Leading scholars, peace advocatesand artists from the United States, Canada, Europe, and Australia today released the attached statement opposing the construction of the new U.S. Marine base at Henoko, Okinawa, planned by the US and Japanese governments as a replacement facility of Futenma airbase located in the middle of Ginowan City. Their statement urges “support for the people of Okinawa in their struggle for peace, dignity, human rights, and protection of the environment.”

Initial signers of the statement include linguist Noam Chomsky, academy award winning film maker Oliver Stone,Nobel Laureate Mairead Maguire, historian John Dower, former U.S. military officer and diplomat Ann Wright, and United Nations Special Rapporteur for Palestine Richard Falk. (See complete list of initial signers on statement. Additional names are being added.)

Speaking for the signers, Joseph Gerson of the American Friends Service Committee, who has worked with Okinawan base opponents and initiated the 1996  “Statement of Outrage and Remorse” following the kidnapping and rape of an Okinawan schoolgirl by U.S. servicemen, said the statement  is intended to “ rally international support for Okinawans in their inspiring and essential nonviolent campaign to end seventy years of military colonization, to defend their dignity and human rights, and to ensure peace and protect their environment.”

Professor Peter Kuznick of American University, who co-authored TheUntold History of the United States with Oliver Stone, decried Okinawa Governor Hirokazu Nakaima’s betrayal of Okinawan voters.   “During the campaign, Nakaima promised to work for the relocation of Futenma base outside Okinawa. According to the polls, 72.4 percent of Okinawans see the governor’s decision as a ‘breach of his election pledge,’” Kuznick said, “The deal was made at the behest of the United States and of Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. It tramples the rights of the Okinawan people to advance Obama’s Asian ‘pivot.’”

The statement reviews theoppression andexploitation of Okinawa-- first by Japanese rulers with invasion and annexation,and then by the United States to support its hegemonic interests in the Pacific. It points to the unjust concentration of 73.8% of exclusively U.S. military bases in Japan on less than 1% of the country’s land mass. Signers also point to the painful irony that for seven decades Okinawans “have suffered what the signers of the U.S. Declaration of Independence denounced as ‘abuses and usurpations,’ including the presence of foreign ‘standing armies without consent of our legislature.’”

Professor Gavan McCormack of the Australian National University, and co-author with Satoko Norimatsu of Resistant Islands: Okinawa Confronts Japan and the United States, described the intrusions of militarism that threaten Okinawans’ lives and health, " from military accidents, crimes including sexual violence for which U.S. forces are not held fully accountable, to intolerable military aircraft noise and chemical pollution.” He said that “Okinawans’ courageous and unrelenting struggle to finally end the military occupation and to enjoy real security deserves the support of people around the world.”

(Statement Follows.)

STATEMENT

We oppose construction of a new US military base within Okinawa, and support the people of Okinawa in their struggle for peace, dignity, human rights and protection of the environment

We the undersigned oppose the deal made at the end of 2013 between Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Governor of Okinawa Hirokazu Nakaima to deepen and extend the military colonization of Okinawa at the expense of the people and the environment. Using the lure of economic development, Mr. Abe has extracted approval from Governor Nakaima to reclaim the water off Henoko, on the northeastern shore of Okinawa, to build a massive new U.S. Marine air base with a military port.

Plans to build the base at Henoko have been on the drawing board since the 1960s.  They were revitalized in 1996, when the sentiments against US military bases peaked following the rape of a twelve year-old Okinawan child by three U.S. servicemen. In order to pacify such sentiments, the US and Japanese governments planned to close Futenma Marine Air Base in the middle of Ginowan City and  move its functions to a new base to be constructed at Henoko, a site of extraordinary bio-diversity and home to the endangered marine mammal dugong.

Governor Nakaima’s reclamation approval does not reflect the popular will of the people of Okinawa.  Immediately before the gubernatorial election of 2010, Mr. Nakaima, who had previously accepted the new base construction plan, changed his position and called for relocation of the Futenma base outside the prefecture. He won the election by defeating a candidate who had consistently opposed the new base. Polls in recent years have shown that 70 to 90 percent of the people of Okinawa opposed the Henoko base plan. The poll conducted immediately after Nakaima’s recent reclamation approval showed that 72.4 percent of the people of Okinawa saw the governor’s decision as a “breach of his election pledge.” The reclamation approval was a betrayal of the people of Okinawa.

