Our ‘Eve of Destruction?’

IN 1965, American singer and composer, Barry Macguire released his song, ‘Eve of Destruction,’ a commentary on the raging racial conflict in American society, the war in Vietnam, the armed violence raging in the Middle East and the threat of nuclear war.

His truthful observation immediately made the song popular and its lyric still rings very much true today as it was nearly 60 years ago—racial tension still afflicts American society, the world is now in ‘de facto’ World War 3 under the shadow of nuclear annihilation as the West continues to escalate its proxy war in Ukraine against Russia while proceeding with their military ‘bloc alliances’ in Asia for their war with China.

Meanwhile, Israel, America’s sledgehammer in the Middle East, is making sure that its naked aggression would engulf the entire region in war.

The Philippines, of course, is fast becoming the center of tension in Southeast Asia over our leaders’ mistaken belief that tying our fate to our ‘ironclad’ military alliance with the United States and reverting to our role as an obedient “tuta” is the surest way to maintain our territorial integrity in relation to China.

It is foolish of us to believe Uncle Sam’s argument that constantly provoking and embarrassing China would result to “concession.”

Instead of resorting to diplomacy as any mature and sane person would do given our dismal situation, we up the ante of our provocation by reneging on our “promise” to return, “by September,” the US’ ‘Typhoon Missile System’ that was brought in here last April during the biggest ‘Balikatan’ military exercise this year. To drive home the point of our servility, we even announced that we want to purchase the missile system “for our own defense and security.”

Instead of listening to the (still) friendly overtures from Chinese officials for us to “stop going further down the wrong path,” Foreign Affairs Secretary Enrique Manalo, in an open display of either naivete or stupidity or both, told Chinese Ambassador Huang Xilian that “No, (Typhoon) is “not destabilizing” the region and that it is “not a threat” to China.

But how convenient that it was placed near the tip of Northern Luzon facing China and Taiwan?

Let us be clear, Typhoon is an offensive weapon system. Our officials saying otherwise is lying to us in our faces.

If armed with a ‘Tomahawk’ cruise missile with its range of 2,400 kilometers and which the system is capable of, it can hit mainland China including Hongkong, Macau, Hainan, Guangxi, Guangdong and as far as Hubei and yes, Taiwan, in case China decides to reclaim this US-client island province by force.

Russian President Vladimir Putin commented last June 28 that the deployment here of the Typhoon is now part of Russia’ calculations for potential nuclear targets when war with the United States erupts (see also Pinoy Exposé, July 1, 2024).

President Putin said this in the context of Russia’s decision to proceed with the production of new missile systems such as the deadly ‘Oreshnik’ which even the US has no counter measure.

Unless our defense and security officials are content on watching Netflix war films and reading gossip columns for “enlightenment” and “education,” we remind them that the war in Ukraine proved the superiority of Russian arms versus their counterparts in the West. This superiority extends to those of China.

Presently and in the immediate future, only China and Russia possess nuclear-armed ‘hypersonic weapons’ that they would not hesitate to use, as Russia has shown, in defense of their sovereignty and core interests.

Should we persist down the wrong path of provocation instead of diplomacy, this might as well be our ‘Eve of Destruction.’