Sec. Pete Hegseth held a press briefing in Manila, Philippines on Friday.
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NewsTranscript
00:00We will now have statements from our principals to be given first by Secretary Pete Hegseth
00:07to be followed by Secretary Gilberto Teodoro, Jr. Secretary Hegseth, sir.
00:13Thank you very much.
00:14Well, good afternoon, Mr. Secretary.
00:17Thank you for an incredibly productive afternoon.
00:21We're really glad to be here in Manila with Secretary Teodoro.
00:27On my first trip as the Secretary of Defense in the Indo-Pacific, you know this, the audience
00:35knows this, the United States has been fighting shoulder to shoulder with the Philippines
00:40since World War II.
00:42Our partnership not only continues today, but we are doubling down on that partnership.
00:47And our ironclad alliance has never been stronger.
00:54This morning, I also had a chance to meet with President Marcos and Secretary Teodoro,
00:59and I just had a, as I described, very productive discussion about how to not just continue,
01:06but accelerate the progress in U.S.-Philippines alliance.
01:11We agreed on the next steps to reestablish, and that's key, reestablish deterrence in
01:18the Indo-Pacific region.
01:20These efforts build on an ongoing $500 million commitment in foreign military financing
01:26and other security assistance to support the Philippines' military modernization.
01:30First, we agreed that the United States will deploy additional advanced capabilities to
01:38the Philippines.
01:40This includes using the Nemesis anti-ship missile system and highly capable unmanned
01:48surface vehicles in Exercise Balikatan this April.
01:55These systems will enable U.S. forces and the armed forces of the Philippines to train
01:59together on using advanced capabilities to defend the Philippines' sovereignty.
02:07Second, to enhance interoperability for high-end operations, we agreed to conduct bilateral
02:15special operation forces training in the Batazan Islands.
02:22Did I get that right?
02:23Batanes.
02:24Batanes, excuse me, islands.
02:28Special forces training together.
02:30Third, Secretary Teodoro and I agreed to prioritize bilateral defense industrial cooperation,
02:37which is critical.
02:38So today we published a joint statement outlining our priority areas for cooperation.
02:44This includes co-producing unmanned systems and increasing combined logistics support.
02:51I was just in Guam before I came here.
02:53We can talk about big systems and advanced technologies, but if you don't have logistics
02:58support, I see the folks who run militaries and run formations, you need logistics support
03:06to actually operate and advance forward.
03:11These initiatives will help us share burdens and promote a more comprehensive partnership.
03:16We intend for these efforts to boost both of our economies and strengthen supply chain
03:22resilience.
03:23And finally, we agreed to launch a bilateral cyber campaign.
03:29We're going to work together to reduce cyber vulnerabilities across our alliance, and increasing
03:35cyber security will allow even more advanced operational cooperation.
03:41The challenges we face require that kind of team effort, but I'll tell you this.
03:47Those aspects are just the beginning.
03:51We had our meeting this morning.
03:52We had a meeting with the president.
03:53We had a meeting in here.
03:54We had private meetings as well.
03:56I can assure you, and I can assure all those watching, this is just the beginning of what
04:02will continue to be an incredibly fruitful alliance.
04:06So together, we'll encourage our other partners and allies in the region to step up their
04:11efforts and their cooperation to increase defense capabilities and strengthen deterrence.
04:18We have already set a robust agenda for the next few years.
04:23Our staff and both of us are going to remain actively engaged.
04:28It reflects the strength, as I said, of our ironclad alliance, particularly in the face
04:35of communist China's aggression in the region.
04:40And our partnership demonstrates our commitment to peace and security in the Indo-Pacific.
04:47As our president, who sends his greetings, President Donald Trump talks about often and
04:52demonstrates we will achieve peace through strength.
04:57We do not seek war.
05:00We seek peace.
05:01But those who long for peace must prepare for war.
05:05And we stand united shoulder to shoulder.
05:07So, Guibo, if I may, if I may, you can call me Pete anytime you want.
05:15Thank you for hosting us today and for making great progress alongside us.
05:19I look forward to working closely with you to solidify that peace through strength.
05:26Thank you very much, sir.
05:28Thank you very much, Secretary Hegseth, sir.
05:30We now invite Secretary Teodoro to give a statement.
05:37We thank the Honorable Secretary Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of Defense of the United States,
05:44for his momentous visit to the Philippines.
05:46It is an honor for the Philippines to host Secretary Hegseth's first visit to Asia during
05:56his first trip to the Indo-Pacific.
05:59This signals how important our bilateral alliance with our only treaty partner, the United States,
06:08is, and we are gratified by the importance placed on the stability and enhancement of
06:17this relationship as a linchpin of securing peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific.
