Online rumours of civil war in Philippines tied to China’s covert agenda

Analysts link such efforts to a broader cognitive warfare strategy by China, leveraging disinformation through social media and traditional channels in an attempt to sway public sentiment and destabilise the Philippines’ political landscape.

“What we are seeing is just the tip of the iceberg,” Sherwin Ona, a visiting fellow at the Institute for National Defence and Security Research think tank in Taiwan, told This Week in Asia. “We must brace ourselves for more of this.”

Last week, The Philippine Star reported on coordinated efforts by anonymous Chinese social media accounts that shared a November statement by Pantaleon Alvarez, a representative from Davao del Norte, calling for the secession of Mindanao’s southern islands from the rest of the Philippines.

Online personalities linked to the Duterte camp amplified the secession posts, claiming Marcos’ administration was escalating the issue. Pro-Duterte commentator Rigoberto Tiglao, for example, wrote that officials’ “knee-jerk reactions” signalled to the world “that there is already an ongoing armed secession movement” – after National Security Adviser Eduardo Año and Defence Secretary Gilberto Teodoro had said that any secession movement would be “met by the government with resolute force”.

The suspected disinformation campaign aligned with Beijing’s “grey-zone” strategy of using covert tactics like cognitive warfare to achieve strategic objectives without direct military action, Ona said.

“We can also see that disinformation is being pushed through traditional channels, such as state media, astroturfing techniques using pro-Beijing social media sites for amplification, and trolls,” he told This Week in Asia.

A US State Department report last year accused China of spending