73.8 percent of the US military bases (those for exclusive US use) in Japan are concentrated in Okinawa, which is only .6 percent of the total land mass of Japan. 18.3 percent of the Okinawa Island is occupied by the US military. Futenma Air Base originally was built during the 1945 Battle of Okinawa by US forces in order to prepare for battles on the mainland of Japan. They simply usurped the land from local residents. The base should have been returned to its owners after the war, but the US military has retained it even though now almost seven decades have passed. Therefore, any conditional return of the base is fundamentally unjustifiable.

The new agreement would also perpetuate the long suffering of the people of Okinawa. Invaded in the beginning of the 17^th century by Japan and annexed forcefully into the Japanese nation at the end of 19^th century, Okinawa was in 1944 transformed into a fortress to resist advancing US forces and thus to buy time to protect the Emperor System.  The Battle of Okinawa killed more than 100,000 local residents, about a quarter of the island’s population. After the war, more bases were built under the US military occupation. Okinawa “reverted” to Japan in 1972, but the Okinawans’ hope for the removal of the military bases was shattered. Today, people of Okinawa continue to suffer from crimes and accidents, high decibel aircraft noise and environmental pollution caused by the bases. Throughout these decades, they have suffered what the U.S. Declaration of Independence denounces as “abuses and usurpations,” including the presence of foreign “standing armies without the consent of our legislatures.”

Not unlike the 20^th century U.S. Civil Rights struggle, Okinawans have non-violently pressed for the end to their military colonization. They tried to stop live-fire military drills that threatened their lives by entering the exercise zone in protest; they formed human chains around military bases to express their opposition; and about a hundred thousand people, one tenth of the population have turned out periodically for massive demonstrations. Octogenarians initiated the campaign to prevent the construction of the Henoko base with a sit-in that has been continuing for years. The prefectural assembly passed resolutions to oppose the Henoko base plan. In January 2013, leaders of all the 41 municipalities of Okinawa signed the petition to the government to remove the newly deployed MV-22 Osprey from Futenma base and to give up the plan to build a replacement base in Okinawa.

We support the people of Okinawa in their non-violent struggle for peace, dignity, human rights and protection of the environment. The Henoko marine base project must be canceled and Futenma returned forthwith to the people of Okinawa.

January 2014

Norman Birnbaum, Professor Emeritus, Georgetown University

Herbert Bix, Emeritus Professor of History and Sociology, State University of New York at Binghamton

Reiner Braun, Co-presidentInternational Peace Bureau and Executive Director of International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms

Noam Chomsky, Professor Emeritus of Linguistics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

John W. Dower, Professor Emeritus of History, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Alexis Dudden, Professor of History, University of Connecticut

Daniel Ellsberg, Senior Fellow at the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, former Defense and State Department official

John Feffer, Co-director of Foreign Policy In Focus (www.fpif.org) at the Institute for Policy Studies

Bruce Gagnon, Coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space

Joseph Gerson(PhD), Director, Peace & Economic Security Program, American Friends Service Committee

Richard Falk, Milbank Professor of International law Emeritus, Princeton University

Norma Field, Professor Emerita, East Asian Languages and Civilizations, University of Chicago

Kate Hudson(PhD), General Secretary, Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.

Catherine Lutz, Professor of Anthropology and International Studies, Brown University

Naomi Klein, Author and journalist

Joy Kogawa, Author of Obasan

Peter Kuznick, Professor of History, American University

Mairead Maguire, Nobel Peace laureate

Kevin Martin, Executive Director, Peace Action

Gavan McCormack, Professor Emeritus, Australian National University

Kyo Maclear, Writer and Children’s author

Michael Moore, Filmmaker

Steve Rabson, Professor Emeritus, Brown University/ Veteran, United States Army, Henoko, Okinawa, 1967-68

Mark Selden, a Senior Research Associate in the East Asia Program at Cornell University

Oliver Stone, Filmmaker

David Vine, Associate Professor of Anthropology, American University

The Very Rev. the Hon. Lois Wilson, Former President, World Council of Churches

Lawrence Wittner, Professor Emeritus of History, State University of New York/Albany

Ann Wright, Retired US Army Colonel and former US diplomat

(In the alphabetical order of family names, as of January 7, 2014)

After twelve years of war in the Middle East and Central Asia, the Obama Administration is “pivoting” to the Asia-Pacific.  Sixty percent of the U.S. military forces are being deployed in the region to “contain” China.  The popular phrase in Washington to describe this process is a “re-balancing” of US forces.

