Okinawans Demand Clean Drinking Water From US Military

For at least the past five years the Okinawa Prefectural Government has been monitoring the amount of foreign substances in Okinawa’s water. In 2016 Okinawans discovered high levels of toxic chemicals originating from U.S. Kadena Air Base in the drinking water of the densely populated region of central Okinawa, home to some 450,000 people (ANN News). The chemicals are referred to as PFOS, PFAS, and PFOA, and are linked to a plethora of serious health problems, including cancer, reproductive issues, stunted development, immune diseases, cardiovascular problems, and hepatic issues, among others (CDC). They are referred to as “forever chemicals” because they do not breakdown and instead accumulate over time (EPA).

Continue reading

Okinawa: US Military Seeks A Base Built On The Bones Of The War Dead

One Sunday in October, Takamatsu Gushiken dug up a femur. It was one of several exciting finds that fall. By the month’s end, he had uncovered the phalange of a foot, two fibulas, and a lower jaw, too. He rushed to tell the rest of his volunteer group, Gamafuya, which means “cave diggers” in the Okinawan Indigenous language of Uchinaaguchi. The bones confirmed what Gushiken had known all along: There, in a tract of forest in the southern city of Itoman, Okinawa, lay the remains of the victims of World War II.

As November began, Gushiken returned to the site to find the forest had been clear-cut.

“We only work on Sundays,” he told me over Zoom. “When we went to the site on Sunday, November 1, we found that the area of the forest where we were working was gone.”

Continue reading

‘We Won’t Quit Until We Stop It’

Naha, Okinawa – Every day except weekends, holidays, and typhoon days, even in the pandemic, charter buses leave from Naha and other cities on this island to transport protesters to three locations in the north, where the Japanese government is trying to build a super airbase for the US Marines.

One location is Shirakawa, on the Pacific Ocean side of the island, where the government’s Okinawa Defense Bureau is tearing down a mountain and loading it into dump trucks. There, protesters delay the work by standing in front of the trucks.

Continue reading

Will The Pandemic Transform US Military Bases?

Okinawans opposed to the expansion of U.S. military bases on their island have been upset by the environmental damage, the accidents, and the crimes associated with the presence of 25,000 American troops. Now the anti-base movement has one more powerful argument to use in its case to shrink the U.S. footprint in this southernmost Japanese prefecture: the coronavirus.

Until recently, the novel coronavirus pandemic had largely spared Okinawa. There had been fewer than 150 infections and only seven deaths among a population of nearly 1.5 million.

Continue reading

Okinawan People Oppose U.S. Military Base Expansion

Okinawa is an island prefecture of Japan, located about 400 miles south of the rest of Japan. For years, there has been a campaign to stop the construction of the new U.S. military base at Henoko, located in the northern part of Okinawa. In a referendum held February 24, 2019, 72 percent voted against the new military base. Okinawan Governor Denny Tamaki and the Okinawan Assembly have actively opposed the base construction, but the U.S. and Japanese governments continue with the construction plans—in direct disregard for the will of the Okinawan people.

Continue reading

Okinawa Rally Urges Japan, US Gov’ts To Scrap Base Relocation Plan

NAHA (Kyodo) — A rally of thousands of Okinawa residents on Saturday urged the Japanese and U.S. governments to scrap a plan to relocate a controversial U.S. air base within the southern prefecture. Following a local referendum last month that showed over 70 percent opposed the transfer plan, some 10,000 people gathered at a park in the prefectural capital of Naha, according to the organizer of the rally. The protesters adopted a resolution demanding the two governments abolish the plan to relocate U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma from a crowded residential area of Ginowan to the less densely populated coastal area of Henoko in Nago.

Continue reading

Okinawan People Vote By 72% To Oppose US Military Base, But Abe Moves Ahead Anyway

NAHA–Okinawa Governor Denny Tamaki proclaimed that the decisive 72 percent opposed to the relocation of a U.S. military base within Okinawa Prefecture in a referendum on Feb. 24 shows the “firm will” of the people. Tamaki told reporters before dawn on Feb. 25 that the people of Okinawa will never allow the land reclamation work off Henoko for the relocation of U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma. “The central government should reconsider its policy that Henoko is the only candidate site for relocation, and suspend the (ongoing land reclamation) work,” Tamaki said.

Continue reading

Okinawa Activists Petition White House To Stop Military Base Construction

Washington, DC — Peace activists are calling for the U.S. government to call off plans for a massive military construction project on the Japanese island of Okinawa. On January 7, a fourth generation Okinawan-American and local peace groups staged a demonstration and delivered a petition with 190,000 signatures to the White House. The petition calls for a halt of construction of a U.S. airbase at Ourawan Bay until a referendum can be held on February 24. The airbase would build an airstrip by filling in Ourawan Bay with boulders and dirt. Two 5,000-foot runways are planned which will eventually house the ultra-advanced U.S. F-35 fighter jets and V-22 tiltrotor aircraft.

