Part of Me Would Wish That President Biden Tells That Extortionate Thug To Go Fuck Himself

In exchange for the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA), the Philippines should get something like $16 billion that Pakistan had received in counterterrorism assistance from the United States from 2001 to 2017, Malacañang said on Monday.

Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said the Philippines received only a total of $3.9 billion from the United States in the same period.

President Rodrigo Duterte earlier said the US government must pay if it wanted to keep the VFA, an agreement signed in 1998 that allows American troops to come to the Philippines for joint military exercises with Filipino troops and humanitarian missions.
...
Extortion? Vice President Leni Robredo on Sunday scored the President’s remarks demanding that the United States cough up money in exchange for the VFA. She warned that such statements could be misconstrued as extortion.

“It’s embarrassing,” Robredo said in her weekly radio show. “It’s like extortion. [It’s like we’re crooks] — if you want this, pay up.”

There's a bit of a distinction between Pakistan, which is next to a hot war zone and has been for nineteen years, and the Phillipines, which isn't. This smells like Duterte is trying to leverage concern for Chinese influence to get more money from the United States. Or, more sinisterly, he's got a deal with China to make it not with the American's while to stay in the Phillipines.

Which is something that I'd not put past either President Duterte or President Xi. And if Duterte can somehow manage to break Phillipine democracy so he can be Presidente for Life, he'll do that.

Just like El Caudillo de Mar-a-Lago.