The increased militarization of the US’s Asia-Pacific policies is anything but benign. It is fueling region-wide arms races, increasing the dangers of war, as we have seen in the territorial dispute over the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands, reinforces Japan’s transformation into a national security state, and has devastating impacts on the people of Jeju Island, Okinawa, Guam and Hawaii where new bases are being built.

The House Armed Services Committee will begin a series of hearings in February to further demonize China and to create the support for additional Congressional funding for the military “pivot”.  

The Working Group for Peace and Demilitarization invites peace groups, faith communities, and API solidarity groups to join us to counter-organize around those hearings this coming spring. We invite you to organize local or regional educational forums or other public events to create greater public awareness about the pivot. . 

Our plan is to follow up after the spring events by organizing a national conference on the Asia-Pacific in the fall of 2014. 

We will soon provide a list of Asia-Pacific resources including speakers, films, books, websites, and articles that could help further grow the issue in our communities.

The pivot is an issue that will touch every community.  The military industrial complex fully knows that in order to pay for the massively expensive “re-balancing” the remaining slim thread of social spending must be cut in order to pay for corporate imperial ambitions. The military also creates a large carbon footprint that will only exacerbate climate change.

We hope that with your collaboration, we can connect the dots between cancerous militarism, environmental degradation, a new costly arms race, and human rights abuses.

Please let us know if you have any comments, questions, or suggestions or would like to offer to become a local or regional sparkplug for these events.

Contact us at: JGerson@afsc.org or globalnet@mindspring.com

In peace, 

Christine Ahn – Women De-Militarize the Zone (DMZ)

Liberato Bautista - United Nations Ministry of the General Board of Church and Society

Jackie Cabasso – Western States Legal Foundation

John Feffer – Foreign Policy in Focus

Bruce K. Gagnon – Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space

Joseph Gerson – American Friends Service Committee

Subrata Ghoshroy – Massachusetts Institute of Technololgy

Mark Harrison – United Methodist General Board of Church and Society

Christine Hong – Korea Policy Institute

Kyle Kajihiro - Hawaiʻi Peace and Justice

Peter Kuznick - American University

Judith LeBlanc – Peace Action

Hyun Lee – Nodutdol

Andrew Lichterman – Western States Legal Foundation

Ramsay Liem – Boston College

Kevin Martin – Peace Action

Stephen McNeil – American Friends Service Committee

Satoko Norimatsu - Peace Philosophy Centre (Vancouver)

Mike Prokosch – Working Group for Peace & Demilitarization in Asia & the Pacific

Arnie Saiki – Moana Nui Action Network

Chloe Schwabe - Columban Center for Advocacy and Outreach

Tim Shorrock - Journalist

From Japan Council against A & H Bombs (GENSUIKYO) http://www.antiatom.org/

Fukushima Prefectural Assembly unanimously adopted a "Recommendation Calling for Decision and Action for a Total Ban on Nuclear Weapons" to the government of Japan.  This petition was made by Fukushima Council against A and H Bombs (Gensuikyo).   It was discussed and adopted on December 17, 2013.  Fukushima people and the Japanese peace movements are much encouraged by this result.

The recommendation is as follows:

December 17, 2013

To:
Speaker of the House of Representatives
Speaker of the House of Councilors
Prime Minister
Minister for Internal Affairs and Communications
Minister of Foreign Affairs

Recommendation Calling for Decision and Action for a Total Ban on Nuclear Weapons

The NPT Review Conference of May 2010 agreed to “achieve the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons” and declared, “all States need to make special efforts to establish the necessary framework to achieve and maintain a world without nuclear weapons.”

Cross-Posted from DeSmogBlog

The conservative UK-based Centre for Policy Studies recently published a study on the climate change impacts of hydraulic fracturing ("fracking") for shale gas. The skinny: it's yet another case study of "frackademia," and the co-authors have a financial stake in the upstart Chinese fracking industry.

Titled "Why Every Serious Environmentalist Should Favour Fracking" and co-authored by Richard Muller and his daughter Elizabeth "Liz" Muller, it concludes that fracking's climate change impacts are benign, dismissing many scientific studies coming to contrary conclusions.

Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons

In an interview with DeSmogBlog, Richard Muller — a self-proclaimed "converted skeptic" on climate change — said he and Liz had originally thought of putting together this study "about two years ago."

"We quickly realized that natural gas could be a very big player," he said. "The reasons had to do with China and the goal of the paper is to get the environmentalists to recognize that they need to support responsible fracking."

The ongoing debate over fracking in the UK served as the impetus behind the Centre for Policy Studies — a non-profit co-founded by former right-wing British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in 1974 — hosting this report on its website, according to Richard Muller.

