Trump brushes off Duterte's decision to end military pact
Source: Al Jazeera
Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte announced the termination of the military agreement on Tuesday.
5 hours ago
US President Donald Trump on Wednesday brushed aside the decision of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte to end a decades-old military agreement with the United States, saying he did not really mind and it would save money.
Duterte announced the termination of the two-decade-old Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) on Tuesday, a move US Defense Secretary Mark Esper called "unfortunate". The decision will take effect in 180 days.
Asked whether he would try to persuade Duterte to reconsider, Trump told reporters at the White House: "Well I never minded that very much, to be honest. We helped the Philippines very much. We helped them defeat ISIS ... I don't really mind if they would like to do that, it will save a lot of money. My views are different from others."
. . .
Duterte's decision, sparked by the revocation of a US visa held by a former police chief who led his bloody war on drugs, could complicate US military interests in the Asia-Pacific region as China's ambitions rise.
Read more: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/02/trump-brushes-duterte-decision-military-pact-200212204927062.html
left-of-center2012
(34,195 posts)Trump told reporters
"I don't really mind if they would like to do that, it will save a lot of money. My views are different from others."
FormerOstrich
(2,689 posts)I mean seriously, if the reporting is correct, his answer doesn't make sense and interpretation is just speculation.
Asked whether he would try to persuade Duterte to reconsider, Trump told reporters at the White House: "Well I never minded that very much, to be honest. We helped the Philippines very much. We helped them defeat ISIS ... I don't really mind if they would like to do that, it will save a lot of money. My views are different from others."
He never minded helping them? He never minded persuading them to reconsider? Minded what very much? Furthermore, what doesn't he really mind? Persuading, severing ties. He doesn't know what the fuck he is saying.
TeamPooka
(24,155 posts)Grokenstein
(5,707 posts)relayerbob
(6,508 posts)181 days from now
Judi Lynn
(160,214 posts)ALWAYS provides another country for the U.S. military to use strategically as an area from which the U.S. can move against any other country which it might deep as belligerent at some point.
Donald Rumsfeld used to refer to countries like Colombia in South America as "lilypads" the US used as bases in regions from which
it could launch "defensive" operations in any direction against any country it chooses. They have a more technical term, similar to "forward operating bases."
They are VALUABLE militarily to the U.S. and its purposes of looking after U.S. "interests." Colombia, for instance, has 7 different bases in it which house US personnel and equipment continually at the moment, which George W. Bush and Rumsfeld arranged, and the U.S. has doled out more than $11 Billion or $12, by now, to Colombia's government since 2000.
Foreign aid is never charity. The U.S. receives services back from each location in which it invests taxpayers' hard-earned money.
Trump, in his vast ignorance views foreign aid as his tool to reward or punish, not realizing that if he withdraws it, the U.S. will lose what it was getting from the country, for chrissakes. It's amazingly odd that no one has approached him, trying to explain it to him. Maybe they think he will REALLY run wild if he had additional information on anything, screwing up everything worse than it already is.
I may be wrong, clearly, but that's the way it seems to me. I've been thinking about this since Trump started announcing he can cut countries loose from their foreign aid if he wants.
denem
(11,045 posts)"can't grasp" is more like "does not care".
BigOleDummy
(2,260 posts)win for China and Russia. Now I'm no Nationalist but I do believe American values or at the least the values we used to have pre-chump are worth spreading around. As a veteran, I think this is terrible news. Like it or not we live in a world that respects military might and readiness , our chump-in-chief is steadily eroding both our alliances AND our military. A fighting force is much more than hardware, its the men and women who USE that hardware that make a true force to respect. Our orange idiot is doing everything he can to strip the honor, dignity and professionalism from our military and one can only wonder ...... why? I think almost everybody knows the answer to that , even his sycophants of the rethuglican party. Does money or shame about what Putin/Xi has on them override true American patriotism these days? I weep for our country.