MANILA, Philippines – In a maybe imminent but not inevitable scenario where China decides to “re-unify” Taiwan by force – that is, surround the independently governed island and block its friends and allies from coming to its aid – the Philippines, whether it likes it or not, will be involved.

This isn’t about prepositioned United States assets, or even Manila’s gripes over how Beijing exercises its might in the Philippines’ own exclusive economic zone (EEZ) in the West Philippine Sea.

It’s a matter of practicality.

The Philippines’ northernmost provinces — Batanes, Cagayan, and President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s hometown of Ilocos Norte — are the closest major landmasses to Taiwan’s southernmost areas. A flight from Laoag, Ilocos Norte, to Taipei would take less than an hour. By boat, the journey would take much longer and would be decidedly more precarious, but it’s doable.

That’s the scenario Philippine government officials from various agencies and members of civil society considered in imagining, during a closed-door session, how the Philippines could – and would – handle the influx of persons, Filipino or otherwise, seeking refuge from conflict in the Taiwan Strait.

Several questions lingered during that session: 

• Which Philippine agency would spearhead efforts to address a humanitarian problem: hundreds of thousands of people, most likely without documents in tow, fleeing to the small and resource-bereft island province of Batanes? Where would these people eventually go?
• How would Manila handle persons who are not from Southeast Asian nations and would, therefore, not enjoy visa-free entry to the Philippines? That’s assuming Manila is able to verify their nationalities with or without passports in tow. 
• How about Taiwanese who flee to the Philippines? (They’re visa-free, at least.) 
• What if other nations in the region ask us to serve as a staging base for evacuations? 
• In the first place, is the Philippines ready to handle a possible crisis of this scale? 

It’s a scenario that’s admittedly difficult to discuss out loud for many reasons.

Local governments up north have said that while they’re eager to start planning and information campaigns, they’re also weary about triggering a panic in the population. After all, in some sleepier towns, the mere sound of military assets and sight of American soldiers are more than enough to trigger worries of war.  

Diplomatically, it’s tricky, too.

The Philippines has always had to tiptoe around talk of a Taiwan contingency — even as security in the Taiwan Strait is considered a priority for the Philippines, because of the overseas Filipino workers (OFW) population. Analysts have cheekily described Philippine-Taiwan relations as an affair Manila likes to hide. 

Yet Marcos has been unequivocal: Whether the Philippines wants it or not, it’ll be drawn into a war over Taiwan, “kicking and screaming.” 

But, of course, we all remember how calmly Beijing reacted — and how certain sectors of Philippine politics reacted — when Taiwan’s foreign minister had come here for a visit.

The Philippines’ One China Policy means it “fully understands and respects” Beijing’s view that Taiwan is a part of China. Nowhere in the text does it say that the Philippines’ is an advocate for reunification, especially not if it involves violence. 

A One China Policy should not deter Philippine officials from being forthright about planning for a Taiwan scenario that’s imminent but not inevitable – that is, the Philippines (as does Taiwan) must prepare as if it’s going to happen any time but should not succumb to the idea that reunification by force is a done deal. 

After all, there’s space that needs to be made for diplomacy and multilateralism and, for better or worse, the occasional showcase of military might. 

To end 2025, China held “Justice Mission 2025,” during which Beijing’s military forces practiced how they would blockade Taiwan.

While Justice Mission 2025 was the eighth major military drill around the Taiwan Strait since 2022, it was the first where the Chinese military said the quiet part out loud: these were drills meant to warn against intervention in Chinese Communist Party’s dream of “re-unification” with Taiwan, an issue they see as internal. 

On the last day of China’s drills, Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr., in a December 31 statement, said the department was “deeply concerned by China’s military and coast guard actions around Taiwan that undermine regional peace and stability, further creating cracks in an already fragile geopolitical environment.” 

“Basic principles of self-restraint must be observed, and the rule of international law must not be distorted. The Philippines underscores the importance of upholding international law and regional norms, including the principles of peaceful management of disputes. We reaffirm our support for a free, open, stable, and rules-based Indo Pacific, where differences are resolved through peaceful means without deception, coercion, or intimidation,” he said. 

There are at least two events that can explain why Beijing feels the need to make a spectacle of a warning against “separatist forces and external interference.” 

China and Japan ties hit a new low in November 2025, following Japan Prime Minister Takaichi Sanae’s remarks that an attack on Taiwan would trigger a Japan self-defense forces deployment because it was an “existential threat.” 

In mid-December 2025, the US announced a proposed $11-billion arms sale deal with Taiwan that includes “advanced rocket launchers, self-propelled howitzers and a variety of missiles,” according to The Guardian. 

There’s this, too: the US Congress passed legislation that would allocate $2.5 billion in military aid for the Philippines. It’s an unprecedented amount that builds on the P500-million Foreign Military Financing package in 2024 that was then described as a “once-in-a-generation investment.”

A lot of focus has been placed on Philippine and US cooperation in securing and jointly patrolling the South China Sea. Odds are, in 2026, more efforts will be poured over onto the north, too. 

It’s not like this is happening overnight. 

The Typhon, or MRC Launcher, was first brought to the Philippines and deployed in April 2024 to Ilocos Norte for the bilateral army-to-army Salaknib exercises. It has remained in the Philippines since, but has reportedly been moved a little down south of Ilocos Norte, further away from Taiwan. 

The US Marines’ Navy-Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System (NMESIS) are also situated up north. An American general had said, rather casually, that NMESIS live fire drills took place during bilateral drills — a statement the US embassy then swiftly took back. 

The Marines, both Filipino and American, are in a constant phase of relearning and retraining, particularly up north. 

The Philippine military and its allies seem to be getting ready for what is imminent but not inevitable. Civilian government and civil society should, too. 

If 2025 ended on a tense note in the Taiwan Strait, 2026 started with what would have been thought of as the unthinkable – the United States deposing, extracting, and arresting Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in a high-stakes precision operation whose driving force was not a cry for justice and democracy, but resources. As in, Venezuela’s vast oil reserves. 

For the Philippines, it’s an incredibly strange position to be in — having a treaty ally and major defense partner who has stood by in trying to uphold the rules-based international order (RBIO, for the diplomacy geeks) in the South China Sea, while also flouting those same norms in the Americas.

If the Department of Foreign Affairs’ (DFA) statement is any indication, Manila is trying to strike a balance — by calling out its treaty-ally and standing firmly behind the importance of “the relevant principles of international law, including the independence and sovereign equality of states, the peaceful resolution of disputes, the prohibition against the threat or use of force, and non-interference in the domestic affairs of sovereign states” 

Analysts see it as a wide-open opportunity for countries like Russia and China to act even more brazenly in Ukraine, the South China Sea, or Taiwan. 

Aries Arugay, a Filipino professor who has studied Latin American politics, sees the US’ actions, strangely, as an opportunity for the Philippines — to double down on standing by international law and the RBIO, and to rally together smaller, middle powers in the face of two growing belligerent superpowers.

“Hopefully, we’ll be able to encourage and nudge other countries that, for small to middle powers, our only recourse is to uphold these rules – to have that rules-based international order. And, hopefully, to remind superpowers that, while they have the ability to do what they want in international affairs, [they will] also be judged not just by history, but they will also be seen through the lenses of credibility of reputation,” he said in an interview with Rappler. 

That, of course, presupposes a world where superpowers and their larger-than-life leaders – whether it be our treaty-ally or our testy neighbor in the north — care about how the world perceives them and about how the world perceives their great nations. – Rappler.com