"They asked for it because some environmentalists are currently opposing fracking in the UK, and they wanted us to share our perspective that fracking is not only essential for human health but its support can be justified for humanitarian purposes," he said. 

This isn't the first time Liz Muller has unapologetically sung the praises of fracking and promoted bringing the practice to China. In April, she penned an op-ed in The New York Times titled, "China Must Exploit Its Shale Gas." 

    On Jeju Island, an environmental jewel sixty miles south of the Korean Peninsula, a massive naval base is being built to house US warships, submarines and aircraft carriers, serving as a key forward base for the " US Pacific Pivot", and turning the region into a hair trigger for global confrontation. Seven years of principled non-violent struggle by the affected villagers have resulted mostly in endless beatings, arrests, fines, imprisonment; a growing international solidarity movement; but little tangible in the way of political support from any national or local government.
     
    On December 3rd, 2013, the City Council of Berkeley, voted to support the Peace and Justice Commission's Resolution in support of the residents of Jeju Island and to End US support for construction of the Jeju Naval Base.  This makes it the first city in the world to formally declare its support of the Jeju Islanders and its opposition to the base.
     
    Despite being stripped out of the consent calendar and placed almost at the bottom of the council agenda--procedural maneuvers designed to kill off the item--the resolution ultimately passed (with 5 votes in favor) and 4 abstentions in the Berkeley City Council.  Council member Kriss Worthington, who had fast-tracked the resolution, tabled the two items preceding the resolution, allowing it to be put to discussion and a vote, minutes before the clock ran out.
     
    Huge popular support, an unusually vibrant and vocal group of speakers who stayed late into the night--waiting for over 4 hours for the opportunity to address the council for a single brief minute--and a massive flurry of emails from concerned individuals all over the country may have influenced the final vote.
     
    Motivated activists from local seminaries, from the Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists, the Peace and Justice Commission, the Ecumenical Peace Institute, and others made passionate, informed pleas for support of the resolution.  An activist in a wheel chair broke down in tears as she implored the council to support the cause of peace.
     
    Also significant was a letter from Christine Ahn, a scholar at the Korea Policy Institute and peace activist, who wrote in a heartfelt and moving letter that she had named her daughter Jeju because of her passion for the cause of the peace activists on the island.

    An earlier version of the resolution had previously been shot down in February by the Council.  Even as it was drafted by the commission, Thyme Siegel of the Peace and Justice Commission had stated, with a straight face, "It is not our business of the US to tell the South Korean government and military how to defend itself against North Korea and China."

    Council Member Linda Maio attempted to water down the resolution by stripping out references to the Pacific Pivot (despite corroborating statements from the Secretary of State and Defense); references to toxic dumping in bases in the Phillipines, and rapes and violence in Okinawa, (as well as missile tests in the Marshall Islands and drone bases in Australia).   In particular, Council Member Maio stated, "Condemning the U.S Military for rapes--I can't put it in there", apparently oblivious to the fact that 22,000 rapes and sexual assaults occur within the military annually, a number that itself pales in comparison with the abuse that is dealt out to the general population by an occupying military immunized from local prosecution by Status of Forces Agreements.
     
    She also removed information regarding the hardware being deployed (the US Navy's Aegis Combat System).
     
    Council Member Max Anderson, however, put paid to her statement, stating that he had been in Okinawa, and had witnessed first hand the abuses, the rapes, the violence, and ugliness of the military occupation.
     
    Council Member Gordon Wozniak mentioned the recent escalation of hostilities in the pacific with Air Defense Zones, stating that "it was not just about Korea, that it was Japan, China", and that the supporters of the resolution were "missing the point" [in focusing on Korea].  He did not seem understand that he had just proven the argument of the supporters, that the Jeju base was part of the general escalation of hostilities and projection of force in the pacific, and that its presence would exacerbate regional conflict.
     
    Ultimately, what may have swung the vote may have been a missive from Gloria Steinem, legendary feminist icon and supporter of Jeju, addressing the city council:
     
    "As you cast your votes about Jeju's future, I hope you will consider the attached", referring to her article in the New York times where she had written, "There are some actions for which those of us alive today will be judged in centuries to come. The only question will be: What did we know and when did we know it?  I think one judgment-worthy action may be what you and I do about the militarization of Jeju Island, South Korea, in service of the arms race."

