Good Job in Seoul. Now, Where is the Rest of the Gov’t?

Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. holding up a handwritten hotel note from the Chinese Military attaché during the Seoul Defense Dialogue. Photo: POLITIKO

September 15, 2026 – Quezon City, NCR, Philippines

Article by Whesley Samar

Governance, Foreign Policy, and Diplomacy | Editorial | West Philippine Sea

Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. certainly did a good job in Seoul. When he turned a smuggled hotel note into a live public reading at the Seoul Defense Dialogue, the execution was a masterclass in composed pushback. There was Beijing, reverting to the time-tested diplomatic strategy of an insecure eighth-grader passing a passive-aggressive note in homeroom and there was our defense chief, casually unfolding it and reading it to the entire class.

It was a satisfying mic-drop, yes. However, as we flooded our feeds with celebratory memes, I couldn't shake a rather depressing thought: Why on earth are we this easily impressed, and why did it take a single cabinet official to do the work of an entire government?

Let's face it. Our political ecosystem has been conditioned by decades of diplomatic tiptoeing, nervous laughter, and polite whimpering. When a cabinet official simply reads an adversary's talking points out loud and tells them to show a little basic decency, the public reacts as if he just wrestled a shark on live television. If doing your actual job gets you this much viral fanfare, our national expectations have officially hit bedrock. We have been starved of a backbone for so long that standard professional competence looks like a miracle.

To give credit where credit is due, Secretary Teodoro executed that moment with pitch-perfect precision. It was sharp, composed, and undeniably satisfying to watch. However, let’s draw the line at hero worship: he isn't a cape-wearing vigilante, but rather a defense chief simply fulfilling the job description mandated by the Constitution. Treating a standard, unflinching defense of our sovereignty as a rare, mystical event doesn't actually praise him. Instead, it indicts everyone else. The cheering crowd on social media is less a testament to superhuman abilities and more a glowing neon sign pointing to how low the bar has been dragged.

If one official can dismantle a clumsy coercive stunt without breaking a sweat, we have every right to demand that same baseline resolve from the rest of the national government. National security isn't a solo sport tossed entirely into the Department of National Defense's lap. To be fair, statecraft requires a diverse toolbox. Not every bureaucrat needs to public-shame delegates on a stage, and quiet backchannels certainly have their place. However, while tactics can vary, resolve cannot. The rest of the state must stop hiding behind cautious ambiguity: Diplomatic channels must match this institutional refusal to be bullied.  Administrative and enforcement agencies must stop tip-toeing around foreign subversion. Lastly, every corner of the bureaucracy must operate knowing our sovereign rights are not open for haggling.

At the end of the day, that scribbled hotel stationery shouldn't be framed on a wall as a memento or treated as a legendary piece of lore. True deterrence isn’t anchored on a single official having a sharp tongue in a foreign capital. It happens when the entire Philippine government stops treating national dignity as an optional, high-risk hobby, and starts enforcing it as the non-negotiable minimum wage of public service.