Marine general says US troops not a burden on Okinawa, but a benefit to Japan

US Marine general says Okinawa troops not a burden

TOKYO — The U.S. troop presence on Okinawa should not be seen as a burden but as a benefit, a senior Marine Corps general said Friday, despite calls from some Japanese leaders to move a major American base off the crowded southern Japan island.

Lt. Gen. Keith Stalder, commander of the U.S. Marine Corps Forces Pacific, said the more than 13,000 Marines on Okinawa play a key role in securing the region from threats such as North Korea, and said the presence should continue.

“I’m frequently concerned when I hear the word burden used as a description,” Stalder said. “I suggest that it is an obligation under the alliance to do the hosting and basing of U.S. forces. And for that, the government of Japan gets the services of one of the best and biggest militaries in the world.”

The U.S. troops on Okinawa — and particularly the future of the sprawling Marine Corps Air Station Futenma — have become a contentious issue between Washington and Tokyo.

Under a post World War II pact, the United States has about 50,000 troops in Japan. Most of the U.S. bases are concentrated on the island of Okinawa, which was a bloody battlefield during the war and was under U.S. jurisdiction until 1972.

To lighten Okinawa’s load, both sides have agreed the Futenma base should be closed and about 8,000 Marines shifted to the U.S. Pacific territory of Guam. But Japan’s new coalition government is divided over calls that a replacement for Futenma should be located off Okinawa or outside of Japan altogether.

Washington wants Japan to stick to an agreement made with the previous administration in Tokyo to relocate the base farther north on a less populated part of Okinawa, and says the transfer of the 8,000 Marines to Guam cannot move forward until the new site on Okinawa is finalized.

Stalder, in an interview with The Associated Press, said the issue should not be looked at as a local problem, but should be seen from the regional strategic perspective.

He said the troops on Okinawa continue to serve a key deterrent and stabilizing role, need to be close to potential hot spots like North Korea and Taiwan and are now well positioned to deal with other humanitarian or security contingencies in the region.

“You’ve got to have forward-deployed ground forces. In our case, that happens to be the Marines,” he said. “Okinawa, if you look at the map, is strategically in maybe the perfect place in the region. From there, you deter a lot of potentially bad events, and you can get everywhere you need to get very quickly.”

He said that moving the Marines off Okinawa completely would compromise the U.S. military’s ability to respond to crises because troops would have to be called in from Hawaii or the west coast of the United States.

“Days lost truly equate to lost lives,” he said. “If you are trying to deploy from farther away, people are going to die because it took you too long to get there.”