When did it all begin? (1)

The other day, senators started sniping at each other about our claim to the Spratlys. Sen. Rodante Marcoleta offended Sen. Panfilo Lacson on the question of Tomas Cloma, saying he didn’t “discover” the Spratlys. Antonio Contreras, in a Facebook post, clarified things quite well, I thought: “That is the point Lacson is defending: Cloma’s claim helped provide a narrative and documentary foundation for the Philippines’ later formal assertion of sovereignty … Marcoleta is also right to caution against calling Cloma the ‘discoverer’ or suggesting he ’donated’ Philippine territory. Sovereignty is established by states through effective occupation and administration.”

Contreras’ point serves as a reminder that all our sovereignties exist within borders defined by others—the colonial powers from whom independence was negotiated or fought for by today’s independent Asean and neighboring states. Just how arbitrary this was is best demonstrated by Sabah (North Borneo): The American flag and the British flag bisected one territory (the Sultanate of Sulu) that, up to then, straddled what were later two Western colonies: the Philippines and Malaya. Even earlier, the Treaty of Paris between Spain and the United States cut off the Philippines from the Spanish East Indies, which had comprised a “Greater Philippines” of sorts, with Manila the capital of a cluster of colonies that included the Marianas and Caroline Islands (The Malolos Congress even included an appointed representative for Palau), ourselves, and even the Spratlys.

In the 1930s, as Japan’s territorial ambition grew even more aggressive, it stimulated countries facing the prospect of war to identify possible refueling, observation, submarine, and navigation facilities. The Spratlys became a bone of contention: The French, masters of Indochina (today’s Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam) formally annexed the Spratlys on July 25, 1933; the Republic of China (not yet defeated in the civil war to come) ordered mapping to be done; then Japan annexed the Spratlys in 1939, named them the “New Southern Islands,” and was in a better position to do something about it, despite strong French protests.

For our part, we were aware of what was going on. In 1933, the year of France’s annexation, then Sen. Isabelo de los Reyes wrote to Governor-General Frank Murphy that nine islands (“Los Corales”) near Coron (they are now part of our Kalayaan Island Group) should be claimed; his proposal led to the legislature assigning a committee, chaired by Sen. Elpidio Quirino, to study the matter. In the proceedings of the 1934 Constitutional Convention, the question of Philippine territory and questions still pending were tackled in a report signed by Nicolás Buendía, of renamed avenue fame (such as the status of the Bashi Channel, which remains a contentious issue with Taiwan to this day, or the US-British negotiations for the handing over of the Turtle Islands).

While the Philippine Independence Act retained foreign affairs for the United States, the Commonwealth of the Philippines, established in 1935, began to use both formal (within the limits of the law) and informal (person-to-person diplomacy) means to stake out a foreign policy for the country and lay the basis for postindependence relations. 1937 proved a watershed year in self-assertiveness for the Philippines, with a visit by Quezon to Mexico essentially becoming a state visit, as well as his personal diplomacy with Japanese leaders, and the start of Philippine claims to (at least part of) the Spratlys. By 1937 (as early as 1941, it was already being called a “farseeing move”), Quirino, as Secretary of the Interior, made an inquiry with the Americans “for a formal declaration of claims to the Spratlys for national defense purposes.” The director of the US Coast and Geodetic Survey in Manila, Capt. Thomas Maher, said the best he could find was a Spanish survey done in 1800: “If this survey would confer title on Spain or be a recognition of sovereignty, or a claim for the same without protest, the reef would apparently be considered as part of Spanish territory, the transfer of which would be governed by the treaty of Nov. 7, 1900.”

With this frustrating answer, the question was escalated upward. On March 31, 1938, Executive Secretary Jorge Vargas wrote to the Americans that “The Commonwealth Government desires to study the possibilities of the reef, particularly as to its value as an aid to air navigation. It is requested, therefore, that an inquiry be made of the State Department as to what information is available regarding its ownership. In case it should appear that the reef is of value to air or ocean navigation, the Commonwealth Government may desire to claim title thereto, should there be no objection on the part of the United States Government to such action.”

On July 27, 1938 the US Secretary of State, Cordell Hull, wrote to the Secretary of War, Harry Woodring, “In the absence of evidence of a superior claim to Scarborough Shoal by any other government, the Department of State would interpose no objection to the proposal of the Commonwealth Government … provided that the Navy Department and [others], are informed and have expressed no objection to the course of action contemplated by the Commonwealth…” By Aug. 27, 1938, the Acting Secretary of the US Navy, W.B. Furlong, had written, “This Department has no objection to the course of action contemplated by the Commonwealth Government.”