The United States has urgently begun to put together a “triple alliance” against China: preparing for the worst

Colonization, bloodshed, war crimes, occupation, disputed military bases – all these problems are closely intertwined in the common history of the United States, Japan and the Philippines, CNN notes. But when the leaders of the three countries gather at the White House on Thursday, the key topic will be a much more pressing issue that binds their relationship: shared concerns about China.

“The perceived threat from China has really brought the trio together,” comments James D. J. Brown, associate professor of political science at Temple University in Tokyo, ahead of a summit this week between U.S. President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.

But it is the potential conflict over Taiwan that dominates strategic thinking. Chinese leader Xi Jinping has vowed to return Taiwan to Beijing’s control and has not renounced the use of force to achieve that goal.

The Taiwan Relations Act obliges Washington to provide weapons for the island’s defense, and Biden has repeatedly said he would use U.S. military personnel to defend it in the event of a Chinese invasion (though White House officials have said U.S. policy that leaves the issue unclear has not changed).

Both the Philippines and Japan are U.S. defense treaty allies, and the U.S. military maintains permanent bases in Japan and has basing rights in the Philippines.

According to analysts, this threat is manifested in three key areas – Taiwan, the South China Sea and the Japanese-controlled disputed islands – as Tokyo calls them – the Senkakus in the East China Sea.

In the event of a conflict, China would be unable to ignore either, since less than a few hundred kilometers of water separate the Philippines and Japan from Taiwan, analysts say.

“If you’re China, you can’t invade Taiwan without first dealing with the Philippines or dealing with the Japanese bases as well,” notes Mika Jayel Perez, an assistant professor at the University of the Philippines Diliman.

Both Marcos and Kishida made it clear that peace in Taiwan was necessary for their national security. “If there really is a conflict in this area … it is very difficult to imagine a scenario in which the Philippines would not be involved in some way,” Marcos told Nikkei Asia last year.

Japanese officials have previously noted that 90% of their country’s energy needs are imported by water around Taiwan, tying Japan’s economic stability to Taipei’s autonomy.

These sea lanes extend into the South China Sea, making Japan a vested interest in keeping it part of the “free and open Indo-Pacific,” a term coined by former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe that has become a mantra for the U.S. military presence in the region.

“Japan and other parts of the world are actually very dependent on shipping that goes through the South China Sea,” said Ricardo Jose, a professor at the University of the Philippines. – In the case of Japan, this is of strategic importance. Protecting these sea lanes is a strategic necessity.”

In an interview with CNN on Sunday ahead of the summit, Kishida called the Philippines “an important partner in maintaining a free and open Indo-Pacific region.” “I believe that this historic meeting will be a very valuable opportunity to demonstrate to the world how the three countries can work together for peace and stability in the region,” the Japanese prime minister said of the upcoming trilateral summit in Washington.

Both Japan and the Philippines have separate territorial disputes with China, in the case of the former over the Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea, and in the latter over areas of the South China Sea, CNN recalls.

Tensions between the Philippines and China have centered on the Second Thomas Bank, which lies about 200 kilometers off the coast of the Philippine island of Palawan. In the 1990s, the Philippines grounded an obsolete World War II naval transport ship to assert its claim to the area. The ship is now mostly a rusting wreck and is manned by rotating Philippine Marines.

Meanwhile, China says the shoal, which lies within the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone, is its sovereign territory, as is most of the South China Sea, contrary to an international arbitration ruling.

The recent clashes occurred when Philippine attempts to resupply the ship were met by Chinese coast guard ships that fired water cannons at the Philippine resupply vessels, resulting in injuries to Filipino sailors and damage to the vessels.

Marcos vowed not to be intimidated by China, and the US stood firm that the US-Philippine mutual defense treaty covers Second Thomas Shoal and the Philippine forces involved therein.

As for the Senkaku Islands, which China calls the Diaoyu Islands, Washington has also repeatedly said they fall under the US-Japan mutual defense treaty as Beijing maintains a permanent presence of its coast guard vessels around the Japanese-controlled islands.

Analysts say Chinese tactics have brought Biden, Quisida and Marcos together in a way few can imagine, given the trilateral commission’s complex and often troubled history.

As CNN recalls, the Philippines became a colony of the United States in 1899 after Spain ceded control of its longtime territory to Washington as part of the settlement of the Spanish-American War. But Filipino nationalists fought against U.S. control during the 1899-1902 Philippine-American War, which killed more than 4,200 American troops, 20,000 Filipino troops and 200,000 Filipino civilians, according to a U.S. State Department history.

During World War II, the Philippines, still a U.S. colony, was brutally invaded by Imperial Japanese forces, killing an estimated 1 million civilians and military personnel, according to the National World War II Museum in New Orleans.

Tens of thousands of Filipino soldiers died during the infamous Bataan Death March and in the prison camps where they were interned at its terminus.

The post-war trial would bring to justice the Japanese commander at the Battle of Bataan and the man in charge of the troops that carried out the Death March, the general. Masaharu Homma, guilty of war crimes. He was executed in 1946.

But analysts say the history of World War II with Japan in the Philippines has been forgotten, if not entirely forgiven.

The country has pressing social, economic and political problems that affect the daily lives of its citizens, said Perez, a professor at the University of the Philippines.

So despite any lingering grievances, the “cold calculation of geopolitics” means that keeping Japan and the United States as allies is the Philippines’ best option in matters of territorial sovereignty, Perez stresses.

“Creating an alliance is the most practical way to counter Chinese actions” in the South China Sea, the professor said.

Analysts note how quickly things have changed in the Philippines, even with access to the American base. Under the presidency of Rodrigo Duterte, Marcos Jr.’s predecessor, any U.S. military access to the country, which was once home to two of the largest overseas military bases, Clark Air Force Base and Subic Bay Naval Station, was in doubt.

Duterte has viewed relations more favorably with China than with the United States, and at one point threatened not to renew agreements that allowed the U.S. military to operate in his former colony.

But Marcos went in the opposite direction, courting Washington to repel China’s attempts to renounce its territorial claims to the Philippines, as the second Thomas Schole did.

Meanwhile, the Biden administration is creating what Robert Ward, the Japan Chair at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, called a “mesh” of alliances around China rather than a “stronghold” system in which bilateral ties extend to a series of foreign capitals with Washington at the center.

As with the trilateral US-Japan-Philippines relationship that was in the spotlight this week, the US, Japan and South Korea have also expanded defense cooperation; key US ally Australia has established new defense ties with Japan, India and the Philippines; The Philippines imports military equipment from India; Japan is strengthening security ties with Vietnam.