles. Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), which sparked fury in China.
The current war drills between the US and the Philippines, which are near to Taiwan, risk escalating tensions between Washington and Beijing.
China's Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Wang Wenbin said in a statement on Monday that the joint drills "must not interfere in South China Sea disputes, still less harm China’s territorial sovereignty, maritime rights and interests and security interests."
Balikatan spokesperson Col. Michael Logico told reporters in March that the exercises are "not a provocation," adding that the military has the authority to conduct such operations within its own territory, including its territorial seas.
"Everything that we are doing here is only within our territory. Our exercises are not aggressive. We term our exercise as defenses, so we are doing maritime defense, territorial defense, coastal defense," Logico explained.
In a separate statement earlier this month, AFP Spokesperson Colonel Medel Aguilar stressed that the joint exercise serves to enhance both the United States and Philippines’ “tactics, techniques, and procedures across a wide range of military operations,” while simultaneously increasing their ability to “work together effectively and efficiently in response to various crisis situations.”
