Okinawa Base Issue Illustrates the Age-Old Problem of the Empire
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
WHEN EAST MEETS WEST
Commentary by Hank F. Miller Jr.
Sliding voter support over Futenma base, the U.S. Marine air station in Okinawa, have fanned talk that Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama continues to be in hot water with the U.S. Government. I am writing this commentary just in case the newspapers and the TV News broadcasts in the Delaware Valley aren't reporting news regarding this long running dispute with the people in Okinawa and their government.
A bloody battlefield in 1945, Okinawa is the subject of an equally bitter political fight today.
A majority of the prefecture's residence want the American military to go else ware.
The U.S. -Japan alliance is almost 50 years old. The treaty terms are simple. The U.S. agrees to defend Japan. Tokyo agrees to be
defended. Japan’s international role has been circumscribed by Article 9 of the postwar Japanese Constitution; domestic pacifism growing out of World War II; and regional fears of revived Japanese imperialism. Concern in Tokyo is growing over China’s rising military expenditures and North Korea's ongoing nuclear program, but the pace of policy change remains glacial.
Last August the Democratic Party of Japan ousted the long-ruling Liberal Democratic Party. The DPJ advocated a more independent foreign policy and the new government let expire authority to refuel U.S. and other ships in the Indian Ocean.
Even more controversial are American bases in the prefecture of Okinawa which
(The largest island of which also is named Okinawa). In April and May 1945 the island suffered through one of the most brutal battles of World War II.
After the war occupying U.S. military loaded the main island with bases. Okinawa was not turned back to Japan until 1972, but with only a modest U.S. military drawdown.
Today the prefecture, Japan’s smallest with just 0.6 percent of the country's land area, host roughly three-quarters of American military facilities and two-thirds of American military personnel-some 27,000 personnel stationed on 14 major bases located in Japan.
A decade later after the American and Japanese governments agreed to move the U.S. Marine Corps’ Air Station at Futenma to a less heavily populated area on Okinawa. However, Okinawa residents want to remove, not relocate, the base. The DJP government announced plans to revisit the 2006 agreement while the Obama administration demanded that Tokyo live up to its responsibilities. The Hatoyama government is holding consultations, the decision promised for May. Even if U.S. forces left, Okinawa's future would be tied to the more basic question Japan's foreign policy and military posture. Fairness suggests a major drawdown form Okinawa irrespective of whose military is protecting Japan. This fight from the people of Okinawa with their government has been ongoing and it seems to me that they will not be satisfied until all our U.S. troops are out of Okinawa.
It would really be better for our government in Washington financially and better for our troops mentally. The troops are harassed constantly by the locals while in the towns shopping and just trying to enjoy themselves. Many of the restaurants, bars and other places of business are closed to our Military personnel; this has been going on for quite a long while. My son Max Miller was a U.S. Marine stationed at Camp Schwab in Okinawa for four years, and he use to keep me informed as to what was going on there.
Warm Regards from Kitakyushu City, Japan
Hank F. Miller Jr.
Editors Note: The author is a former resident of Gloucester City New Jersey