With assault weapons ready, U.S. and Filipino marines sprang from amphibious vehicles and transport helicopters to defend an island from potential aggressors in a war exercise and show of American firepower staged on Thursday in the northern Philippines.
The exercise — held in far-flung Claveria town across the sea from China and Taiwan — fits into a strategy unveiled in February by the Biden administration to considerably broaden U.S. engagement in the Indo-Pacific region by strengthening a web of security alliances and partnerships, with an emphasis on addressing China’s growing influence and ambitions.
