Hostname: page-component-55f67697df-q9hcs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-05-08T12:20:06.408Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Okinawa's Nature Groaning - Let's Turn Mt Kushi into a Forest of Life. On the Sixtieth Anniversary of the San Francisco Treaty and the Fortieth Anniversary of Okinawa's Reversion to Japan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 May 2025

Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

May 15 marks 40 years since Okinawa “reverted” from US military administration to Japan, but the celebrations in 2012 will be muted. While few Okinawans regret the fact of reversion, there is widespread resentment over the fact that the national government continues to insist the prefecture serve US military ends first and foremost. Newspaper opinion surveys taken on the eve of the commemoration found that 69 percent of Okinawans believed they were the subject of inequitable and discriminatory treatment because of the heavy concentration of US military bases, and nearly 90 percent took the position that the Futenma Marine Base should either be unconditionally closed and the land simply revert to Ginowan township or else be moved away, whether elsewhere in Japan or beyond it. That figure exceeds even the opposition of the time of the Hatoyama government (84 percent) less than two years ago. A similar 90 percent oppose the deployment within Okinawa of the accident- plagued MV22-Osprey VTOL (vertical takeoff and landing) aircraft that the Pentagon, backed by the government of Japan, promises to deploy in Okinawa from July.

Type
Research Article
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BYCreative Common License - NCCreative Common License - ND
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is unaltered and is properly cited. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained for commercial re-use or in order to create a derivative work.
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 2012

References

Notes

1 “Fukki seron chosa, fubyodo no ne utsu toki da - shin kichi kobamu min-i no hanei o,” Ryukyu shimpo, 10 May 2012 (editorial).

2 “Osupurei ‘anzen nara Hibiya koen ni,’ Okinawa chiji hanpatsu,” Asahi shimbun, 11 May 2012.

3 “Gunko e Osupurei, Futenma haibi o sokkoku tekkai o,” Ryukyu shimpo, 13 May 2012.

4 Medoruma Shun, “Warushiki ‘rinjin, tomodachi’ tachi,” Uminari no shima kara, 12 May 2012.