President Rodrigo Duterte threatened Saturday to terminate a pact that allows U.S. troops to visit the Philippines, saying "bye-bye America" as he reacted with rage to what he thought was a U.S. decision to scrap a major aid package over human rights concerns.

A U.S. government aid agency, the Millennium Challenge Corporation, said earlier in the week that its board deferred a vote on a renewal of the development assistance package for the Philippines "subject to a further review of concerns around rule of law and civil liberties." ...

"I understand that we have been stricken out of the Millennium Challenge. Well, good, I welcome it," Duterte said with apparent sarcasm.

"We can survive without American money," he said....

In November, Duterte said he wanted U.S. troops out of his country in the next two years.

"I want in the next two years, to be freed from the presence of foreign military troops. I want them out," Duterte told reporters Nov. 1. "And if I have to revise or abrogate agreements, executive agreements, I will." ...

While calling Americans "sons of b------" and "hypocrites," Duterte praised China as having "the kindest soul of all" for offering what he said was significant financial assistance. "So, what do I need America for?" he asked.

STEPHEN COHEN: We’re in the most dangerous confrontation with Russia since the Cuban missile crisis. It needs to be discussed. And at the moment, it can’t be discussed because of these charges that everybody is a client of Putin who disagrees with the mainstream opinion. And it’s coming from the Senate. It’s coming from The New York Times. It’s coming from—and I wish we had a second to say what the motives are. But one motive is to keep Trump from going to the White House. Another is to delegitimize him before he gets there. But the main motive—and you can hear it clearly—is Trump has said he wants cooperation with Russia, and the war party here that’s against that is determined to stop it. And the way you do it is level against Putin the kinds of accusations that Mr. Roth uncritically levels, so the rest of us will say we can’t have any cooperations with Putin because he’s a war criminal.

AMY GOODMAN: Twenty seconds, Ken Roth.

KENNETH ROTH: Well, I’m all for talking with Putin, trying to cooperate with him. In fact, my New York Review piece argues that the key to Syria is for Trump to put pressure on Putin, because Assad wouldn’t be able to commit these atrocities without Putin’s active support. So, I’m—

STEPHEN COHEN: That’s not talking with Putin; that’s putting pressure on Putin.

KENNETH ROTH: And talk to him, too. And we never objected to the ongoing debate, the ongoing conversation, but it shouldn’t be in lieu of the kind of pressure, which is all that Putin listens to these days.

STEPHEN COHEN: Oh, for God’s sake. That’s all he listens to. And you base that on what? Your careful study—

Stephen Cohen: I think we're in uncharted, perilous territory. Even before this began--the hacking allegations--we were in a Cold War with Russia fraught with hot war from the Baltics to Ukraine to Syria.... Now we're accusing the Russians ... of attacking us. Cyberattacking. And now we have a President of the United States suggesting that he's gonna counterattack. We're talking about war between nuclear powers! And overlaying it all is this story about what the Russians did in our election for which we have yet to be presented a single piece of empirical evidence.....

Here's my point, and what I've never seen in my life: that we have ratched it up to a moment so dangerous, at least as dangerous with Russia since the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962--normally we have a national debate about what to do.... What are we talking about? It could be fiction. We don't know.