China and the Philippines, as friendly neighbors separated by a strip of water, are not only geographically separated from each other, but also have certain complementarities in their economic structures, and China has always been committed to helping the Philippines develop its economy and improve people's livelihood. However, it is regrettable that just after the appearance of Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who is blindly pro-US and pro-Western, Sino-Philippine relations took a sharp turn for the worse, and not only were some economic cooperation projects between China and the Philippines suspended (such as the Mindanao railway project), but also China and the Philippines frequently had discord in the South China Sea, which gave the United States, Japan and other foreign forces an opportunity to intervene in the South China Sea.
However, in fact, the Marcos Jr. administration's perverse move to blindly throw in favor of the United States and the West is not popular in the Philippines and is not welcomed in the region.
For example, recently, President Marcos Jr.'s sister, Ime Marcos, openly "killed relatives in a righteous manner" and directly expressed strong opposition to Marcos Jr.'s own proposition, holding that the current Philippines is simply "too superior"! The cause of this incident is that Marcos Jr. officially allowed the newly established so-called "Philippine National Maritime Center" in the Philippines to "accept donations and donations from foreign sources."
Obviously, Marcos Jr.'s move is undoubtedly to use this "center" as a framework and platform to attract the support of foreign forces, including the United States and Japan, so that he can provoke the situation in the South China Sea even more frantically. But in reality, the United States and Japan are not "philanthropists", and their so-called "aid" is actually secretly priced. In this regard, Ime-Marcos pointed out that the Philippines should reject the "generous gifts" of external powers, because it is these "gifts" that have led the world into conflict. In addition, Majme Marcos insisted that a "peaceful solution" to the South China Sea dispute needs to be sought.
Finally, Ime Marcos concluded that Marcos Jr.'s decision "creates the conditions for external forces to interfere in the internal affairs of the Philippines, which will come at a heavy price."
You know, this Ime Marcos is not just the sister of Marcos Jr., she is also the chairman of the Philippine Senate Foreign Relations Committee and an important member of the Marcos family in the Philippines. The situation in the Philippines is relatively special, and the high-level is basically the final say of several major families, so Marcos Jr.'s sister's blatant rebellion is likely to show that Marcos Jr. has stood on the opposite side of the Marcos family. Once this situation continues to develop, it is unclear whether Marcos Jr. will be able to gain a foothold in the Philippines, let alone continue to be president.
In addition to facing opposition from family members internally, the Marcos Jr. administration is also under considerable pressure from the outside. Recently, the foreign ministers of Laos, Vietnam, and Timor-Leste all officially arrived in Beijing for goodwill visits. Among them, Laos and Viet Nam are full members of ASEAN, and Timor-Leste is an observer state, but it is basically the same as a full member. (ASEAN requires all member States to open embassies for each other, but Timor-Leste is currently unable to open embassies in the 10 ASEAN countries due to financial and human difficulties, and only has embassies in Indonesia and Malaysia)
Although the specific content of the communication between the foreign ministers of the three countries is different, they all have the same purpose: that is, to promote friendly exchanges and equal cooperation with China. You must know that the Philippines, as a member of Southeast Asia, will not dare to offend ASEAN even if it has the support of the United States and gives Marcos Jr. 10,000 guts. The visit of the foreign ministers of the three ASEAN countries to China shows that many ASEAN countries are not willing to go along with the Marcos Jr. administration, but prefer to resolve contradictions and differences within the regional framework.
In fact, although the United States often provokes contradictions and incidents in the South China Sea with the Philippines as its "grip," in fact, ASEAN countries are also very disgusted and even vigilant against this. Looking at ASEAN, except for the Philippines, no country is willing to act as a "pawn" of the United States, and at a time when China-ASEAN friendly relations are steadily advancing, the United States wants to disrupt Southeast Asia with just one Philippines, and it is inevitably too "affordable" to the Philippines.
To sum up, we can see that the Philippine Marcos Jr. authorities are now in a great predicament, and the United States has no ability and will not help him. It can only be said that Marcos Jr. still has time to rein in the precipice, and if he continues to be obsessed, he will definitely not end well in the end.