Brawner can lie, but videos don’t
First of a Series of 2: The Chief of Staff’s Baptism of Fire into the Real World
Armed Forces Chief Romeo Brawner Jr. branded the China Coast Guard as a “liar” after it blamed the Philippine vessels on routine and supply missions for the collision near Ayungin Shoal last December 10.
“They’re really a liar, they are inverting the situation. Imagine, in fact they said we’re the ones who collided with them which is really impossible because our ship is just too small compared to their larger ships, so what they are saying is not true,” Brawner said.
According to the Manila Times, Brawner, who was on board a civilian boat Unaizah Mae 1, witnessed how Chinese vessels “harassed” their boat, making dangerous maneuvers, including an attempt to bump them from behind, making the Chinese version of the story “absurd.”
So goes the Philippine version and I have to give the AFP chief of staff some leeway because coming from the Philippine Army and not the Navy, I am sure from how he sounded, he is ignorant of International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea (Colregs) – and so the experience must have scared him to near-death. Let us examine Brawner’s allegations against this video taken from two angles:
Now what does Colregs say about the position of the two vessels so we can apply its rules of the road to separate fact from fiction.
We see the Philippine resupply boat was at the port side perpendicularly approaching a Chinese Coast Guard ship. Coming from the port side (red), so it must stand on as it has priority of movement.
However, the resupply boat’s orientation placed it under risk of collision as it turned left.
Rules #7 Risk of Collision
So, the safe maneuver option of the resupply boat was to correct its orientation from a diagonal to a parallel distance from the CCG.
Rule #8 Action to Avoid Collision
“Alteration of course alone may be the most effective action to avoid a close- quarters situation provided that it is made in good time, is substantial and does not result in another close-quarters situation.”
“Alteration of course alone may be the most effective action to avoid a close- quarters situation provided that it is made in good time, is substantial and does not result in another close-quarters situation.”
Another option would have been to slow down, allow the CCG to pass, and crossover to the starboard side after the CCG had passed.
Rule #15 Crossing Situation
“When two power driven vessels are crossing so as to involve risk of collision, the vessel (@portside) which has the other on her own starboard side shall keep out of the way and shall, if the circumstances of the case admit, avoid crossing ahead of the other vessel.”
The resupply boat, however, did not turn to its left to establish a parallel position but sought to continue on a diagonal direction, causing its astern or rear portion to cause a minor collision, in its attempt to cross ahead of the CCG ship.
In the illustration below, Colregs provide that the vessel at port side must “stand on” meaning keep its side of the waters at a safe distance.
To reiterate, the CCG made a deliberate slowdown to give way to avoid collision, but the resupply boat awkwardly maneuvered turning left with its astern scraping the left side of the CCG bow, causing a minor collision.
Brawner according to Brawner
Brawner’s party that included Vice Admiral Alberto Carlos, Western Command chief, escorted by M/L Kalayaan, was water cannoned by the CCG as they headed to the grounded BRP Sierra Madre to hand over needed provisions and Christmas gifts to troops and deliver President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s message.
In an interview, Brawner said “We keep on avoiding them, but they continue to harass; it’s dangerous, it’s dangerous.” He said he was not afraid, “but I’m angry because of what they did. I think they (Chinese ship) didn’t know I was on board.”
So what if they knew or didn’t know he was on board? So what if he civilian clothing during the trip? So what if he asked permission from President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to visit the troops on the Sierra Madre?
It is a risk he should not have taken. Sea travel on a small boat in those waters is dangerous already and that was what he found on the trip back from the shoal, as he experienced “tremendous” discomfort because of the sea swells that were pounding the Unaizah Mae 1. He later transferred to a Philippine Navy ship to complete the return voyage to Palawan.
I find it irresponsible on his part to have even gone there and I don’t buy his explanation, “We give importance to our troops on the BRP Sierra; we give importance to their presence in Ayungin Shoal, because it is a symbol of our sovereign rights in our exclusive economic zone.”
This is why his Brawner’s commander-in-chief, the President, waxed in ludicrity, when he remarked, “The aggression and provocations perpetrated by the China Coast Guard and their Chinese Maritime Militia against our vessels and personnel over the weekend have only further steeled our determination to defend and protect our nation’s sovereignty, sovereign rights, and jurisdiction in the West Philippine Sea.”
Can I ask the President to produce any title, any ruling, any award to show how Ayungin Shoal falls under our sovereignty? The Arbitral Award classified it as a low tide elevation (LTE), which by itself cannot be the subject of any sovereignty claim.
