The final weeks of the Biden administration have been filled with turbulence in foreign policy. Some of the most serious wounds have been self-inflicted. For example, no one forced America’s lame-duck president to capitulate to Ukraine’s longstanding lobbying effort to obtain U.S. ATACM missiles capable of striking targets deep inside Russia. Biden and his foreign policy team were entirely responsible for implementing such a dangerous, provocative escalation.
Other destabilizing developments, however, have originated in the capitals of U.S. allies. Israel’s expansion of its war against Palestinian militants to southern Lebanon is the most troubling episode in that category, but two other incidents probably merit more attention than they have received to this point. One was the attempt by South Korea’s president, Yoon Suk Yeol, to impose martial law on his country. The other was the burgeoning, violent feud in the Philippines between President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and Vice President Sara Duterte.
Yoon’s proclamation of martial law seemed to catch U.S. officials by surprise. It is possible that Washington’s long history of tolerating, even encouraging, coups by congenial autocrats in Seoul may have generated unrealistic expectations of U.S. backing on his part. But just because Washington supported friendly tyrants such as Park Chung Hee in the 1970s and Chun Doo-Hwan in the 1980s did not necessarily mean that current U.S. leaders would respond in the same way, especially since South Korea had become a stable, well-established democracy in the meantime.
The Biden administration’s outpouring of praise for Yoon’s support of key U.S. policies in East Asia and beyond may have inadvertently fed Yoon’s delusions. In any case, he appears to have miscalculated badly. The decision to impose martial law has backfired in a spectacular fashion. Yoon already has been forced to dismiss one close aide, the country’s defense minister. Even more ominously, South Korea’s principal opposition party in parliament has commenced efforts to impeach the president, which appear likely to succeed.
Washington’s relations with Seoul may encounter significant difficulties, and a similar situation has the potential to erupt in the Philippines. Vice President Duterte has called on her supporters to take action (implying violent measures) against President Marcos if she becomes the victim of an assassination attempt. Unfortunately, such a concern is not a far-fetched notion, given the history of the Philippines. The current president’s father, Ferdinand Marcos, Sr, ruled as a dictator from 1972 until his ouster in 1986. His security forces eliminated dozens of media and academic critics as well as prominent political opponents.
The most high-profile person in the latter category was Benigno Aquino, an exiled senator, who was assassinated upon his return to Manila in August 1983. Eliminating Aquino did not save Marcos’s rule in the long run, however. Aquino’s widow, Corazon, led the mounting public opposition to Marcos, culminating with her victory in the country’s 1986 presidential election, despite efforts at massive vote-rigging on the part of the Marcos camp.
Her triumph did not herald a lengthy period of political stability, however, much less a strong commitment to democratic norms. What stability did exist was upended in 2016 when Rodrigo Duterte (Sara Duterte’s father) became president. His presidency was marked by thousands of extra-judicial killings. Most of the victims were alleged drug dealers, but any outspoken critic of Duterte appeared to be a potential target.
Given the emerging feud between the Marcos and Duterte families, and the weak commitment to democratic norms in the Philippines generally, the United States could well be dealing with a volatile, unsavory ally in East Asia.
Given the recent developments in Seoul, South Korea could become a source of concern for the United States. However, the Philippines could become a nightmare. That prospect is especially pertinent if Washington is expected to defend Manila’s expansive territorial claims against China in the South China Sea. U.S. leaders need to ponder what level of risk they are willing to have their country incur on behalf of a client that continues to have a checkered record regarding democratic values.
Ted Galen Carpenter is a senior fellow at the Randolph Bourne Institute and a senior fellow at the Libertarian Institute. He also served in several senior positions during a 37-year career at the Cato Institute. Dr. Carpenter is the author of 13 books and more than 1,300 articles on foreign policy, national security, and civil liberties topics. His latest book is Unreliable Watchdog: The News Media and U.S. Foreign Policy (2022).
