Carpio: PH may need more warships, fighter jets

From ABS-CBN (Jul 29): Carpio: PH may need more warships, fighter jets

The Philippine government may have to allot more funds to the military if the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea does not rule in Manila's favor in its maritime case against China, Supreme Court Senior Associate Justice Antonio Carpio said Wednesday.

Carpio, in a forum held in Camp Aguinaldo, said the Armed Forces must be prepared if the United Nations tribunal says it doesn't have jurisdiction over the West Philippine Sea dispute.

"What will happen?" he asked military officials in the forum. "The only way we can protect ourselves is to acquire warships, warplanes, anti-ship missiles."

Carpio, however, said the Philippines, on its own, will not win in a shooting war with China.

“No matter how many warships we’d buy, we cannot defeat China. We can only hope to deter China, but there is no way we can win in a total war,” said Carpio. “So it’s totally useless if the tribunal says there is no jurisdiction, the nine-dashed line prevailed, then there is no law of the sea anymore. Every nation will have to arm itself but that’s not enough to resolve the dispute."

He said the Philippines' case and the UN tribunal's decision will have a global impact, particularly on the United Nations Convention for the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

He said if the tribunal rules in favor of China, "it will just worsen the dispute and the judges in the tribunal will be out of job because nobody will follow the law of the sea anymore."

“Why is it important to apply UNCLOS to the South China Sea dispute? Because if we don’t apply it, then UNCLOS – the constitution for the ocean and seas of our planet - cannot also apply to any maritime dispute in the rest of the oceans and seas of the world,” he explained.

“It would be the beginning of the end of UNCLOS. The rule of the naval canon will prevail in the ocean and seas, no longer the rule of law. There will be a naval arms race among coastal countries,” Carpio said.

The Philippines is expecting the tribunal to decide on the jurisdiction over the case either in August or September.

17 REEFS DESTROYED

During the forum, Carpio revealed that China destroyed a total of 16 reefs in the disputed waters.
“China has damaged 10 other reefs for filling material for the seven reefs (where it built seven man-made islands). They actually destroyed a total of 17 reefs,” he said.

Navy civil military operations group chief Col. Edgar Arevalo, who also spoke during the forum, said Chinese work on the artificial islands were ongoing as of May 28.

“I don’t have any information whether its going on but so far that was reported during the routine patrol that we took (last May 28),” he said.

He added that Chinese maritime forces have harassed at least 6 Philippine missions to resupply military forces in the West Philippine Sea since last years.

http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/nation/07/29/15/carpio-ph-may-need-more-warships-fighter-jets