06:24We are grateful for the enduring support of the United States, including the State Department's
06:32issuance of a waiver, in part in no small way to the efforts of Secretary Hegseth and
06:39the rest of the team, for a waiver of foreign military financing for the Philippines.
06:46We believe these engagements are crucial and need to be enhanced in order for there, as
06:54Secretary Hegseth put it, to be a re-establishment of effective deterrence against unwanted and
07:02malign influences that affect the stability not only of the Indo-Pacific but of the whole world.
07:12And as Secretary Hegseth said, we are going to work very closely, not only with our treaty
07:20ally but with other like-minded partners, in re-establishing deterrence. This will mean
07:27increased interoperational activities, joint exercises, realistic training in a myriad of
07:38scenarios to mirror what may be possible in the future. God forbid, however, we must be prepared
07:47to answer and to meet and even to deter any possibility in the future for our mutual defense
07:58and the defense of freedom and international law. During our discussions, we enhanced – we discussed
08:06the enhancement of the quality of Philippine investments in strategic basing, in capability
08:12upgrades, in the skill sets of our fighting men, women, and our civilian personnel to complement
08:21the comprehensive archipelagic defense concept which has in its underpinnings not only the
08:29Philippine Constitution but international law. The deployment of the Nemesis and other unmanned
08:37surface vehicles will hasten the introduction of these technologies into the vista of the
08:44Philippine Armed Forces and will train our troops to train for higher technological
08:50capabilities that we need for effective deterrence in the future. The Philippines is prepared and is,
09:00in fact, taking a more active role in rallying our other allies and like-minded nations to resist
09:08any attempt to change international law by a quiescence or a fa compli in the South China Sea.
09:16The number of Status of Visiting Forces Agreements that we are entering into is – for the rules-based
09:23international order is proof of this. Because of the increased interoperational activities,
09:32we expect increased rotational presence of like-minded and allied troops in the Philippines.
09:38With our strategic basing initiative, we will also expect a heightened tempo of the Philippine
09:47Armed Force for external and territorial defense to put in our share of deterrence. And we will
09:55also expect a hastening of our capability upgrades and our logistical support facilities
10:01to support deterrence. And deterrence comes also with synergy with humanitarian assistance and
10:10disaster response, because natural calamities hit us the hardest at this time, particularly in
10:19the Philippines, which is one of the most vulnerable countries in the world. We will
10:24enhance our current EDCA locations and we will make improvements. Mind you, these are Philippine
10:33bases of which we have to invest in. We will enhance them for logistical support. We have
10:44talked about establishing a sustainable, effective, and business case-focused defense industrial base
10:55which suits our national interests and advances our economic defense and other cooperative
11:04resilience activities, which are of benefit not only to each one's economy, but on partnerships
11:13and synergies, so that there can be a multiplier effect on the enhancements to different sectors
11:22of our societies, of both our peoples. As we know, the relationship between the Philippines
11:29and the United States is not unipolar. It's multipolar, and the most important thing are
11:37people-to-people exchanges, but also commerce, defense, education, language, and the NBA.
11:45This initiative will support the self-reliance defense program of the Philippines and other
11:55initiatives of the United States government. On cybersecurity cooperation, as rightly said
12:02by Secretary Hexhead, we need to work hand-in-hand to develop resilience, resilience and security
12:11of our cybersecurity network. When we work in partnerships, we need to keep those flows
12:20of information secure. We need to keep our own operations secure, and we need to tap each
12:30other's expertise, best practices, and hardware in order to secure our cyber systems, and this
12:40is not a one-stop deal. It goes on and on as threats evolve. So therefore, we are firming up
12:50our shop for IT and for cyber to work hand-in-hand with our treaty partner for mutual resilience and
13:01enhancements. In closing, I would like to categorically state that what is at stake in
13:09our unilateral and bilateral activities is not merely the security of either the United States
13:16or the Philippines. We are facing a common threat, which now is the miss, the overreach of the
13:29Communist Party of China. So the Indo-Pacific, the rule of international law, freedom of navigation,
13:38and freedom, individual personal freedoms are what are at stake here. Therefore, as President
13:49Marcos has stated, U.S. leadership is essential to the continuing peace and stability of the
14:00Indo-Pacific. We look forward to the outcomes on the working levels of what we have agreed to and
14:08discussed here during our meeting, especially as we mark this year the 80th anniversary of,
14:16or next year rather, of Philippine-U.S. ties in 2026. Once again, we are very thankful for the
14:25visit of Secretary Pete, who has not only built rapport with the Department of National Defense,
14:34but with the PT session, with our troops, he has truly made his mark. Thank you for your visit,
14:40Secretary. Thank you very much, Secretary Tedoro, sir. We will now begin our question-and-answer
14:49portion. I now invite our co-moderator this afternoon, Mr. Sean Parnell, DOD spokesperson,
14:58to call the name of the first journalist. Well, thank you. Bill from The Washington Times.
