Posted on 04/06/2015 4:10:52 AM PDT by Timber Rattler
For more than a decade, the protest movement over the relocation of Marine Corps Air Station Futenma to Camp Schwab was largely characterized by smiling elderly Okinawans holding sit-ins.
The most provocative action of these Western-friendly protesters was perhaps temporarily blocking a gate or tying colored ribbons on the chain-link fences surrounding the seaside Marine Corps base.
But 2014 brought a new development: Local politicians who spoke against the construction of a controversial runway at Oura Bay on the northern part of the island were swept into power. And when those politicians were unable to fulfill campaign promises to put the brakes on the project — their demands largely ignored by Tokyo’s central government — the protests took a more desperate and vitriolic turn.
Buoyed in numbers by foreigners and non-islanders, the protesters began to verbally attack American families and their children. They egged the cars of Americans and locals who work on base and tried to intimidate reporters and Japanese security guards. They phoned in bomb threats.
On Tuesday, after the arrest of a 35-year-old protester for allegedly assaulting two Japanese police officers, protesters blocked the main gate at Camp Schwab, where the new runway is to be built. Young Marines entering and exiting the base on foot and by car were forced to wade through about 100 shouting protesters who held signs calling them murderers.
(Excerpt) Read more at stripes.com ...
The Chinese position seems to be that they own everything up to your shoreline.
The last time I was on Camp Schwab was more than 20 years ago so my info might be a bit out of date, however that picture showed a bunch of Okinawans protesting. Back when I was there, that was about how many people lived in the town outside. That was the whole town. Schwab is in the northern part of Okinawa which is bascially uninhabited. The airbase Futema is down south where all the Okinawans are. I don’t understand why they have a beef with moving Futema up north where no one lives. I would think they would like that.
You are correct about one thing, if the U.S. military (mostly Marines and one Air Force Base (Kadena)) moved out, that would be a huge hit to the economy.
Interesting....
I wonder about Olongapo. I thought that the base structures were taken over by commercial developers and the runways became the base for Asian Fedex.
I looked on Google Earth and there was no trace of the vast POL tank field it was covered in green. I did locate our house though
I was a member of the Olongapo Jaycees and they did make their livings off the Navy but were pretty savvy business men
Pull the base and troops.
Vieques comes to mind.
After we left the area, unemployment there went up to silly levels.
Let em starve or worse yet, let the chi-coms have it.
I suppose that 81 year old “protester” who buys into “US is the source of all evil” crap pines for the good ol'’ days of his parents and grandparents and those before them living as Japanese vassals, considered a subhuman race by their imperial overlords. Or perhaps the Okinawans look forward to the vacuum a US withdrawal would create for a China whose stated goal is Pacific hegemony. Perhaps all Okinawan school children should be presented with a map of the Pacific showing all Chinese territorial claims and goals.
Back in 1977 they were protesting the closing of a dirt farm trail so that the Marines could safely fire artillery on a practice range. 800 Okinawan police and 700 Japanese police were there to handle the demonstrations. I flew in a Japanese police Huey, filled with a police SWAT team, while I served as the USMC liaison.
The “student” protesters were trying to infiltrate the impact area. When we spotted one, the SWAT team rappelled down and captured him. We landed and as they threw him handcuffed into the Huey, my Japanese counterpart told me the prisoner was a 35 year old, well known Marxist political agitator.
The Marines eventually ended up loading the artillery battalion on ships and cruising to South Korea for artillery practice at a range 5 miles south of the DMZ. The Koreans had a much better appreciation of our presence!
The Japanese treated Okinawa very poorly during WWII. The battle for Okinawa was one of the bloodiest in WWII, and the locals (Okinawans) were generally dragged into it against their will. I think many mainland Japanese think Okinawa is a backward prefecture, and they treat it as such. I don’t blame the Okinawans for wanting to control their own island, but it’s been a pawn for other civilizations for a long, long time.
There is and additional problem with US/Okinawa relations. That being Agent Orange storage and subsequent “leakage” during the Vietnam War years. Some vets have actually been awarded compensation for exposure to said chemicals (Rainbow Herbicides) as a result of their service on Okinawa. Yet, US Government continues to deny such chemicals were ever stored there, much less used there....
My folks and I were stationed in Japan in the 1950s - early 60s. I still have good memories of growing up over there. Japan was still making toys out of reclaimed tin cans.
Students!
Marxist useful idiots the world over, right!
In reality, there were very few “students” in the crowd. Many were heavily tattooed, the mark of dock workers in Japan. There were also N. Koreans...
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