Continue reading

After 1,600 Days Of Protest, Okinawans Bring Fight To Washington

The United States military is building another base on Okinawa in an environmentally-sensitive area, on top of the second most diverse coral reef in the world, against the will of Okinawans who have been protesting every day for over 1,600 days. There are many reasons why this base should not be built. We discuss those with Robert Kajiwara, a Hawaiian-Okinawan human rights activist, as well as why he traveled to Washington, DC and new developments in the struggle to regain Hawaiian sovereignty. And we cover news and upcoming actions.

Continue reading

The Tyranny Of Contamination: The US Military Is Poisoning Okinawa.

High concentrations of the deadly compounds Per-fluoro-octane sulfonate (PFOS) and Per-fluoro-octanoic acid (PFOA), together known as Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) have been found in the drinking water in communities adjacent to the U.S. Air Force’s Kadena Air Base and the U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma in the Japanese Prefecture of Okinawa. The chemicals are found in the fire-fighting foam used in routine fire-training exercises on base.

Continue reading

Tokyo Solidarity With Okinawa Against Killing Of Henoko Coral

Tokyo, Japan – On US television, in US newspapers, and on US-based Internet news sites this week there is a near-perfect silence as our government begins to build in earnest, on the island of a peaceful and democracy-loving people in Japan, another military base. The coral has been injured before, such as when they dropped concrete blocks on it, but only now it will be killed off for good, as they do the landfill work and bury it along with all its beautiful biodiversity. No news reports, no photos, no interviews with Okinawan intellectuals or protesters or politicians, not even with the new and interesting Governor of Okinawa, Denny Tamaki, who said that Okinawans will resist with “all methods” (arayuru shudan).

Continue reading

Demand Investigation Before New Base Built In Okinawa

Okinawa is heading for a crisis.  After decades of delays, the Japanese Defence Ministry is poised to begin dumping earth into the pristine coral garden of Okinawa’s Oura Bay to build a super base for the US Marines.  The Prefectural Government opposes it, the grassroots vigil at the construction site has continued for more than 5000 days, the actual sit-in (blocking construction vehicles) over 1000 days.  The Okinawa Chapter of Veterans For Peace is launching a campaign to persuade the US Government Accountability Office to launch an investigation of this flawed project, which, with a nudge from Congress, they just might do. 

Continue reading

The Dramatic Struggle For Our Planet And For Humanity In Henoko, Okinawa

The political scientist and activist Douglas Lummis has written, “The reasons for abandoning construction of the new US Marine Corps Air Facility at Henoko in northern Okinawa are many.” Indeed. It is hard to think of any legitimate reasons to go through with the project. Illegitimate reasons I can think of off the top of my head include increased status for the US and Japanese military, more power for ultranationalists and militarists in general, and a steady Pentagon-centered cash flow from US and Japanese taxpayers to fat-cat weapons suppliers. Professor Lummis outlines some of the many reasons why we all should oppose this new base construction…

Continue reading

In Blow To LDP, Opponent Of U.S. Base Relocation Plan Denny Tamaki Wins Okinawa Gubernatorial Race

OSAKA – In a major defeat for Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and the ruling bloc, Kyodo News and other media reported Sunday evening that former Lower House member Denny Tamaki, a staunch opponent of a controversial central government-backed plan to relocate a U.S. military base, won Okinawa’s governor race over a candidate heavily backed by the ruling parties. The last of the votes were being counted late Sunday and official results were expected by early Monday. The 58-year-old Tamaki, who had the support of all major opposition parties, reportedly defeated 54-year-old Atsushi Sakima, a former mayor of Ginowan, which houses U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma. The Futenma base is supposed to be relocated to an offshore facility in Henoko now under construction on the northern part of the main island.

Continue reading

World Scholars, Artists, Activists Call For Demilitarization Of Okinawa

In January 2014, more than one hundred scholars, peace activists and artists from around the world issued a statement condemning the Japanese and U.S. governments’ plans to close MCAS Futenma, which is located in the middle of a congested urban neighbourhood, and build a new base for the US Marine Corps offshore from the coastal village of Henoko in Northern Okinawa. While we applauded shutting the Futenma base, we strongly objected to the idea of relocating it inside Okinawa.
Okinawa has suffered at Japanese and American hands for more than a century. It was incorporated by force into both the pre-modern Japanese state in 1609 and into modern Japan in 1879. In 1945, it was the scene of the final major battle of World War Two, resulting in the deaths of between one-third and one-quarter of its population.

Continue reading