The Filipino, Japanese and Korean people, along with all other peoples of the world who stand against US war preparations and war provocations, must come together to protest the arrival next week of US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and State Secretary Antony Blinken, the biggest war monsters of the US government.

The war-obsessed duo’s scheduled three-country swing signals a heightened campaign of US intervention in the Philippines and other countries in Asia. The US government’s push to pursue its Indo-Pacific Strategy to encircle its imperialist rival China and contain its economic and military growth has steadily aggravated military tensions in the region.

The Austin-Blinken visit comes just a few days after the US-led North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) military alliance issued belligerent declarations against China. The US and NATO, which are actively waging a proxy war in Ukraine against Russia, have effectively drawn China into the conflict by declaring it to be a “decisive enabler” of Russia.

The arrival of Austin and Blinken is a clear indication of US imperialism’s intention to further consolidate its military stronghold in Japan, South Korea and the Philippines. The visit will serve as an occasion to plan out tighter US-Japan military coordination, especially after having secured Japanese military access to the Philippines through the Reciprocal Access Agreement. They will also pave the way for greater military involvement of NATO countries, including France, Italy, Canada, and others.

The US is orchestrating a psywar campaign to manipulate the minds of Filipinos to favor US military intervention in the Philippines. The Marcos government, US-funded groups and institutions, and US-minded politicians and individuals are deliberately exaggerating claims over the Philippine exclusive economic zone by hyping up the line “defend the West Philippine Sea.” The aim is to falsely depict the presence of China’s coast guard ships in the EEZ as “armed intrusions” and portray maritime disputes between the Philippines and China as a military conflict. This “China invasion” fear-mongering is designed to make Filipinos believe the country’s only option is to seek US “protection” and invoke the Mutual Defense Treaty.

US military intervention in the Philippines is in hypermode. Over the past two years under Marcos, the US has stepped up the deployment of its troops, prepositioning of weapons in its military bases in the Philippines, saber-rattling and conducting non-stop war exercises.

All of this serves to heighten tensions and increase the possibility of sparking an armed conflict. This will benefit only the US and its military-industrial complex, and bring only greater misery to the Filipino people.