The local and international media once again sensationalized a minor issue. This time, the Philippine Star a story about a cancelled arms deal with the United State in its front page. Worse, the Philippine Daily Inquirer tried to turn the image below into a meme.
“Bato saddened by scuttled arms deal of PNP with US”
Source: inquirer.net
Now, whenever the media talks about guns, knowledgeable persons try not to take them seriously as their ignorance is aptly exemplified by the meme below.
source: www.mojosteve.blogspot.com
Since I think that the media sensationalized a simple issue once again, let us try to make sense of it ourselves.
Why the deal cancellation makes no sense
The deal was ostensibly cancelled out of concern for “human rights,” the Philippine Star in the abovementioned report states that:
The US State Department halted the planned sale of some 26,000 assault rifles to the Philippines’ national police after Sen. Ben Cardin said he would oppose it, Senate aides told Reuters on Monday.
Aides said Cardin, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was reluctant for the United States to provide the weapons given concerns about human rights violations in the Philippines.
The relationship between the United States and the Philippines, a long-time ally, has been complicated lately by President Duterte’s angry reaction to criticism from Washington of his violent battle to rid the country of illegal drugs.
We know that this reasoning makes no sense because the United States has previously supplied weapons to regimes which have had questionable human rights track records previously whenever it suits them or whenever it is expedient. Thus, proceeding from the assumption that Human Rights has absolutely nothing with this, it is safe to say therefore that our relationship was “complicated” not by human rights, but as a result of the country’s realignment or pivot to China as well as “punishment” for continued anti-US rhetoric which has confounded Obama’s own “Pivot to Asia” which many commentators have now declared a failure often citing the Philippines as an example of America’s inability to keep its allies. This is further implied in a recent article from the Washington Post:
Reuters reported Tuesday that the State Department will stop the weapons sale because of opposition from Sen. Benjamin L. Cardin (Md.), the top Democrat on the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee and a vocal critic of Duterte's "drug war."
Although the State Department did not comment to confirm or deny Reuters's reporting, the head of the Philippine National Police said in a statement that he was “saddened” by the news. Duterte, meanwhile, tried to shrug it off, dismissing the report as a U.S. “scare tactic” and saying the necessary weapons can be purchased somewhere else — like Russia.
Duterte is partly right. Stopping the sale of 26,000 guns is a small gesture, compared with the $9 million in aid that the State Department will give to counternarcotics and law enforcement programs in the Philippines in 2017 and with the $32 million that Secretary of State John F. Kerry pledged this summer for Duterte's law enforcement programs.
But it's a move that is intended to show that some U.S. funding for the Philippines can and will be cut if the president's human rights abuses and anti-U.S. rhetoric continue.
So, as the Americans understand it, this isn’t really about human rights, its about anti-US rhetoric. Keep in mind that the US will have their elections coming up, the current Democrat-dominated government’s inability to keep their alliance with the Philippines has become ammunition by their Republican rivals. This is retribution, plain and simple.
Duterte is not concerned though, he mentioned that if America will not sell us weapons, it is their loss, we will buy from other countries and possibly use locally produced weapons.
M4 Carbines are of an outdated design and is a waste of money
This cancelled deal involves the sale of some 26,000 M4 Carbines. The M4 Carbine is an updated and shortened version of the original M16 Assault Rifle designed by Eugene Stoner in the 1960s. Philippine media may have made a big deal out of this because they cling to a belief in the superiority of American firearms, but this is simply not the case. If you look at the credible militaries all over the world, you will see that very few of them are actually using M-16s or M4 carbines despite their availability. In the ASEAN region, our neighbors are equipped with
| Country | Standard Issue Assault Rifle | Comment |
| Indonesia | Pindad SS1; Pindad SS2; SAR 21 (special forces) | The SS1 is currently being phased out and will be replaced by the SS2. Both are locally manufactured. The SAR 21 is of a bullpup design and is imported from Singapore. All are chambered for 5.56 x 45 mm NATO |
| Malaysia | M4 Carbine | Produced under license. Chambered for 5.56 x 45 mm NATO |
| Singapore | SAR 21 | Bullpup configuration, locally designed and produced. Chambered for 5.56 x 45 mm NATO |
| Vietnam | Hodgepodge of Weapons, many Soviet and American leftovers from the war are still in use. Modern weapons include IWI Tavor TAR-21; Galil ACE | TAR-21 is a bullpup design. Both the TAR and the Galil are of Israeli origin, the Galil is license built in Vietnam using the old 7.62 x 39 mm round. |
| Cambodia | Variety of AK-47 and Chinese clones. QBZ-95 (special forces) | The AK variants are chambered for 7.62 x 39 mm round. The QBZ-95 is a bullpup design and the variant in use by the Cambodians are chambered for 5.56 x 45 mm NATO. |
| Thailand | M16A1 (phase out); IWI Tavor TAR-21; SAR 21 (special forces) | The bullpup designed TAR-21 is set to replace the aging M16s in front line service. These rifles are all chambered for 5.56 x 45 mm NATO. |
| Brunei | M16A1/A2/A4; SAR 21; Pindad SS2 | All are chambered for 5.56 x 45 mm NATO. |
| Other reference countries | ||
| Japan | Howa Type 89 | Chambered for 5.56 x 45 mm NATO |
| India | 1B1 INSAS | Locally designed and produced, chambered for 5.56 x 45 mm NATO, standard configuration |
As the table shows, American assault rifles are, in general, being phased out, and countries tend to be gravitating towards the “bullpup” configuration as exemplified by the TAR-21 and SAR 21. The M4 carbine is simply a bit old fashioned, it seems bulky and front heavy compared to the SAR, TAR or even Cambodia’s QBZ imports from China. Worse is that American built M4s are simply not as robust as other models and requires too much maintenance, this was a glaring deficiency discovered as far back as the Vietnam war. No wonder none of our neighbors are modernizing to these guns. Are these really the sorts of weapons we want to be equipping our police officers? They will be fighting house to house, in cramped urban environments, in jungles, they might want a modern bullpup design. It seems to me that the M4 was only chosen because of our familiarity with the design and because it seems that the US is treating the Philippines is a “captive market” for US arms, we never having had a real opportunity to field test the assault rifles of other nations or to develop our own. Basically, we should just buy the best weapons for the best price, if that means buying Israeli, Indonesian or Chinese weapons, then so be it!
