Third of a four-part series LAST week, we examined Sara Duterte’s impeachment. This week, we return to a world confronting a different problem: What happens when even the strongest power cannot guarantee order? Our earlier column asked who guards the sea lanes. Developments around Iran offer an uncomfortable answer. Others begin protecting themselves, forming arrangements and providing order or their version of it. The vacuum never remains empty. It merely acquires several competing tenants. For years, the question was: If American dominance weakens, who replaces America? China? A coalition? Several powers balancing one another? The more disturbing possibility is that nobody can replace America everywhere. The war without a settlement Eight months after the war began, military punishment has not produced a durable settlement. An interim agreement in June failed to resolve the confrontation. Now renewed attacks on shipping and fears of another bombing campaign threaten diplomacy again. On Oct. 24, Iran’s ambassador to Pakistan said Tehran remained open to negotiations. He described an offer to reopen Hormuz if Washington lifted its naval blockade. That is Iran’s account, not an agreed bargain. The distinction matters: Diplomatic proposals become achievements only when both sides accept and implement them. Wars are advertised as shortcuts to clarity. Superior force destroys capability. Sanctions compel concessions. Victory is announced, preferably before the bill arrives. America can destroy installations. Can it secure a lasting political outcome? It can deploy warships. Can it persuade every tanker owner and insurer that passage is safe? Firepower can open a campaign. It cannot, by itself, close the argument. The weaker power needs only to survive Iran cannot defeat America conventionally. It can nevertheless obstruct American objectives and impose costs. Survival becomes leverage, although survival should not be confused with prosperity or victory. Iran’s people bear the devastation. Economic pressure remains powerful. But a battered state can retain enough missiles, geography and determination to make everybody else’s recovery expensive. On Oct. 22, Iran claimed attacks on seven tankers in Hormuz. The British maritime monitor reported October’s highest number of commercial shipping attacks since March. These developments hardly encourage insurers to discover their adventurous side. A missile fired in the Gulf eventually appears as a higher diesel bill in Davao. Modern military power can punish a country. It cannot always make that country comply. That distinction is rewriting geopolitical arithmetic. The Mecca message On Aug. 7, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan signed the Mecca Joint Defense Agreement, treating an armed attack on one as an attack on all. Saudi Arabia brings financial weight, Turkey military and industrial capability, and Pakistan nuclear deterrence. The agreement does not replace America. These partners are building additional protection around relationships they already maintain. But signing agreements is easier than preparing for battle. Reuters reported on Oct. 21 that the pact had not produced additional support for Saudi Arabia. Pakistan already had forces there; Turkey’s parliament had yet to ratify the agreement. Houthi attacks have shown the gap between promising support and deciding who must act. Collective defense sounds impressive at the ceremony. It becomes less stirring when somebody asks who will send the first aircraft. The lesson is not that regional arrangements are useless. Their credibility depends on capabilities, domestic approval and agreed responsibilities. A treaty cannot intercept a missile merely by being beautifully bound. Regional powers move in Regional initiative also means diplomacy. On Oct. 23, Turkey hosted European and Middle Eastern foreign ministers in Istanbul for talks covering Hormuz and other conflicts. Countries exposed to the consequences are seeking a larger role in shaping the response. Such meetings guarantee nothing. They nevertheless show why the choice is broader than American leadership or complete disorder. China need not become a global policeman. It seeks sufficient economic, technological and military strength to prevent Washington from deciding outcomes unilaterally where Chinese interests are vital. India cooperates with America, maintains Russian ties, competes with China and cultivates Gulf relationships. It calls this strategic autonomy. Less elegant countries might call it keeping every telephone number. Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Japan, Australia and Indonesia pursue different ambitions. None can police the world. Each can influence its neighborhood, build partnerships and complicate another power’s plans. The return of geography Globalization made us think geography mattered less. Money crossed borders, supply chains spanned the world and the internet erased distance. Then geography returned without asking anyone’s permission. Ukraine reminds Europe that Russia lives next door. Taiwan places semiconductor production beside a dangerous military flashpoint. Hormuz exposes energy supplies to disruption. The South China Sea reminds us that, regrettably, Palawan cannot be relocated. Regional powers possess one advantage over distant superpowers: they live there. America can redeploy. China cannot leave East Asia. India cannot leave the Indian Ocean. Geography keeps their interests close to home. But nearby powers are not necessarily friendly. The neighbor promising peace may also want the keys to your gate. Multipolar does not mean peaceful Several centers of power can produce balance. They can also produce competing rules, conflicting guarantees and more opportunities for miscalculation. Before the First World War, Europe had alliances, diplomacy and sophisticated governments. These did not prevent catastrophe. Commitments meant to deter war helped widen it. Today’s danger is not simply American retreat. It is that more actors can initiate events that nobody can control. Governments may intend limited retaliation; their adversaries may interpret it as preparation for something larger. Nor does Iran’s ability to disrupt shipping confer a legitimate right to control international passage. Explaining leverage does not excuse its abuse. Smaller countries need enforceable rules precisely because they cannot win every contest of force. Power is more than armies The strongest regional powers will not necessarily possess the most tanks. Power includes energy, technology, industry, finance, infrastructure and competent institutions. A country unable to supply reliable electricity, educate its people, administer laws or plan beyond the next election does not become strategically powerful by purchasing expensive weapons. It becomes a weak state with impressive equipment. National competence is national security. That lesson brings us uncomfortably close to home. For Manila, this means treating energy security, functioning ports, professional public service and credible defense as parts of one national strategy. Foreign policy cannot compensate indefinitely for failures of government. The question has changed America remains indispensable to many security arrangements, but indispensability is not omnipotence. China can challenge American purposes without assuming America’s burdens. Regional powers can shape their neighborhoods without stabilizing them. Smaller states and armed groups can disrupt systems they cannot manage. This is a world of competing partial orders. The question is: Who maintains order when nobody can impose it everywhere, yet several can disrupt it? The answer requires overlapping partnerships, negotiated rules and institutions strong enough to survive changing leaders. A world without one referee need not become a world without rules. But somebody must defend them. The Philippines cannot choose the world it inherits. Geography has already entered our name on the attendance sheet. We can choose whether to enter as an actor or become the arena where others compete. Next: The Philippines in a world without a referee. To be continued on Nov. 4, 2026