15:03Yeah, hi. Bill Gertz with The Washington Times. China is waging aggressive gray zone warfare in
15:15the South China Sea. Will the Trump administration order the Navy Seventh Fleet to provide a greater
15:21enduring naval presence in the South China Sea, considering the Biden administration failed to
15:26provide visible support there to a key U.S. ally in the Philippines? Well, Bill, it's a great question.
15:32You're right. What we're dealing with right now is many years of deferred maintenance, of weakness,
15:40that we need to re-establish strength and deterrence in multiple places around the globe,
15:45but pertinently today for this region. There was a lot of talk about shifting, a lot of talk about
15:54emphasis on the Indo-Pacific, a lot of talk about allies. What the Trump administration will do is
15:59deliver, is truly prioritize and shift this region of the world in a way that is unprecedented to
16:06match the threats of the future, with a recognition that for the 21st century to be a free century,
16:13America needs to stand alongside our allies and partners, shoulder to shoulder. Today it's the
16:20Philippines, tomorrow it's Japan, it will be Australia and South Korea and other nations in
16:26this part of the world, where together, by, with and through, we will establish the deterrence
16:32necessary to prevent war. You mentioned the 7th Fleet. It's not my job to determine where the 7th
16:41Fleet goes. I defer to Admiral Poparo and his war plans, real war plans. Admiral Poparo understands
16:52the situation, understands the geographic significance, understands the urgency, and is
16:59prepared to work with those in the region to ensure we are leaning forward in our posture,
17:05not waiting for events to develop, not retrograding to places further from the front, but deploying
17:13capabilities forward, posturing and creating dynamics and strategic dilemmas for the Communist
17:19Chinese that help them reconsider whether or not violence or action is something they want to
17:25undertake. Again, President Trump is a peacemaker. President Trump seeks peace. That's my message
17:34here as well. But in order to bring that peace, we will be strong. Our allies will know we stand
17:41with them. Our admirals are prepared and they will be properly equipped. We're rebuilding our
17:47military under President Trump, reviving that warrior ethos across the force. You know, I look
17:53out at the men and women of our military, many of which I did PT with this morning, younger and
17:59more fit than their secretary. And I see mechanics, I see special operators, I see lawyers, I see
18:10fuelers, I see pilots, I see sailors, all with different jobs. But what I ultimately see are
18:17warriors in the profession of arms, here deployed forward with our allies, postured and prepared to
18:25deter war. So Admiral Papparo is exactly where we need him to be, with contingencies laid in place,
18:32and we will be positioned to stand with our partners, hopefully to prevent any conflict at all.
18:39We now call on Mr. Chad Williams of Agence France-Presse to ask his question.
18:45Thank you. This is for Secretary Hedges. You gave a speech last month at a Pentagon
18:52town hall where you specifically talked at length about accountability.
18:58And I'm wondering, including even in the smallest things you've said,
19:02and I'm wondering if now as we have the Senate Armed Forces Committee asking for a report
19:08into the signal controversy, if you feel as the leader of the Defense Department you have
19:13any level of responsibility for what Marco Rubio and some other people have called a mistake?
19:20Thank you for the question. I'm responsible for ensuring that our department is prepared
19:24and ready to deter and defeat our enemies. And I'm quite proud, quite proud of what our forces
19:31in CENTCOM did on that initial series of very effective and devastating strikes,
19:38and the ongoing campaign that we are undertaking, because that is a, again, on the backs of four
19:45years of deferred maintenance and failure and weakness of the Biden administration,
19:49we are re-establishing deterrence. And as the leader of that department, my job is to advise
19:54and work alongside the president and then work with my fellow cabinet members to ensure that
20:00we're operationalizing in every way possible, re-establishing that deterrence. So we will
20:06ensure the freedom of navigation returns to that part of the world, just as pertinent to
20:11our conversation today, freedom of navigation is something the Philippines experiences in the South
20:17China Sea or the West Philippine Sea. It's something we take very seriously.
20:24So we'll go with Kazu next.
20:29Thank you so much for having us today. So I have a question for Secretary Texas. How do you evaluate
20:36trilateral cooperation between the U.S., the Philippines, and Japan in deterring China?
20:44And do you intend to take a leadership of it?
20:48Well, thank you for the question. I'd love to have the secretary answer as well.
20:52As he mentioned, this is not just country to country bilateral cooperation. This is trilateral.
20:57It's multilateral. The broader our alliance, the better. The more security cooperation,
21:03the better. The more interoperability, the better. The more contingencies, the better.
