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Originally Posted by Ozy_Flame
Nice context spin. You were stating your opinion earlier, not the American experience.
And for the record, the positions of Okinawans are not irrelevant. Shinzo Abe (Japanese PM) has largely been assisting Okinawans and their positions, supporting the move of the Marine Corps Air Station out of Futenma into a reclaimed land location, providing Okinawans $2.9 billion in support, and specifically saying in his January speech to the Diet "We will engage in these matters with the stance of "doing everything possible," taking into consideration the feelings of the people of Okinawa."
The Obama administration has also agreed to forces realignment in the area, including adjusting troop numbers from Okinawa to Guam and Hawaii.
Maybe you should visit the island sometime and see just how irrelevant it is.
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I wasn't stating anyone's opinion at all, I was stating observed fact. The Okinawans are against having American bases. The bases are there, and will continue to be there. Therefore, their opinion is irrelevant to the continued presence of said bases.
Did you know that the area where the Americans are moving their base also has the local population against their presence? Yet the move is going ahead anyway. The speeches and promises of politicians are theatre designed to disguise the reality that the American military wants and needs a presence on Okinawa, and the Japanese and American governments see the necessity for that presence, and so it shall continue to be.
I'm hardly any kind of American foreign policy apologist. Still, if my concern was to interdict any move of China's fleet into the North Pacific, I couldn't find a better place to do it from than Okinawa. If Okinawans really want the Americans out, they should be agitating for Japan to spend money on a much larger military that could replace the American presence with a Japanese one.