The Senate President crowed yesterday that the party he nominally coheads, PDP-Laban, has a “pleasant problem” — too many potential senatorial candidates. Koko Pimentel’s estimate is they have up to 20 possible choices for the 12-person slate for the 2019 senatorial race. But his list includes the five administration-affiliated senatorial incumbents up for reelection next year. This is a group that has made noises that, much as it prefers to remain in the administration camp, it is unhappy with the way PDP-Laban has been designating its local leaders and candidates, and therefore prefers to strike out on its own, perhaps in alliance with the other administration (regional) party, Hugpong ng Pagbabago, headed by the President’s daughter and current Davao City mayor, Sara Duterte.

Setting aside, then, the five-person “Force,” the administration-oriented but not PDP-friendly reelectionists (Nancy Binay, Sonny Angara, Cynthia Villar, Grace Poe, and JV Ejercito), what Koko’s crowing over is a mixed bag. Some of them have been floated by Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez (with whom Mayor Duterte clashed in recent months): six representatives (Gloria Macapagal Arroyo who is in her last term in the House of Representatives; Albee Benitez, Karlo Nograles, Rey Umali, Geraldine Roman, and Zajid Mangudadatu), three Cabinet members (Bong Go, Harry Roque, and Francis Tolentino), and two other officials (Mocha Uson and Ronald dela Rosa), which still only adds up to 11 possible candidates (who are the missing three?).

Of all of these, the “Force” reelectionists are only fair-weather allies of the present dispensation; their setting themselves apart is about much more than the mess PDP-Laban made in, say, San Juan where support for the Zamoras makes it extremely unattractive for JV Ejercito to consider being in the same slate. Their cohesion is about thinking ahead: Creating the nucleus for the main coalition to beat in the 2022 presidential election. The contingent of congressmen and congresswomen who could become candidates for the Senate, however, seems more a means to kick the Speaker’s rivals upstairs (at least in the case of Benitez and Arroyo) and pad the candidates’ list with token but sacrificial candidates, a similar situation to the executive officials being mentioned as possible candidates (of the executive officials, only Go seems viable, but making him run would deprive the President of the man who actually runs the executive department, and would be a clear signal that the administration is shifting to a post-term protection attitude instead of the more ambitious system-change mode it’s been on, so far).

Vice President Leni Robredo has been more circumspect, saying she’s not sure the Liberal Party can even muster a full slate. The party chair, Kiko Pangilinan, denied that a list circulating online (incumbent Bam Aquino, former senators Mar Roxas, Jun Magsaysay, TG Guingona, current and former representatives Jose Christopher Belmonte, Kaka Bag-ao, Edcel Lagman, Raul Daza, Gary Alejano and Erin Tañada, former governor Eddie Panlilio and Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña) had any basis in fact.

What both lists have in common is they could be surveys-on-the-cheap, trial balloons to get the public pulse. Until the 17th Congress reconvenes briefly from May 14 to June 1 for the tail end of its second regular session (only to adjourn sine die until the third regular session begins on July 23), it has nothing much to do. Except, that is, for the barangay elections in May, after a last-ditch effort by the House to postpone them yet again to October failed.

Names can be floated but the real signal will come in July, when the President mounts the rostrum and calls for the big push for a new constitution—or not. Connected to this would be whether the Supreme Court disposes of its own chief, which would spare the Senate—and thus, free up the legislative calendar—to consider Charter change instead of an impeachment trial. In the meantime, what congressmen do seem abuzz over is an unrefusable invitation to the Palace tomorrow — to mark Arroyo’s birthday. An event possibly pregnant with meaning.

