Скачать или смотреть ONLY ON AP Plan to move base highlights US problem on Okinawa

(20 Feb 2014) For ten years, Hiroshi Ashitomi has been coming to the beach near his Okinawa home every day to sit and relax.
He loves nothing more than the sea around the island, the rare sightings of dugongs and sea turtles, the tan sand and the crags out by the breakwater.
But like many Okinawans, including leading politicians and media, Ashitomi opposes a plan to move a controversial United States Marine base to a less crowded part of the southern Japanese island.
The proposed location for the new base is Henoko Beach, Ashitomi's favourite beach.
The US and Japan reached the relocation agreement after nearly two decades of talks and protests. Ironically, it was partially intended to placate Okinawan anger over the huge US military presence near urban areas.
Okinawa is the most important forward operations location the United States military has in Asia. Nearly 20-thousand Marines are based there, along with one of the US Air Force's largest overseas airfields.
Both governments say the multi-billion-dollar deal to move Marine Corps Air Station Futenma will strengthen Washington's keystone alliance in Asia.
But it has reopened frustrations that underscore on-the-ground opposition to how the US is positioning its troops in the region.
It also highlights difficulties for ally Japan, which must deal with an increasing challenge from China for superiority in the Western Pacific.
Okinawan public opinion is strongly against increases in the US military presence.
"We Okinawans are not particularly anti-American," said Ashitomi, a retired welfare case worker, from inside a weather-beaten tent covered with protest banners and anti-base posters.
"But we can't allow the politicians to betray us like they have. It will be difficult, but we must go back to the roots of democracy and get a mass movement to force them to resign," he added.
Though it makes up less than one percent of Japan's total land, the tiny, crowded island of Okinawa hosts more than half of the US troops based in the country.
Okinawa's government has long demanded that the burden be more equitably shared across the nation.
The Futenma Marine base was built when Okinawa was under US jurisdiction, and initially was surrounded by sugar cane fields and the ruins of war.
Now it is surrounded on all sides by dense urban growth.
A decision to shut Futenma down was made amid a massive uproar over the 1995 rape of a schoolgirl by three US servicemen.
Though initially seen as a breakthrough for Okinawans who oppose the military presence, it came with the condition that a replacement facility be constructed.
That touched off a nearly 20-year standoff. Okinawan leaders demanded the new facility be built somewhere else. Tokyo balked, because no other Japanese communities - whose votes are more important to national leaders - wanted to take it on.
The base remained in operation.
Colonel Eric Mellinger, the chief of staff for the Okinawa-based III Marine Expeditionary Forces, said issues between Okinawa and the central government have complicated the Futenma relocation.
"I hate to say we're the ball between the two rackets, but often I think the US military is used that way because it highlights other tensions that have absolutely nothing to do with the US military involvement here," he said in a recent interview.
The US has maintained all along that it has no intention of leaving Okinawa, and says the Marines' air and ground units need to be based near each other.
Washington has since agreed to move some troops elsewhere - including Guam and Hawaii - as part of a larger restructuring across Asia.


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