___________________

Cross-Posted from Frack the Media

The same week in which a Washington Post columnist claimed that interracial marriage makes people gag, a USA Today columnist has proposed using the U.S. military to aid those suffering in the Philippines -- as a backdoor means of getting the U.S. military back into a larger occupation of the Philippines.

While the Philippines' representative at the climate talks in Warsaw is fasting in protest of international inaction on the destruction of the earth's climate, and the U.S. negotiator has effectively told him to go jump in a typhoon, the discussion in the U.S. media is of the supposed military benefits of using Filipinos' suffering as an excuse to militarize their country.

The author of the USA Today column makes no mention of the U.S. military's history in the Philippines.  This was, after all, the site of the first major modern U.S. war of foreign occupation, marked by long duration, and high and one-sided casualties.  As in Iraq, some 4,000 U.S. troops died in the effort, but most of them from disease. The Philippines lost some 1.5 million men, women, and children out of a population of 6 to 7 million. 

The USA Today columnist makes no mention of Filipinos' resistance to the U.S. military up through recent decades, or of President Obama's ongoing efforts to put more troops back into the Philippines, disaster or no disaster.

Instead, our benevolent militarist claims that budgets are tight in Washington -- which is of course always going to be the case for a government spending upwards of $1 trillion a year on militarism. 

He claims that the United States "stations troops throughout the world in the hope of shaping the political environment so as to avoid sending them into combat" -- a perspective that ignores the alternative of neither sending them into combat nor stationing them abroad. 

The terrorist attacks that the U.S. uses to justify its foreign wars are, according to U.S. officials, provoked by the over a million troops stationed in 177 countries, the drone strikes, and other such "preventive" measures.

"[D]eploying military resources for disaster relief is a remarkably effective -- and inexpensive -- investment in the future. One of the largest such deployments in history, the deployment of the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and other assets following the Asian tsunami of 2004, is estimated to have cost $857 million. That's roughly the price of three days' operations in Afghanistan last year."

Or of 15,500 teachers in U.S. schools, or of enormous supplies of far more edible food than an aircraft carrier full of troops and weapons.

Much of the world has long-since learned to fear U.S. Trojan horses.  As I noted in War Is A Lie:

"By 1961, the cops of the world were in Vietnam, but President Kennedy's representatives there thought a lot more cops were needed and knew the public and the president would be resistant to sending them. For one thing, you couldn't keep up your image as the cops of the world if you sent in a big force to prop up an unpopular regime. What to do? What to do? Ralph Stavins, coauthor of an extensive account of Vietnam War planning, recounts that General Maxwell Taylor and Walt W. Rostow, '. . . wondered how the United States could go to war while appearing to preserve the peace. While they were pondering this question, Vietnam was suddenly struck by a deluge. It was as if God had wrought a miracle. American soldiers, acting on humanitarian impulses, could be dispatched to save Vietnam not from the Viet Cong, but from the floods.'"

What a blessing! And how well it helped to prevent warfare!

Of course, today's enlightened punditry means well.  The thought of Southeast Asians marrying their daughters might make some of them gag, but philanthropy is philanthropy after all, even if we'd never stand for some other country stationing its military here on the excuse that it brought some food and medicine along.  Here's the USA Today:

"The goodwill the tsunami relief brought the U.S. is incalculable. Nearly a decade later, the effort may rank as one of the most concrete reasons Southeast Asian nations trust the long-term U.S. commitment to a strategy of 'Asian rebalancing' The Obama administration recognizes the value of disaster relief. As the Pentagon attempts to shift more of its weight to the Asian Pacific region while balancing a shrinking budget, this could turn out to be one of the best decisions it could make."

But good will is dependent on not dominating people militarily and economically -- yet that seems to be exactly the goal. 

What's wrong with that, some might ask.  The sneaky abuse of disaster relief might be thought to give aggressive war "prevention" an undeserved bad name were it not for the fact that nobody is threatening war on the United States and nobody is about to do so.  Don't take my word for it. Listen to one of our top veteran warmongers, via PopularResistance:

"During a recent speech in Poland, former U.S. National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski warned fellow elitists that a worldwide 'resistance' movement to 'external control' driven by 'populist activism' is threatening to derail the move towards a new world order. Calling the notion that the 21st century is the American century a 'shared delusion,' Brzezinski stated that American domination was no longer possible because of an accelerating social change driven by 'instant mass communications such as radio, television and the Internet,' which have been cumulatively stimulating 'a universal awakening of mass political consciousness.' The former U.S. National Security Advisor added that this 'rise in worldwide populist activism is proving inimical to external domination of the kind that prevailed in the age of colonialism and imperialism.'"

