Influence operations push Philippines as 'Ukraine of Asia' narrative after EDCA expansion

MANILA, Philippines — Self-styled experts and "think tanks" have been attempting to seed the narrative that the Philippines is the "next Ukraine in Asia" due to President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.'s pivot away from his predecessor's pro-China stance toward upgrading ties with the United States, according to a new study on influence operations in the Philippines.

In its August 12 report titled "Nexus of Manipulation: Anatomy of Influence Operations in the Philippines," media development nonprofit Internews described the narrative on the "Ukrainization" of the Philippines by the US as an example of a distorted narrative intended to disparage the latter. 

The information campaign emerged after US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin III visited the Philippines in February 2023, which led to a deal that gave US troops access to four more military bases in the Philippines. The two countries have a decades-old security alliance that includes a 2014 treaty known by the acronym EDCA.

This visit prompted self-styled geopolitical experts, think tanks, and dubious online entities that brand themselves as news sources to spread questionable narratives in 2023. In their commentaries, these actors drew parallels between the Philippines' foreign policy stance and Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

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The narrative of the Philippines as the "next Ukraine" is one of several influence operations that spread in the Philippines from 2023 to 2024, based on the monitoring of Internews.

Besides Internews, a network of Philippine and global civil society and media organizations (including Philstar.com) also tracked a number of local and foreign influence operations that were seeded online in the same period. Most either dealt with the Philippines' maritime tensions with China or the in-fighting between the Marcoses and the Dutertes, who teamed up in the 2022 elections. 

The campaign to warn the public about the "Ukrainization" of the Philippines appeared to use one of five common tactics seen in influence operations, according to the report, which cited the "5D model." 

It specifically attempted to "distort" the narrative and twist the framing to