A US official has finally admitted that it is unlikely that the US and Japan will meet the 2014 target date for initiating the relocation of US Marines from Okinawa to Guam.Admiral Timothy Keating, commander of US Pacific Command, was in New York City last week, where he reviewed the state of the Defense Policy …
Tag: US realignment
General Rice criticizes the Japanese media (implicitly)
Your humble blogger was invited to attend a media roundtable with Lieutenant General Edward Rice, United States Air Force, the commander of US Forces Japan (previously discussed here), the sole "new media" representative sitting around a table with wire service correspondents and reporters from the major Japanese newspapers and TV networks.The meeting wasn't General Rice's …
Continue reading General Rice criticizes the Japanese media (implicitly)
An Ozawa indiscretion?
Ozawa Ichiro's comments on the US decision to proceed with removing North Korea from the list of state sponsors of terrorism — mentioned here in passing — have apparently caused a tempest in Washington, as US Asia watchers have taken issue with his claim that the US "never" takes Japan's wishes into account when making …
Guam, Okinawa, and the fate of realignment
The Joint Guam Program Office, the US Department of Defense office responsible for drawing up plans for the expansion of US military facilities on Guam to accommodate the forthcoming influx of US military personnel, has a new website.For a look at the scale of the on-base construction project — the project to which the Japanese …
Gates in Asia
Robert Gates, the US secretary of defense, is in Asia for the Shangri-La Dialogue, an annual meeting of defense ministers in Singapore. Mr. Gates has also stopped in Guam, and will visit Thailand and South Korea before returning to the US.Before addressing the substance of the secretary's swing through the region, it is worth pointing …
Looking to 2014
The future of the US-Japan alliance increasingly rests on Guam, a 209 square-mile island 1500 miles from Tokyo. The intricately arranged realignment process that envisions the relocation of roughly 8,000 Marines (and their dependents) from Okinawa to Guam by 2014 depends on both governments funding and executing major construction projects in Okinawa and Guam in …
Schieffer bemoans Japan’s (lack of) defense spending
On Tuesday, J. Thomas Schieffer, US ambassador to Japan, spoke at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Japan, where he called on Japan to spend more on defense.Judging from the coverage in the foreign and domestic press, it appears that the ambassador spoke bluntly, declaring, "I think the Japanese are getting a bargain in the (US-Japan) …
Continue reading Schieffer bemoans Japan’s (lack of) defense spending
Guam makes The Colbert Report
Stephen Colbert interviewed Madeleine Bordallo, Guam's congresswoman, Wednesday evening. Unfortunately Congresswoman Bordallo didn't get a chance to answer the question about Japanese tourists.http://www.comedycentral.com/sitewide/video_player/view/default/swf.jhtml
The campaign comes to Guam
This weekend, the US presidential campaign comes to Guam, the island territory closer to Japan than the continental US that will soon be home to a vastly expanded US military presence, if all goes according to plan.Guam will be holding a Democratic caucus, and with Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton struggling for every delegate, the …
Yokosuka is different
I have held off from commenting on the murder of Takahashi Masaaki, a taxi driver in Yokosuka by Olatunbosun Ugbogu, a deserter from the US Navy because the details were murky.But now that Ugbogu is in Japanese custody and US Navy and State Department officials have made their initial apologies, including a visit by Rear …
Tobias S. Harris 