If this master warmonger recognizes that the age of colonialism and imperialism is gone, how do millions of Americans still manage to bark out the Pavlovian response "What about the next Hitler?" whenever someone proposes ending war?

The fact is that no governments are plotting to take over the United States.  Old-fashioned imperialism and colonialism are as gone as 1940s clothing and music, not to mention Jim Crow, respectability for eugenics, established second-class status for women, the absence of environmentalism, children hiding under desks to protect themselves from nuclear bombs, teachers hitting children, cigarettes being good for you. The fact is that 75 years is a long, long time.  In many ways we've moved on and never looked back.

When it comes to war, however, just propose to end it, and 4 out of 5 dentists, or doctors, or teachers, or gardeners, or anybody else in the United States will say "What about the next Hitler?"  Well, what about the dozens of misidentified next-Hitlers of the past 70 years?  What about the possibility that within our own minds we're dressing up war as disaster relief?  Isn't it just possible that after generations of clearly aggressive, destructive, and criminal wars we describe militarism as a response to the second-coming of Hitler because the truth wouldn't sound as nice?

Editor's note: For what happened the last time the United States encouraged Japan toward militarism and imperialism, read The Imperial Cruise by James Bradley in combination with virtually every piece of propaganda depicting the U.S. Dept of Defense as defensive since the day it changed its name from the Dept of War. --DCNS

Japan’s Remarkable “No War” Constitutional Article under Strong Attack

By Ann Wright

After the end of World War II, the Japanese constitution, written in part by the United States for the defeated Japanese nation, rejected war as a solution for conflict. The Preamble to the Japanese constitution recognized the Japanese government’s brutal actions in Asia during World War II,  “…we  resolve that never again shall we be visited with the horrors of war through the action of government,” and continues “We, the Japanese people, desire peace for all time and are deeply conscious of the high ideals controlling human relationship, and we have determined to preserve our security and existence, trusting in the justice and faith of the peace-loving peoples of the world.  We desire to occupy an honored place in an international society striving for the preservation of peace, and the banishment of tyranny and slavery, oppression and intolerance for all time from the earth.  We recognize that all people of the world have the right to live in peace, fee from fear and want.”

Article 9 states: "Aspiring sincerely to an international peace based on justice and order, the Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes. In order to accomplish the aim of the preceding paragraph, land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained. The right of belligerency of the state will not be recognized."

Two weeks ago I was in Osaka, Japan as an international speaker at the Article 9 “No War” conference. I was also in Japan five years ago in 2008 at a similar conference, when George Bush was President of the United States and was undermining the spirit and intent of Article 9 of the Japanese constitution by urging the Japanese government to allow the Japanese Self-Defense forces to provide air and sea logistics assistance to Bush's war on Iraq.

One of President Bush’s chief advisors, former Assistant Secretary of State Richard Armitage had complained that “ Japan’s Article 9 is an impediment to the US-Japanese alliance," an alliance the Bush administration wanted to use to spread the financial and military operational burden of the war on Iraq.

Over the objections of many Japanese citizens, the Japanese government did provide ships for resupplying American warships and logistic transport aircraft to fly supplies into Baghdad. A 2008 decision by the High Court of Nagoya found that Japanese Air Self-Defense Force missions into Iraq were unconstitutional as they violated Article 9.

Obama Administration Wants Japan to “Re-examine” legal basis for Article Nine

Five years later it is Barack Obama that is President of the United States, but the demand from the United States government has not changed—that Japan “modify” Article 9 and end its renunciation of war.

 On October 3, 2013, the United States and Japan issued a “Joint Statement of the Security Consultative Committee: Toward a More Robust alliance and Greater Shared Responsibilities.” http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2013/10/215070.htm

In the document, the United States “welcomes” the Abe government’s “re-examining the legal basis for its security including the matter of exercising its right of collective self-defense…”  In other words, find a way to eliminate Article 9 that will then allow Japan to have a military policy that does not preclude its participation in wars of aggression.

The document puts countries in the region on edge, China, North Korea and even South Korea by touting the U.S. commitment for Japan’s security through nuclear, as well as conventional, military capabilities, by welcoming the Abe government’s “determination to contribute more proactively to regional and global peace,” and by announcing that the United States will strengthen its military involvement in the region.  Japan and the United States state that their alliance must be ready to deal with “persistent and emerging threats to peace and security” including “coercive and destabilizing behaviors in the maritime domain, disruptive activities in space and cyberspace; proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD), man-made and natural disasters and North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs.”

