[nathanbedford]

Let's see, the United States is now committed to wage war at the option of the Philippine islands against the world's most populous nation, the world's largest economy, a nuclear power nation with intercontinental ballistic missiles, on behalf of a nation that just kicked us out.

And we got in return…?

[2ndDivisionVet]

Don’t worry, he didn’t mean it.

[Old Teufel Hunden]

"Let's see, the United States is now committed to wage war at the option of the Philippine islands against the world's most populous nation, the world's largest economy, a nuclear power nation with intercontinental ballistic missiles, on behalf of a nation that just kicked us out."

Not just on behalf of the Phillipines, but also South Korea, Japan, Vietnam, Taiwain, Australia. We have these same pacts with our NATO partners in Europe, has that concerned you (now going on almost 70 years)? We used to have one with many of these countries years ago called SEATO. Many of these same countries also fought with us in Korea and Vietnam (Many Fillipinos fought in Vietnam). The difference between our NATO partnerships and these (that I can see) is that we have credible partners here who are all building up their Naval forces, conducting joint exercises and actually getting prepared to be in a partnership. Over in NATO, the only country that spends 2% of it's GDP (per NATO rules) is us. Perhaps someone like Poland does also, but the majority of them don't. That's not the case in Southeast Asia.