Sovereign rights are also not applicable in “quintessentially” militarized areas, ruled the Arbitral Tribunal in Paragraph 1161.
So how could it be under our jurisdiction? Will someone be brave enough to correct the president in his misconception because it is making him look like a fool. He should be informed that in the succeeding Paragraph 1162, the Arbitral Tribunal found accordingly, “it lacks jurisdiction to consider the Philippines’ Submissions No. 14(a) to (c),” pertaining to Ayungin.
Who militarized the area? The Philippines (!) when President Erap Estrada ordered the Philippine Navy to run aground its rusting BRP Sierra Madre there.
The Arbitral ruling Paragraph 11 continued to explain “…the Tribunal finds that the essential facts at Second Thomas Shoal concern the deployment of a detachment of the Philippines’ armed forces that is engaged in a stand-off with a combination of ships from China’s Navy and from China’s Coast Guard and other government agencies. In connection with this stand-off, Chinese Government vessels have attempted to prevent the resupply and rotation of the Philippine troops on at least two occasions. Although, as far as the Tribunal is aware, these vessels were not military vessels, China’s military vessels have been reported to have been in the vicinity.”
This ought to educate Raymond Powell, the chief provocateur whose ideas the Philippine Coast Guard now uses as bible to escalating tension in the South China Seas that his strategy to render black and white what he calls “China’s grayzone tactics” has already been clarified by the tribunal itself, and his tactics are mere propaganda obfuscating, instead of deconflicting tension.
It is only prolonging the agony began by Antonio Carpio seven years ago asserting that sustained insistence about our claimed sovereignty, sovereignty rights and jurisdiction with UNCLOS and the Arbitral ruling as bases will eventually exhaust China to give in to our demands.
Marcos’ rhetoric “steeling our determination” to employ “Powell” tactics use “transparency” as fuel to soften China is merely fishing for a false flag that can lead to a hotwar as this motherhood statement throws us to “steeling” our alliance with the US and Japan, who are non-interested parties to the legalisms that we have used in our word war with China.
We are even assuming here that the US, Japan and any of their allies, would sacrifice mitigating their own relations with China, to side with the Philippines in what the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs terms as “self-amusement”.
As a result, the US has already taken advantage of our naivete in fortifying their own pivot to the Indo-Pacific region by adding bases in our territory under the pretext that they are helping modernize our military and reinforcing our mutual defense treaty? Is this what Marcos says as “steeling” our sovereignty – capitulating to the United States as a deterrence to a phantom enemy that is China?
Its red line has long been proclaimed by China.
On 7 March 2014, the Philippines recorded a meeting between our embassy officials and the Department of Boundary and Ocean Affairs of China’s Foreign Ministry. (AA – Paragraph 1122)
“China would never accept the Philippines occupying Ren-ai Reef under any circumstance and in any form. If the Philippines chooses to ignore China’s major concerns and resolute objections, insists on construction, this would severely violate China’s sovereign rights, push China’s bottom line, and severely undermine DOC, the peace and stability in the SCS, China will not sit idly by and tolerate. We will take resolute measures and actions. There will be further damage to relations. All consequences will be borne by the Philippines side.”
I challenge Marcos with a little more than four years left in his term, to test this stick against China’s hundred years of humiliation, that stood firm in history to finally liberating itself from colonial domination, consolidating its territory and finally arriving to the economic and military powerhouse that it is now.
But unlike what Powell of Stanford University’s Gordian Knot Center, powered by the US Naval Research, presents as a gordian knot, the Arbitral award has already prescribed the Philippines’ way out of this.
But that is for Part 2 of this article.
Next: Project Myoushu Tactics Backfire, Lawfare Weakens PH Position
Adolfo Quizon Paglinawan
is the anchor of Ang Maestro – the Unfinished Revolution at Radyo Pilipinas1, co-host of Opinyon Ngayon at Golden Nation Network Television, a political analyst, and author of books.
His third book, The Poverty of Power will soon be off-the-press. It is a historiography of controversial issues of spanning 36 years leading to the Demise of the Edsa Revolution and the Rise of the Philippine Phoenix. Paglinawan’s past best sellers have been A Problem for Every Solution (2015), a characterization of factors affecting Philippine-China relations, and No Vaccine for a Virus called Racism (2020) a survey of international news attempting to tracing its origins. These important achievements earned for him to be named one of the 2021 international laureates for the Awards for the Promotion of Philippine-China Understanding. Ado, as he called for short, was a former press attaché and spokesman of the Philippine Embassy in Washington DC and the Philippines’ Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York. Facebook
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