Is Philippine President Duterte playing the United States and China?

This Tuesday, 1,400 US marines and navy servicement will train with 500 Filipino soldiers on Philippine soil, for the final time if President Rodrigo Duterte is to be taken at his word.

“You [the United States] are scheduled to hold war games again which China does not want. I will serve notice to you now, this will be the last military exercise,” he said during a visit to Vietnam on September 28.

The military exercises are to be accompanied by humanitarian and engineering projects.

Duterte’s statement caught two key cabinet secretaries off guard. “No, no, no, he did not say that at all,” Perfecto Yasay, Duterte’s foreign secretary, told reporters in Hanoi who had sought clarification.

The next day, the defence department issued this terse statement: “The DND will await further orders from President Rodrigo R. Duterte regarding the [armed forces’] exercises with the US forces. Defence secretary Delfin N. Lorenzana will discuss this with the president to seek more clarification and guidance. As stated earlier, all agreements and treaties with the US are still in effect. As to succeeding exercises, we will have to sit down with our US counterparts to discuss them.”