21:09Again, the more strategic dilemmas for our adversaries, the better. And so we're here in
21:15the Philippines to strengthen that partnership. We'll be in Japan to do the same. I believe as
21:20we speak, all three countries are sailing together right now in the region. So we have that kind of
21:27security cooperation happening right now with our navies at sea, sending those signals of
21:32cooperation. And I know President Trump values greatly the ability to bring together an alliance
21:39as opposed to just unilateral action, which is never as effective. But I would defer to
21:44the secretary's thoughts as well. Well, thank you very much, Secretary Hicks.
21:49The trilateral cooperation has been going at a very fast pace. As a matter of fact,
21:57we also, aside from the multilateral cooperative activity right now ongoing, Japan has just
22:06announced its inauguration of the Joint Operational Command under General Nagumo,
22:14which is at the operational level a result of our trilateral partnership. A lot of activities
22:23are ongoing, and we are merging and meshing these capabilities together, together with Australia
22:30at a speed which we have not seen in a long, long time.
22:37For the last question, we'll have J.P. Soriano of GMA News.
22:44Secretary Tedoro, Secretary Hicks, welcome to Manila. Can you confirm the current status
22:50and estimated arrival date for the deployment of the mid-range capability typhoon missile
22:55from the Indo-Pacom to the Philippines? And since Secretary Tedoro mentioned EDGA,
23:00Secretary Hicks said, how many more EDGA sites should Manila consider establishing in the
23:06Philippines, and how soon could that expansion take place? Additionally, and last question,
23:11how do you respond to China's warning regarding military cooperation with Manila, particularly
23:17their assertion to the Philippine government that, and I quote Chinese MOFA, nothing good
23:22could come from opening the door to a predator? Thank you.
23:30On the EDGA sites, as I stated earlier, that they will remain as such, and enhanced development
23:38will be taken thereon. On the multi-, medium-range capabilities, we will neither confirm nor deny
23:48any deployments. We will train as we see fit, and the Philippine Armed Forces will equip as it sees
23:57fit. And lastly, let the facts speak for themselves. I mean, where did the quote come
24:10from on the predator thing? Chinese MOFA. I think their worldview is really, really quite limited.
24:21That's why the robotic quality of their statements. I think that characterizing
24:32people who do not appropriate parts of the South China Sea as their own, as they do the 10-dash
24:42line, speaks loudly of themselves rather than others. And there was a collatelia to that,
24:49I believe that the Philippines should not be a mouthpiece of any other country. You know,
24:55that's once again the product of a limited worldview of a closed society. We don't practice
25:04propaganda in this country. We practice free speech and democracy. So the Philippines is not
25:10a mouthpiece, unlike they themselves, who are mouthpieces of Xi Jinping thought.
25:19You know, the problem is, you will hear me, the United States will hear me,
25:26Filipinos will hear me, but one billion or more Chinese won't get to hear what I said.
25:33Powerful words. I will just add two things. There's a long line of countries in the past
25:40who have attempted to test U.S. resolve. We are resolved at this time, at this moment,
25:45to work with our partners, to reestablish the warrior ethos, to rebuild our military and
25:51reestablish deterrence, and come alongside our allies and partners, first and foremost,
25:56in this region. And then I also, on behalf of the American people, want to thank the people
26:01of the Philippines. I want to thank you for your friendship. I want to thank you for your
26:06partnership. I want to thank you for your love of our country and our of yours. It is a long,
26:13enduring friendship and partnership, so much so that myself and my team will be heading to the
26:20U.S. military cemetery here in the Philippines later on today, which, shame on me, I knew there
26:26was a large one here. I didn't know it was the largest outside of the United States U.S. service
26:32member graveyard in the world. What a demonstration of the sacrifice America has been willing to make
26:42over decades, the resolve that generations of Americans have been willing to show
26:47for the cause of freedom. We don't seek intervention. President Trump has made it
26:54clear we don't seek war. We don't seek to nation-build. We don't seek to use chess pieces
27:00and move them around the board. All we seek is peace. All we seek is freedom and cooperation
27:08and mutual benefit, and we find that in friends like our friends in the Philippines.
27:13But do not mistake our friendship. Do not mistake our belief in peace and our desire for peace
27:21for a lack of resolve. Too many have, and America still stands strong today and will
27:26continue into the future. So I want to thank you all. Thank you very much, sirs.
27:30That ends our press conference. I now invite our two secretaries to
27:38stand together in front of the podium for our final video and photo opportunity.
28:01Thank you very much, sirs. I'd like to ask everyone to kindly stay in their seats
28:09until our two principals have left the venue, along with the entourage, please.