As Indo-Pacific security threats and possible responses become more complex, the Philippines is enhancing its defense education and related partnerships. The National Defense College of the Philippines (NDCP) and the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) will be pivotal in cultivating the next generation of military leaders and strategists.
Located in Baguio City in the northern Philippines, the PMA is the country’s premier military academy. In May 2024, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. ordered a review of the academy’s curriculum “to ensure that our cadets will be equipped with the 21st century skills necessary to counter conventional and asymmetric threats.”
In a statement to FORUM, the academy said it is focusing on its majors in management and security studies, while planning to increase its offerings in topics such as cybersecurity, electronic and space warfare, international relations, and politics.
The PMA said military education reforms improve leadership, critical thinking and operational skills, ensuring officers and enlisted personnel can effectively incorporate emerging defense technologies. The PMA curriculum was established in 1935 and has been revised 10 times, with updates more frequent since 2021, according to the Presidential Communications Office.
The reforms also enhance the country’s role in Indo-Pacific security.
“By modernizing education, the Armed Forces of the Philippines [AFP] can shift its focus from a predominantly internal security [one] to a broader defense-oriented strategy aligned with regional security dynamics,” the academy stated.
Updated military doctrines are essential to addressing new threats such as hybrid warfare, gray-zone tactics and cyberattacks, the PMA noted.
Similarly, the NDCP is revising its graduate-level program for senior military and civilian leaders to ensure the curriculum reflects modern warfare and technology.
Defense education should be inclusive and broad to respond to internal and external security threats, according to Chester Cabalza, who heads International Development and Security Cooperation, a Manila-based think tank, and was a NDCP course director from 2022-24.
“The defense college should be the top producer of security experts, and not just outsourcing from top civilian universities in the country,” Cabalza told FORUM.
PMA is partnering with India, Japan, Singapore, South Korea and the United States to develop its curriculum. Cadets also are attending pre-commission training institutions in Australia, Japan, South Korea and the U.S. “to learn the systems being implemented by allied nations … and return to serve the AFP armed with the knowledge essential to foster mutual understanding in terms of joint and multinational interoperability,” according to the PMA.
The exchanges highlight how partnerships contribute to defense education. In January 2025, the NDCP hosted its first round of the “Security Lounge for National Security Administrators,” a forum focused on Australia-Philippines defense cooperation.
“Foreign partnerships in national defense education [are] one of the most important elements in forwarding the Philippines’ intent to work with like-minded partners,” Don McLain Gill, a lecturer at the Department of International Studies at De La Salle University in Manila, told FORUM.
McLain, who lectures at the NDCP on foreign policy and maritime security, said such collaboration fosters mutual understanding and allows partners to learn from shared challenges.
