Pete Hegseth in Shangri-La: He came, he saw, he sells

JUST like his boss, US President Donald Trump, new US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, is fast losing status as a credible and trustworthy American official by apparently succumbing to the influence of the US ‘Deep State’ that has shifted its attention from containing Russia into preparing for actual war against China.

Again, the Deep State is composed of unelected officials and their stooges in the US Congress and the mainstream media (MSM) whose sole preoccupation is the business of war, starting with the selling of Western arms to their global subalterns ingeniously described as “allies,” “friends,” and “strategic partners,” like those in Europe and Taiwan, Japan, South Korea and yes, the Philippines in Asia and Australia in the Pacific.

He may have not noticed, but Hegseth has turned himself into another arms salesman for the US Deep State, who has combined his anti-China scaremongering with the sales pitch for the purchase of more US arms.

Hegseth of course, has no trouble convincing the Philippines, its most reliable puppet, to buy a squadron of ‘hands-me-down’ arms such as the 50 plus years old, F-16 fighter jets at a tune of more than $5.5 billion, which, in reality, would not bolster our national security, but, would aid Uncle Sam in attacking China once the badmouthing has ended and actual shooting starts.

Twice under the Duterte administration, the US tried to sell us those relic of the Cold War (that are proving useless in the ongoing Russia-Ukraine War with three F16 jets already shot down to date) but was also rebuffed by President Duterte twice over.

That Hegseth has transformed into the Deep State’s salesman, Numero Uno, can be seen during his speech at the 2025 Shangri-La Defense Dialogue in Singapore from May 30 to June 1, where he tried to scaremonger the participants to increase to up to 5 percent of their GDPs their defense spending to counter China—and to hell about the more pressing problem of creating a more livable and prosperous society in America’s client states like the Philippines.

We note that this “5 percent defense spending” is the same “condition” that the US, thru Trump and Hegseth, imposed on Europe in exchange for America’s continued leadership of NATO.

What this condition really amounts to is to increase the sales of US and Europe’s arms factories while fueling local and regional tensions everywhere.

It is about time that we all take a pause and evaluate what all these fearmongering and slandering of other countries by the US is all about.

Is Hegseth’s exhortation for countries in Asia and elsewhere to militarize themselves in exchange for their domestic prosperity an “investment” in their own security? Or the continued profitability of Western arms manufacturers?

Is China or Russia or North Korea or Iran for that matter, really a threat to other countries or to America’s desire to maintain its role as the Global Hegemon?

Is war preparation and not patient diplomacy now really the only way out of our disputes with China as Hegseth seems to suggest?

Finally, must we condemn our country to perpetual poverty by pulling money away from economic growth and investment in our human resources so we can enrich the likes of Hegseth and America’s local stooges in our national security sector in the form of “legal fees” and “commission” after our purchase of American arms?