Huddling with DFA’s Top Guns on the Spratly’s Conundrum

 

 By Mortz C. Ortigoza, MPA

I bumped into Assistant Secretary Roberto “Bobby” Ferrer, Jr. of the Department Foreign Affairs (DFA) at the booth of Pangasinan in the International Food Expo (IFEX) held last Friday at the World Trade Center, Pasay City.

“O Bob kilala mo pa ako?”

“Siyempre si Mortz Ortigoza,” Philippines embassy in Russia former Deputy Chief of Mission and Consul General and the illustrious son of Binmaley, Pangasinan told me.

ENVOY. Undersecretary Eduardo Jose A. de Vega  (right) of the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA). He was once the acting Secretary of the DFA and Ambassadors to Belgium and Mexico.

I first met him when was a graduating student of Bachelor of Arts major in Political Science in 1990 when I joined the teaching staff of the Social Science Department of the present Lyceum Northwestern University in Dagupan City. He is the son of the late Pangasinan’s provincial lawmaker Roberto Ferrer, Sr.

Accompanying Ferrer was DFA Undersecretary Eduardo Jose A. de Vega who was once acting Secretary of the DFA and Ambassadors to Belgium and Mexico.

We have an animated conversation when I asked De Vega why not the Philippines military used a C-130 cargo plane to air drop provisions and repair materials to the beleaguered Marines holed in at the dilapidated navy ship's BRP Sierra Madre.

I cited to the duo how the American military delivered with success their stuffs thru low altitude parachute extraction system (LAPES) and ground proximity extraction system (GPES) at the Khe San aerial resupply mission in January 1968.

During that month the mountainous Khe San - the Dien Bien Phu’s version of the gung ho Americans – where guarded by 6,000 U.S Marines and South Vietnamese Rangers against 20, 000 armed to the teeth and blood smelling Vietcong and North Vietnamese soldiers. The enemies took control of the road where supplies like 1.5 million kilos of ammunition and armaments of the besieged allies passed by and six of their transport and combat helicopters and the runway had been destroyed by enemies’ artillery fires.

 “Why our military would not emulate the Americans” I posed.

“They have their own reason,” De Vega retorted as I told him about the incessant utilization of the resupply mission through civilian vessels but water cannoned by the bigger ships of the Chinese Coast Guard.

“Are our military continue to use the harassed resupply missions to put in bad light the Chinese before the bar of world’s opinion”?  I inquired.

“That’s probably the obvious reason,” the envoy answered.

I told them that incase a coast guard or a Marine die because of the dangerous maneuvering of the Chinese ships it will trigger the 1951 Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT) where the U.S military juggernaut comes to the succor of the lilliputian Armed Forces of the Philippines.

 De Vega nodded his head.

He has all ears when I opined that the Chinese is not yet prepared to wage war with the Americans as long as the dilemma of Malacca Strait’s choke point is not yet solved by Beijing.

The Strait is a narrow stretch of water, 500 miles long and from 40 to 155 miles wide, between the Malay Peninsula to the northeast and the Indonesian island of Sumatra to the southwest, connecting the Andaman Sea and the South China Sea.

Malacca is where China’s seaborne import from the Middle East like the 10 million barrels (2019 data) per day crude oil passes to fuel her economy. Because of that the still growing People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) would not gamble to have a shooting war with the blue water navy of the United States of America especially through her nuclear subs that lurk stealthily and treacherously in the three trillion dollars a year South China Sea’s lane.

Assistant Secretary Roberto “Bobby” Ferrer, Jr. (right) of the Department Foreign Affairs (DFA).  He used to be Philippines embassy in Russia former Deputy Chief of Mission and Consul General and the illustrious son of Binmaley, Pangasinan.

I told them in that huddle that incase President Ferdinand Marcos succumbed to the pressure of threat of a coup from the military – ala Erap Estrada's presidency – and he stepped down from office because of that narcotics brouhaha with actress Maricel Soriano, the U.S government would not allow China friendly Vice President Sara Duterte – whose former president father cozied up with Beijing – to succeed as the country’s Commander-in-Chief.

“Do you remember what happened to the bachelor Presidents Ngô Đình Diệm of South Vietnam and Salvador Allende?” I posed

“Of Chile,” Bobby retorted.

They were victims of a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) inspired coup d’état where the military replaced the civilian government because Diem became abusive to the Buddhists, his dictatorial tendency, and enmeshed himself to corruption and favoritism through his younger brother and chief political adviser’s Ngo Dinh Nhu and his wife the prolifigate Madame Nhu that could prejudice the U.S war against the USSR and China through their puppets North Vietnam and the Vietcong while Allende was a Marxist that could undermine the U.S business interest in South America.

“Kalian ka maging Ambassador (When are you going to be an Ambassador)?” I asked Assistant Secretary Ferrer in the vernacular.

“Bahala na si Sir kung kelan niya gusto (It’s up to Undersecretary De Vega when he wants me to be an Ambassador) as he glanced playfully to De Vega.

“Mga after one year puede na siya maging Ambassador,” the high official bantered.

“I doffed my hat to career officials like you who rose from the rank and to your present perches compare to those presidential appointees who were generals, average thinking newsmen, politicians, and others being appointed as ambassadors where some of them did not know the nuances – mga walang alam ang mga p*tang ina! - of the mandate,” I told the amused De Vega as he and Ferrer bid goodbye to end the huddle.

Oh by the way, the amiable De Vega possesses the following credentials:  Master in National Security Administration at the National Defense College of the Philippines (2004-2005), post graduate studies in International Relation at Escuela Diplomatica de Madrid (1993-1994), and Bachelor of Laws at the University of the Philippines – Diliman (1986-1991) where he passed the Bar examination in 1991.

Damn! How can a retired Army or Police General, politician, or an average opining columnist deals with seasoned foreign diplomats without those attainments like what former acting DFA Secretary Ed de Vega can swasbuckle?