Philippine navy’s ‘aspirational’ middle power claim comes under scrutiny
The navy based its assessment partly on regional partners admiring its newer ships that were deployed in recent joint exercises
Rear Admiral Joe Anthony C. Orbe, commander of the Philippine Fleet, told reporters on Tuesday that the country’s navy had attained the status of a “middle power” in Southeast Asia as it marked its 128th anniversary this month.
“We are on par with our Southeast Asian neighbours. Most capabilities that our neighbours have are also the same with what we have now. In fact, we have newer ships than some of our neighbours.”
He said that during recent naval multilateral exercises, including the Multilateral Naval Exercise (Milan) held in India in February and Exercise Cacandu hosted by the Philippine navy this March, its regional partners said that “they look up to us because they admire this modernisation programme of ours”.
“We have newer ships, capability equal [to] or more than what they [our neighbours] have right now ... I would say that we can consider ourselves a middle power.”
Hunter Marston, an Australian geopolitical analyst, said Orbe’s description of the navy attaining the status of a “middle power” was “a fair, if somewhat aspirational, characterisation of the Philippine navy’s overall capabilities”.