Let’s just play pretend for a second: imagine the Philippine National Police planting some shady surveillance tech—a nice little IMSI catcher—on a few Chinese nationals. Just a “nothing to see here” kind of move. You know, the kind that quietly grabs phone data, maybe throws around the word spy, and conveniently gives the government something dramatic to wave around. National security threat! Must escalate! Call the Americans!
Totally illegal? Yup. Totally believable? Also yup.
And you have to ask: who exactly benefits if this kind of stunt actually goes down? The Philippines? LOL. Not really. China? Definitely not. Oh—but the U.S.? Ding ding ding!
See, Uncle Sam doesn’t need us to go to war with China. He just needs us to keep poking the bear while he stands behind us like, “Wow, China’s really being aggressive, huh?” All while he builds more bases, lands more troops, and sells us the idea that we’re safer because he’s hanging out in our backyard.
Spoiler: we’re not.
And let’s be honest. This isn’t about defending the country. This is theater. Drama. The geopolitical equivalent of lighting a match, then blaming the guy holding a fire extinguisher. “Oh no, China’s mad! Better let the Americans step in—again.”
Meanwhile, if someone did plant that IMSI catcher and got caught? We’d be the ones scrambling. Not the Pentagon. Not the embassy. Us Filipinos.
So before we let anyone pull us into some half-baked spy game dressed up as patriotism, maybe we should ask: are we protecting ourselves, or just playing decoy in someone else’s power play?
Because if this is the plan, it’s not a defense strategy. It’s a trap.