Here’s a striking statement about love shared with me by an English college mentor. “Love knows no grammar. How it works can’t be measured by any parts or figures of speech. It goes beyond the literate and illiterate. The sad reality is that, even a fool who has got no philosophy is not spared of its harsh reality.” After almost three decades, I reminded him through a private message of his words. Here’s what he said. “Thank you, Jord. This statement about love is searing to the heart. And, yes, fools do fall for it too. But I thought that we as well speak of the beauty that it gives and not so much focus on the harsh realities. After all, our country has had enough of the negativities.” Thank you, dearest Sir Eugene.

In these decisive times when our nation trembles under the weight of corruption, inequality, and disillusionment, it is you―the youth, burning with idealism, courage, and an unyielding sense of right―who must stand at the forefront of CHANGE. The future of the Philippines hangs in the balance, calling not for silence or apathy, but for unity, conviction, and action. Let your dreams be the spark that ignites renewal; let your voices thunder against injustice; let your hands build the nation our forebears envisioned but never fulfilled. Now is the hour to awaken, to rise, and to lead the march toward a just and transformed Philippines.

Remember, the pages of our history resound with the triumphs of youth who dared to dream and act. From the Propagandists who wielded the pen against tyranny to the Katipuneros who took up arms for freedom, it was always the young who ignited revolutions and rebuilt nations. As Dr. Jose Rizal declared, “The youth is the hope of our motherland,” but that hope is not a gift to be passively claimed; it is a duty to be earned through courage and purpose.

Today’s generation must transform awareness into action―to confront corruption with integrity, to challenge inequality with empathy, and to counter apathy with participation. The time for mere commentary has passed. What the nation demands now is commitment, creativity, and collective resolve. When the youth stand united in conscience and conviction, no obstacle is insurmountable, no reform impossible. The power to redeem the nation’s promise lies not in the hands of the few, but in the awakened spirit of the many. Rise, therefore, as one generation with one objective―to forge a Philippines worthy of its people’s deepest hopes. And to those who were once the torchbearers of youth but have since laid down their fire―hear this call.

The nation does not forget its veterans of hope, those who once believed that change was possible but have since grown weary in the long twilight of disappointment. Thus far history grants no sanctuary to resignation. It demands of every generation the same unrelenting duty―to defend what is right, to confront what is wrong, and to labor still for what remains unfinished.

Now is the moment to rise again. Let not caution disguise itself as wisdom, nor comfort as peace. The courage that once stirred your youth still flickers within; rekindle it, and let it burn anew for the sake of those who follow. Your experience, tempered by time, must now join hands with the fervor of the young - to guide, to mentor, to strengthen.

Together, let the wisdom of the seasoned and the passion of the rising coalesce into a single, indomitable force for renewal. For the task of nation-building is not bound by age, but by conviction. The call of the motherland resounds to all who still believe that the story of the Filipino is not yet complete―and that redemption, though delayed, is still within our grasp if only we choose to act once more. And to those whose hands have long gripped the levers of power―hardened by privilege, dulled by entitlement―hear this with clarity: the era of self-preservation must yield to the dawn of selfless service.

The nation can no longer afford leaders who mistake possession for stewardship, nor governance for dominion. The time has come to relinquish the throne of complacency and make way for the custodians of vision, courage, and renewal.

To step aside is not to surrender, but to honor the sacred rhythm of nationhood―to allow new voices, new hearts, and new minds to breathe life into institutions that have grown stale from neglect. True leadership is an act of stewardship, and stewardship demands humility―to know when to lead, and when to pass the torch. Those who have ruled long enough must now become mentors, not masters; guides, not gatekeepers.

To the youth who will inherit this burden and blessing alike, the call is equally profound. Lead not with arrogance, but with awareness; not with impulse, but with integrity. Let optimism be your discipline―a conscious act of faith in the nation’s capacity to rise again. Lead with inclusivity that unites rather than divides, with courage that reforms rather than destroys, and with resilience that endures when hope seems frail.

For the measure of a new generation’s greatness lies not in its defiance alone, but in its wisdom to build where others have failed. Let your leadership become the living testament that the Philippines, once disillusioned, has learned at last to believe again―through you.

Now, the Filipino youth stand at a defining crossroad of history. The echoes of the past and the murmurs of the future converge upon this moment, and in your hands rests the fragile, however formidable promise of a nation reborn. You are the inheritors of unfinished dreams and the architects of what is yet to be. United in thought and deed, strengthened by the wisdom of history and the fire of conviction, you possess the power to shape a Philippines anchored in justice, animated by democracy, and sustained by the collective flourishing of its people.

The mantle of responsibility has passed to you. Do not falter beneath its weight; bear it with courage, for it is through your resolve that the nation will rise from the ruins of complacency. Let your unity transcend boundaries of region, class, and creed. Let your integrity redefine leadership, and your compassion restore faith in the Filipino spirit.

This is your hour. Let this narrative be not merely a call to awaken, but a solemn commitment―to the country that nurtures you, to the people who believe in you, and to the generations who will follow your example. Stand firm, for you are the heartbeat of a nation yearning to live with dignity once more. Speak right and shine!

Rise, Filipino youth, and let history remember that when your time came ―you stood unwavering, and the nation moved forward.