The statement also calls for “encouragement of China to play a responsible and constructive role in regional stability and prosperity, to adhere to international norms of behavior, as well as to improve openness and transparency in its military modernization with its rapid expanding military investments.”

America’s Military Pivot toward Asia and the Pacific

With President Obama’s military “pivot” of the United States toward Asia, the government of the United States is putting a heavy hand on the Japanese government to pay even more for the United States defending its security. Japan currently pays the U.S. over $2 billion for the U.S. bases and military personnel stationed in Japan.  In effect, the Japanese government is subsidizing the U.S. military.

American military exercises and deployment of strategic military equipment in Asia and the Pacific has increased substantially as the war on Iraq ended and the war on Afghanistan winds down.

For example, the United States will begin flying long-range Global Hawk spy drones from a base in Japan. Surveillance flights will begin in the Spring, 2014 and reportedly will primarily target North Korea. Additionally, the U.S. will construct a new radar system in Japan for its missile defense system.

 A new generation of U.S. military equipment is being deployed to Japan, including the new P-8 anti-submarine planes, reportedly marking the first use of the aircraft outside the United States. The US has already sent the Osprey aircraft to Japan and its presence is causing Japanese citizen protests.

In the summer of 2012, the largest “war games” of military exercises ever held in the Pacific off Hawaii was conducted with 42 ships, including the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz, 200 aircraft and 25,000 personnel from 22 nations.  The exercise involved surface combatants from the U.S., Canada, Japan, Australia, South Korea and Chile. China was excluded from observer status of the exercises, which it had had in the previous “war games.”

In 2012, the U.S. and Japan agreed to cut by half the controversial Marine Corps presence on Okinawa and redeploy about 9,000 Marines across the Pacific region, including a military buildup of about 5,000 Marines on Guam, the redeployment of thousands of Marines to Hawaii, and the rotation of forces through Australia.  Between 4,700 and 5,000 Marines will relocate from Okinawa to Guam. The total cost includes an unspecified amount for possible construction of new training ranges in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. territorial possession, that could be used jointly by U.S. and Japanese forces.

Conservations groups are already protesting the possible use of the islands of Pagan and Tinian in the Marianas Islands as an aerial bombing target.  In the past twenty years, activists have forced the US Department of Defense to close down US bombing ranges on the Hawaiian Island of Kahoolawe and the Puerto Rican Island of Viequez.  

On the mainland of Japan, citizen activism has forced the relocation of the Futenma airbase in a densely populated area on Okinawa.  However, the  U.S. plan to place the new airbase at a Marine base further north on the island, has generated fierce opposition from local residents, who do not want the habitat of unique marine mammals in the area destroyed by a runway that would be on a land fill into the pristine waters off Okinawa.

In Australia, Robertson Barracks is reported to be a future site of a United States Pacific Command Marine Air-Ground-Task Force rotational deployment. Military facilities in Darwin will become a base for a US Marine task force, airfields and training ranges in northern Australia will be used by American long-range bombers.  The port in Perth will be visited by US warships and nuclear-armed submarines. The Australian armed forces are being structured at every level to function as an integral part of US operations in the region.

B-52 bombers will be deployed twice to Darwin this year and an American drone base is being constructed in the Cocos Islands, an Australian possession. A second rotation of more than 200 US marines deployed to Darwin in September, 2013, with plans to increase this force to about 2500 annually.

The Joint Defense Facility Pine Gap was established in central Australia near the town of Alice Springs in 1970. Pine Gap is one of three major satellite tracking stations operated by US intelligence agencies and the U.S. military.

Every day, agents of the US National Security Agency, the Central Intelligence Agency, the intelligence branches of the US Air Force, Army, Navy and Marine Corp, as well as Australia’s intelligence agencies, process vast amounts of data that is transmitted to Pine Gap by US spy satellites as they pass over the Middle East, Central Asia, the Indian Ocean, China and South East Asia and the Pacific Ocean.

In New Zealand in May, 2012, U.S. Marines conducted the first large-scale combat exercise involving New Zealand in 27 years.  The combat training was the first conducted since the U.S. suspended ANZUS (Australia, New Zealand, U.S.) Treaty obligations with New Zealand in 1986 after the country’s government passed anti-nuclear legislation that banned nuclear-powered U.S. Navy ships from New Zealand’s waters.

