Why US is backing Philippine airport at former Sangley Point naval base

A proposed airport on a former US naval base in the Philippines near the entrance to Manila Bay is drawing fresh strategic attention after Washington agreed to fund a feasibility study, a move analysts say fits into US efforts to strengthen logistics, access and interoperability with the country in the South China Sea. Experts said the proposed Sangley Point International Airport in Cavite could become more than a commercial aviation project because of its access to the South China Sea and the Luzon Strait, a critical corridor in any Taiwan-related contingency. The site has previously drawn geopolitical scrutiny, including over a since-cancelled airport deal involving a Chinese state-owned firm. The US Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) said on Tuesday it would fund a feasibility study for the proposed airport “to serve the Philippines’ projected aviation needs and define strong security measures to protect direct flights to several major US aviation hubs”. Under the plan, the USTDA will provide technical expertise, including air traffic forecasts, financial analyses and recommendations for advanced security screening. Philippine project developer Cavitex Holdings received an unspecified amount of funding from the USTDA. It has selected California-based The S-A-P Group to conduct the study. The airport is expected to have direct flights to the US. “The high volume of direct international travel between the United States and the Philippines reflects the steadfast friendship of our two countries, and we share a desire to see passenger traffic flourish safely and efficiently,” USTDA Deputy Director Thomas Hardy said. Sangley Point, located about 10km (six miles) west of the congested Ninoy Aquino International Airport, is being positioned as a project that could help ease travel and cargo demand away from the country’s primary gateway. “This project is one of many shared priorities with the Philippines government to achieve our collective goal of a free and open Indo-Pacific,” Hardy said. Formerly the US Naval Station Sangley Point, the facility served as a key US Navy base and aviation hub during World War II and the Vietnam War. Today, the site is home to Naval Base Heracleo Alano, one of the Philippine Navy’s most important and historic installations. Civilian infrastructure could be rapidly adapted to support military mobility and sustainment during contingencies, said Joshua Espena, an international relations lecturer at the Polytechnic University of the Philippines. “In the maritime sphere, the most suitable operational design at present is swarming. This requires forces that are agile, flexible and fast enough to disperse, manoeuvre and mass effects when necessary. Logistically, such an approach depends on resilient and decentralised support systems,” Espena said. Easy access Sangley Point has three key advantages over other airbases and airfields on the western side of Luzon, according to defence analyst Justin Kyle Malarayap: direct access to the South China Sea, presence of existing naval and air infrastructure and proximity to Manila compared with facilities such as Clark and Subic. In the event of a security incident or maritime accident, every second counts in mounting an effective response. “While hubs like Clark International Airport or Subic International Airport exist, those areas don’t fully cover the entrance of Manila Bay. From a purely tactical point of view, the time wasted taxiing for take-off, preflight checks, and transiting the distance required to patrol that area, would have been enough to cover a few nautical miles back and forth through Manila Bay,” Malarayap said. Sangley Point’s location near Manila Bay gives much faster access to the West Philippine Sea and to critical maritime corridors. “In strategic terms, proximity matters for reaction time, surveillance coordination, humanitarian assistance, evacuation operations and maritime-air integration,” said Arnaud Leveau, a professor of geopolitics at Paris Dauphine University. Clark, he said, offered depth and relative protection inland and was more suited for logistics, dispersal and sustained operations away from immediate maritime pressure. Malarayap pointed to the proposed US fuel depot in the southern Philippines as an indication of Washington’s broader Indo-Pacific strategy of strengthening logistical redundancy and resilience across the region. “This means that the US has laid the groundwork for additional supporting infrastructure benefiting its operations in the Indo-Pacific region, whilst also boosting their allies’ infrastructure resiliency,” he said. In 2021, officials cancelled its US$10 billion airport upgrade deal, saying that the companies awarded the contract, China Communications Construction Co (CCCC) and Filipino firm MacroAsia Corp, were not fully committed to the project and their documentation was “deficient in three or four items”. The CCCC was also cited among the Chinese firms blacklisted by the US for their roles in constructing and militarising artificial South China Sea islands. Dual, not secret There was also nothing sinister about officially presenting Sangley Point as a civilian infrastructure project, Leveau said. “Dual-use does not necessarily mean covert militarisation. In practice, modern airports can support multiple layers of strategic utility for humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, evacuation operations, logistics and airlift support, intelligence and surveillance coordination,” he said. Manila, according to him, is particularly exposed to natural disasters, maritime incidents and geopolitical crises. Infrastructure resilience therefore becomes a security issue. “This mirrors broader global trends where the boundary between civilian and strategic infrastructure is becoming increasingly blurred. One of the major lessons of current geopolitical competition is that economic infrastructure can rapidly acquire security functions during periods of tension,” Leveau explained. Dual-use facilities were increasingly becoming the central feature of contemporary strategic competition, Espena said. Strategically, such infrastructure creates ambiguity by enabling participation in grey-zone dynamics without overt militarisation, while operationally allowing military forces to tap into civilian supply chains, transport networks and mobility systems. “The risks, however, are significant: civilian infrastructure and economic flows may become vulnerable during crises or escalation. Consequently, the Philippine government must prioritise redundancy, seamless coordination and alternative logistical pathways to mitigate disruption,” he said.

Why US is backing Philippine airport at former Sangley Point naval base

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}The trend in defence is for civilian infrastructure that can be rapidly adapted for military use during contingencies, experts say

The trend in defence is for civilian infrastructure that can be rapidly adapted for military use during contingencies, experts say