By Thai Newsroom Reporters
THE PHILIPPINES PLANS TO procure the first batch of newly-built submarines in face of China’s increased threat to the island republic’s maritime territorial integrity, specifically regarding sustained tensions in the South China Sea.
The Philippine navy has resolved to upgrade its operational capabilities in regard to national maritime interests and sovereignty amidst intermittent maritime standoffs and provocations between China and the Southeast Asian country in the South China Sea, Philippine navy spokesperson Roy Trinidad confirmed over the weekend.
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has earlier pledged to modernize the country’s defence operational capabilities apparently referring in part to the planned procurement of a few submarines.
The Philippines has never deployed a submarine to help defend the island republic’s exclusive economic zone as part of what Manila calls the West Philippine Sea surrounding the disputed Spratly Islands in the disputed, resource-rich South China Sea has already been approached by a few foreign shipbuilding firms to offer newly-built, diesel-electric submarines, according to the navy spokesperson.
The foreign firms interested in building the first submarine for the Philippine navy included South Korea’s Hanwha Ocean Co. which manufactures Jangbogo-III-class submarines, France’s Naval Group which manufactures Scorpène-class subs and Spain’s Navantia Co. which builds Isaac Peral-class subs. Manila’s plan to procure the first submarines in history of the island republic’s navy apparently followed Taiwan’s launch of indigenously-built, Hai Kun-class submarine last year.
Amongst Asian countries which have emerged as mutually contradictory claimants of maritime territorial sovereignty over coral reefs and atolls around Spratly Islands in the South China Sea are Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia, Taiwan, the Philippines and China.
Meanwhile, a trio of the United States’ aircraft carriers have recently concluded a joint naval exercise in waters on the upper edges of the South China Sea between Taiwan and the Philippines.
Aircraft carriers USS Carl Vinson (CVN-70), USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71) and USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76) have conducted the five-day naval exercise alongside Japan’s Maritime Self-Defence Force ships including the destroyer JS Ise (DDH-182).
Joining in the naval exercise were aircraft carrier-based Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet jet fighters as well as cruisers, destroyers and amphibious assault ships.
The maritime exercise was primarily viewed as the manifestation of the US Seventh Fleet’s naval operational capabilities and interoperability in support of allies in the Indo-Pacific region, ranging from Japan and Taiwan on the upper skirts of the South China Sea down to the Philippines and Singapore on the southern tip of the disputed sea.
CAPTIONS:
Top: A rendering of a Scorpène-class submarine sailing in Philippine waters. Rendering Courtesy of Naval Group and published by Navalnews.com
Insert: South Korea’s Jangbogo-III class submarine. Photo: Republic of Korea, Ministry of National Defence, and published by Thedefensepost.com
Front Page: Isaac Peral submarine at the first static diving test. Photo: Navantia and published by Navalnews.com
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