Ammunition compatibility
We may also make a big deal out of a supposed compatibility of existing ammunition with rifles not made by the United States. This is important because it simplifies logistics and acquisition of weapons and ammunition. But the mere fact that America refuses to sell us its rifles isn’t as big of a deal as it once was. During the Cold War, both the West and the Soviet bloc standardized ammunition and magazines to the “NATO Standard,” likewise, the Soviet Bloc adhered to the Warsaw Pact standard. This means that if two countries belonging to either the NATO or Warsaw standard Ammunition is fairly standard among
Thus assuming we were to find other sources of arms from the Western Bloc, there would be absolutely no compatibility issues using their arms with our existing stockpiles of ammunition and magazines. This is how we are able to supply Steyr AUG assault rifles to our elite troops with no compatibility issues because the Steyr chambers the same 5.56 x 45 mm NATO round that the M4 does in the same STANAG magazines.
Obviously, sourcing weapons from former Soviet Bloc and Chinese countries will cause some issues, but again, the issues are not as difficult to overcome as they may seem. It is a well known fact that both Russia and the former Soviet republics and China are producing arms for export, that variants of their arms exists that are chambered for the NATO standard. The government, in dealing with the Chinese or former Soviet bloc countries just has to make sure that they are getting weapons of compatible calibers.
A blessing in disguise to the local arms industry?
Duterte has mentioned that the Philippines has its own firearms industry. This is true, and the fact is, given the situation, we should seriously be looking into the possibility of tapping into our local manufacturers for locally designed and produced weaponry as our Singaporean and Indonesian neighbors are currently doing.
Among the pro gun groups in the Philippines, many were quite worried that, in spite of the vibrant gun culture in the Philippines, local arms manufacture would soon cease. This was because during the time of PNP Chief Alan Purisima, he implemented extremely onerous registration requirements for gun owners. A firearms owners group, PROGUN has successfully obtained a temporary restraining order against the IRR and has taken the fight to the Senate, but nevertheless, the damage has been done. Around 2014 – 2015, the ammunition and firearms industry chafed under this regulatory regime and thousands were laid off. ARMSCOR, a reputable manufacturer based in Marikina City had to lay off 450 workers during this time.
Former PNP Chief Alan Purisima almost destroyed our arms manufacturing industry, for what? Kickbacks on firearms registration from honest gun owners.
Will the current administration help to undo the damage that was done to our industry? Perhaps it should. Duterte, a self-avowed Socialist, will readily see that a government infusion of funds into industries wherein we have a competitive advantage, will reap huge dividends. Government can advance money to possible manufacturers for the for the production of prototypes for the approval of the government. Once a design is approved and an order is made, Government should advance some money for the construction of factories, hiring of workers and the building of a production line. The rest of the money can be paid after the delivery of the arms. All this can be done in 2 to 3 years through proper motivation. None of this is wishful thinking either. The Philippines already exports firearms to countries such as the United States and Thailand. Most of these are sporting rifles and home-defense revolvers, but the innate capacity is already there.
In spite of all of his recent bluster, I believe that developing a local armaments industry is something that Former President Fidel Ramos will approve of. After all, it was during his administration that we embarked on a [stalled] modernization of the AFP and under whom prototypes of helicopters were even produced in the hope they they would enter active service.
Note that the cancelled deal was actually a sale that was supposed to take place, this means that funds are actually going to be freed up to fund investments or purchases of arms from other countries, so this isn’t a big loss, and merely represents a delay in the acquisition of new assault rifles.
Conclusion
The cancellation of the arms deal is nothing to cry over. This is probably just America’s way of protesting Duterte’s pivot to China. Not that this is a big loss, better and cheaper arms can be found elsewhere. If the United States does not want our money, there are other countries that would love to sell to us. In the meantime, we should try and take this as an opportunity to depend too much on America, nor should we be beholden to their products, and to develop indigenous capability to produce our own weapons.
Related:
Mahindra Trucks: The PNP Appears Satisfied
On the arms disparity between the Philippines and China
Turning the Bangsamoro region into a politico-military complex
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