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Sunday, June 18, 2023 Vol. 18 No. 244
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Gibo’s politics of ‘deterrence’ Teodoro outlines leadership roadmap after second appointment to DND post
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By Rex Anthony Naval
EFENSE Secretary Gilberto “Gibo” Teodoro Jr. aspires to continue to build up the country’s defensive capabilities to deter any possible threats, even as he emphasized that the Philippines will not be a “puppet” to any foreign power.
And in building up the nation’s credible deterrence posture, the newly appointed chief of the Department of National Defense (DND) said this initiative should not be aimed at any particular or specific country in general. Teodoro, in an interview with One News’ The Chiefs shortly after taking over the DND top post on June 6, said the country’s deterrence capabilities should be built up to deter potential threats. “We have to be able to build up our own mechanisms to protect our country, whether this be a dispute in the West Philippine Sea or whatnot, that is a non-negotiable posture,” he emphasized. “That being said, ‘deconfliction’ is also important; however the marching [order], in so far as the mission of the Department of National Defense is concerned [is] to protect the territorial integrity of this country, and I don’t see any deviation from that rule,” Teodoro explained. He also said Philippine ter-
ritorial integrity is not only based on our Constitution but on international law, including the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (Unclos). “We fought so hard for the Archipelagic Doctrine under Unclos and we are [going to] stick by that,” the DND chief pointed out.
Building up deterrence forces
AS this developed, Teodoro said the decision of the country to build up its deterrence capabilities should not be questioned by anyone as this is non-negotiable. “How we do it? Whether through alliances, whether through more aggressive modernization, is our internal question, and it is not a question for any other country to question how we do it as we do not question the military expansionism, you know, the defense spending of [other] countries, that’s their business,” he emphasized. Teodoro also thinks the Philippines should focus on protecting its interests without being tagged
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DEFENSE Secretary Gilberto “Gibo” Teodoro Jr. speaks before a recent DND event. PRESIDENTIAL COMMUNICATIONS OFFICE
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If other countries are sincere about having good relations with the Philippines, they have to give us a modicum of trust, that we are responsible, that we are not puppets of anyone and that we want the Philippines for the Filipinos.”—Defense Secretary Gilberto “Gibo” Teodoro Jr.
as a “puppet” of anyone. “The Philippines should protect its own interests and ours first without being forced or without being named as a puppet of this and a puppet of that. The Philippines should be thought of as a value proposition in its own self, as a strong country, as a country with solid fundamentals which we need to build, and as a country where people can invest, people can come. We are friendly to all but jealous of what’s ours, to paraphrase the President’s [Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr.] words,” he added. And while steady progress has been made in modernizing and beefing up the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), Teodoro admitted that there is still a long way to go due to financial constraints. However, this can be expedited once people realize that a “peso de-
ferred in defense spending will just cost five times more if you postpone it for a few years,” he added. “And also we have to [be] cognizant of the evolving capabilities of potential threat actors. We need to build a credible deterrent not only for now but who knows, maybe there will be another threat actor 30 years from now, maybe we will need other capabilities 30 years from now, so we have to build that infrastructure,” the defense chief pointed out.
No second guessing
ALSO, Teodoro clarified that his role as DND chief is not to secondguess the AFP but to look and provide for its needs. “May I segue, the job of the Secretary of National Defense is not to play soldier or to second-guess the Armed Forces, but it is to be a ser-
vice provider to the agencies under it [DND]. So once the Armed Forces decide [to acquire] something, it is our job to secure it for them with the best terms possible, the best equipment, to liaise with Congress in order to support the life cycles for these, so we are resource managers, contract providers, program managers,” he added. The DND is responsible for the AFP, the Office of Civil Defense, the Government Arsenal, the National Defense College of the Philippines, and the Philippine Veterans Affairs Office. “And we provide essential services to the five agencies, so in that we will support our five agencies in whatever they need; we will liaise, intermediate is the word, with the legislature in order for us to get the most possible in terms of funding in order to
support our needs, depending on the strategic assessments made by the national security authorities,” Teodoro pointed out.
PHL will not take sides
TEODORO also emphasized that he will not let the Philippines fall into the trap of siding with “one camp or the other.” “For example, there is always [this] tale spun that it is because of a potential Taiwan conflict, naturally we don’t want the Taiwan conflict because our supply chain will be affected, a lot of semiconductors come from Taiwan and we don’t want any conflict whatsoever and that tale is a false tale, being spun because we do not take any position regarding internal questions of other countries,” the defense chief explained. Continued on A2
PESO EXCHANGE RATES n US 56.0420 n JAPAN 0.3995 n UK 71.6497 n HK 7.1652 n CHINA 7.8683 n SINGAPORE 41.9413 n AUSTRALIA 38.5513 n EU 61.3436 n KOREA 0.0442 n SAUDI ARABIA 14.9429 Source: BSP (June 16, 2023)