By Karen Lema and Poppy McPherson
MANILA (Reuters) – The United States has no immediate plans to withdraw a medium-range missile system deployed in the Philippines despite Chinese demands and is testing the feasibility of using it in a regional conflict, people familiar with the matter told Reuters.
The Typhoon system, which can be equipped with cruise missiles capable of hitting Chinese targets, was brought in to participate in joint exercises earlier this year, the two countries said at the time, but has remained there.
The Southeast Asian archipelago, which borders Taiwan to the south, is an important part of U.S. strategy in Asia and would provide an essential staging point for the military to aid Taipei in the event of a Chinese attack.
China and Russia condemned the move – the first deployment of the system in the Indo-Pacific – and accused Washington of fueling an arms race.
The deployment, details of which have not been released, comes as China and the Philippines, U.S. allies under a defense treaty, are locked in a standoff over parts of the hotly contested South China Sea. Recent months have seen a series of naval and air clashes in the strategic waterway.
Philippine officials said Philippine and U.S. forces continued to train with the missile system, which is located in northern Luzon, which faces the South China Sea and is close to the Taiwan Strait, and were not aware of any immediate plans to return it, even though the joint exercises end this month.
Philippine military spokesman Col. Louie Dema-ala told Reuters on Wednesday that the training was ongoing and it was up to U.S. Army Pacific (USARPAC) to decide how long the missile system would remain in place.
A USARPAC public relations official said the Philippine military has said the Typhoon could remain in service beyond September and that soldiers have been training with it as recently as last week, engaging in “discussions on the use of the system, with an emphasis on integrating host nation support.”
A senior Philippine government official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, and another person familiar with the matter said the United States and the Philippines were testing the feasibility of using the system in that country in the event of a conflict, to see how well it would work in that environment.
The government official said the Typhoon – a modular system, which is meant to be mobile and moved as needed – was in the Philippines for a “feasibility test of its deployment in the country, so that when the need arises, it can easily be deployed here.”
The office of Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. did not respond to a request for comment.
“WHITE NIGHTS”
The U.S. military flew the Typhoon, which can launch missiles including SM-6 missiles and Tomahawks with a range of more than 1,600 kilometers (994 miles), in the Philippines in April in what it called a “historic first” and “an important step in our partnership with the Philippines.”
A memo from the Congressional Research Service, a research arm of the U.S. Congress, released at the time said it was unclear “whether this temporary deployment could eventually become permanent.”
In July, military spokesman Dema-ala confirmed that the Typhoon missile launcher remained in the northern Philippine islands and said there was no specific date for its “departure,” correcting an earlier statement that it was due to leave in September.
A satellite image taken Wednesday by Planet Labs, a commercial satellite company, and reviewed by Reuters showed the typhoon at the Laoag International Airport in Ilocos Norte province.
Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, who analyzed the images, said the system was still in place.
A senior government official who spoke to Reuters said there were no immediate plans to withdraw the document.
“If it is ever removed, it is because the objective has been achieved and it can be put back in place once all the repairs or construction are done,” the official said, adding that there was strategic value for the Philippines in retaining the system to deter China.
“We want to give them sleepless nights.”
ANTI-SHIP WEAPONS
The United States has been stockpiling a variety of anti-ship weapons in Asia as Washington tries to quickly catch up in an Indo-Pacific missile race in which China has a big lead, Reuters reported.
Although the U.S. military has declined to say how many missiles will be deployed in the Indo-Pacific region, more than 800 SM-6 missiles are to be purchased over the next five years, according to government documents describing military procurement. Several thousand Tomahawks are already in U.S. inventories, the documents show.
China has repeatedly denounced the Typhoon deployment, including in May when Chinese Defense Ministry spokesman Wu Qian said Manila and Washington had brought “huge war risks into the region.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin hinted at the deployment when he announced in June that his country would resume production of intermediate- and short-range nuclear missiles.
Philippine Foreign Secretary Enrique Manalo assured his Chinese counterpart in July that the presence of the missile system in his country did not pose a threat to China and would not destabilize the region.
China has fully militarized at least three of the many islands it has built in the South China Sea, most of which it claims in their entirety despite a 2016 arbitration ruling that backed the Philippines, by arming them with anti-ship and anti-aircraft missiles, the United States said.
China claims that its military installations in the Spratly Islands are purely defensive and that it can do whatever it wants on its own territory.
(Reporting by Karen Lema and Poppy McPherson; additional reporting by Eleanor Whalley; editing by Kim Coghill)
