Demilitarize, Free Up Land, Don’t Provoke Okinawa’s Hostility

What shall be done about the U.S.-Japan Security Alliance? Is the alliance all we need? The time has come to heed the public debate and secure a tiered security situation, showing Japan’s true colors as a peaceful nation.

We are coming up on a critical turning point: the 50th anniversary of the 1960 signing of the amended U.S.-Japan Security Treaty.

At the summit meeting last November, Japan and the United States agreed on the need to “strengthen the alliance.” Just what “strengthening the alliance” will mean is not yet clear, but we must put an end to the state of affairs in which Japanese citizens are shut out of policy-making, and seize this opportunity to bring the debate on the treaty out of the bureaucracy and to the people.

Protect Whom From What?

It has become standard practice to lay the burden of the treaty, from which all Japanese citizens benefit, on Okinawa. What is the purpose of the treaty? To protect whom from what, and how? We want a real debate.

People often look to Article Five of the current treaty, under which the United States must defend Japan, and Article Six, under which Japan must supply the United States with military bases. However, Article One calls on the parties to “strengthen the United Nations,” and Article Two to “encourage economic collaboration.” The Treaty can’t be reduced to a U.S.-Japan military alliance.

The preamble to the Treaty also calls on both countries to “strengthen the bonds of peace and friendship” and “uphold the principles of democracy, individual liberty and the rule of law.”

Moreover, while the Treaty also includes “the inherent right of individual or collective self-defense” (which is enshrined in the UN Charter), Article Three says that the parties, “will maintain and develop, subject to their constitutional provisions, their capacities to resist armed attack.”

Yet, in practice, the treaty is characterized by undue emphasis on the military and by an excessive burden on Okinawa, and raises constitutional issues (as can be seen in the dispatch of the Marine Self-Defense Force to the Indian Ocean). Whatever happened to the appeals to democracy and the rule of law?

The thread running through all of the United States and Japan’s post-war relations is that Japan’s independence has been preserved, and the United States’ national interests secured, through the free use of bases in Okinawa. As a result of this understanding, the lives of Okinawans have been disrupted by an increasing number of incidents, accidents, and aircraft noise linked to the U.S. military presence.

In an opinion poll conducted by Ryukyu Shimpo in Okinawa last fall, just over 40% of respondents said that the Security Treaty ought to be replaced by a treaty of peace and friendship. Less than 17% were in favor of maintaining the current Treaty (the basis for Japan’s provision of military bases to the United States military). Just over 15% said that the Treaty should be changed to a multinational security treaty that includes the United States. Just over 10% wanted the Treaty to be nullified.

While the residents of Okinawa prefecture are against the U.S. military and against its bases, they are not hostile to the United States—they just want to establish better relations by revisiting the Security Treaty.

Years ago, both the United States and Japan, concerned by the fervor of calls to end the United States’ occupation of Okinawa, concluded that if the occupation continued they would lose the bases there. So, they agreed to restore Okinawa to Japan on the condition that free use of the bases would continue, and that nuclear weapons could be introduced there if the need arose.

Fresh in our minds are the stances of Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama and President Obama, who have stressed democracy, human rights, and international cooperation under the banner of “change.”

Both leaders are taking a bold stand on difficult issues such as greenhouse gas reduction and the creation of “a world without nuclear weapons.” There is no reason why they could not see their way to the prompt removal of the Futenma Air Base.

Japan, U.S., China Bear a Grave Responsibility

The international community faces a multitude of security problems that include not only military issues such as nuclear proliferation and eradication of terrorism, but also contagious diseases, famine, poverty, food quality, energy crises, and issues of human rights. If anything, security issues that cannot be solved by military force are becoming increasingly important.

In light of this, aren’t the United States and Japan placing too strong an emphasis on the military in hopes of maintaining the status quo? It is only natural to be alarmed by China’s defense budget, which has increased by two figures in the past 20 years. Nevertheless, it is simplistic for the United States and Japan to antagonize the Chinese “threat” by meeting it with military force.

Through their accrued influence in the realm of economics, diplomacy, and security, Japan, the United States, and China have a role in—and responsibility for—the sustained development of the human race. They must not place the peace and prosperity of the whole world in peril by sinking into military tension and antagonism with each other.

　

The people’s safety cannot be protected, nor the global economy’s continued growth assured, by a security treaty that relies on force. Recent changes in administration in Japan and U.S. provide a good opportunity to radically rethink the overly-militaristic Security Treaty.

It is time to lay to bed the old policy of blindly following the United States. As a “peaceful nation” whose constitution includes a war-renouncing article—and the only country to have been the target of a nuclear bomb, what is expected of Japan are non-military contributions such as those done through its Official Development Assistance (ODA) and its role in urging denuclearization and arms reductions.

In this new year, the fiftieth anniversary of the Security Alliance, we would like to see Japan and the United States take up preventative diplomacy with renewed enthusiasm, achieve multilateral security, and advance “security for mankind” in the context of a new security alliance.