Besides U.S. threats of building a military airport into the pristine marine environment in Okinawa, the United States missile defense system and its Aegis missile ships have already destroyed one of the most pristine marine environments in South Korea with the building of a huge, unnecessary military naval port on Jeju Island to homeport the Aegis missile destroyer fleet.  The building of the new military base on an island closer to China is seen as a provocation by the Chinese government.

I visited Jeju Island in 2010 and was there in again in October, 2013. http://www.opednews.com/articles/America-s-Destructive-Pivo-by-Ann-Wright-American-Facism_American-International-Group_Asia_Disaster-131017-130.html

It was heartbreaking to see an unnecessary military naval base constructed in such a beautiful area.  The activists on Jeju Island have used non-violent tactics to oppose the construction of the base, while the South Korean government has flown thousands of police and military forces from the mainland of South Korea to arrest and imprison many of the activists.

In the Philippines, the United States is in the midst of negotiations for broader access to military bases. A new security accord, called the Increased Rotational Presence (IRP) Agreement, would permit American forces to regularly rotate through the Philippines for joint U.S.-Philippine military exercises.  This agreement would allow the United States to preposition the combat equipment used by its forces at Philippine military bases. The frequency of U.S.-Philippine exercises could increase to the point where there would be a near-continuous American military presence in the Philippines. U.S. military forces were removed from the Philippines in 1992 after citizen protests. Chinese claims over islands traditionally held by the Philippines has fueled the new U.S.-Philippines relationship.

President Obama's postponed visit was to solidify plans for the Philippines to sign on to the  proposed Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP), which would establish an 11-nation free-trade zone in the Asia-Pacific regions that would give unprecedented authority to international corporations to undercut domestic industries in those countries.

Does China Pose a Threat?

The United States has substantially increased its military involvement in Asia to counter China’s increasing economic and military power in the region.  Yet, China’s military spending of $129 billion is dwarfed by the $628 billion spent by the United States.  A comparison of military equipment demonstrates the dominance of US military power:  the US has 10 floating military bases (aircraft carriers) to one for China; the US has 15, 293 military aircraft to 5,048 for China; 6,665 military helicopters to 901 for China.  The disparity between the US and China in numbers of military personnel is striking.  With a population 1, 344, 130, 000, China has 2,285,000 on active military duty and 800,000 in the active military reserves.  The United States has less than one-fourth of the population of China, 313,847,500, but has 1,478,000 on active military duty and 1,458,500 in the active military reserves. http://www.globalfirepower.com/countries-comparison-detail.asp?form=form&country1=United-States-of-America&country2=China&Submit=Compare+Countries

According to Chinese media, the Chinese navy includes 70 submarines, 10 of which are nuclear powered. At least four of those are capable of launching the JL-2 missiles with nuclear warheads which gives China for the first time strategic deterrence and second strike capability against the United States.'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2484334/China-boasts-new-submarine-fleet-capable-launching-nuclear-warheads-cities-United-States.html#ixzz2jVzjmJmQ

The United States has 73 nuclear submarines with 3 more under construction and 4 on order: 14 Ohio class ballistic missile submarines, 4 Ohio class guided missile submarines, 7 Virginia class fast attack submarines with 3 more under construction and an additional 4 on order, 3 Seawolf class attack submarines and 43 Los Angeles class attack submarines with 2 in reserve.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Submarines_in_the_United_States_Navy

The United States has a current stockpile of 5,113 nuclear weapons and missiles with a range of 9,300 miles when fired from land and 7,500 miles when fired from nuclear submarines. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapons_and_the_United_States

In 2011, Georgetown University estimated China had as many as 3,000 warheads while in 2009 the Federation of American Scientists estimated the Chinese may have as few as 240 warheads. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Republic_of_China_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction

In 2011, China published a defense white paper, which repeated its nuclear policies of maintaining a minimum deterrent and became the first nuclear weapon state to adopt a nuclear “no-first use” policy and an official pledge not to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear states. China’s deployment of four new nuclear-capable ballistic missiles has caused international concern.  http://www.nti.org/country-profiles/china/

The United States continues to have “all options” open, including nuclear, as spelled out in the October 3, 2013 “Joint Statement of the Security Consultative Committee.”

Caroline Kennedy-New U.S. Ambassador to Japan--Will She Challenge Obama Policies?

The United States will soon be sending a new Ambassador to Japan.

 Caroline Kennedy, the daughter of former President John F. Kennedy, will be the new face of U.S. imperialism in Japan.   As a private citizen, Caroline Kennedy stated that she opposed the U.S. war on Iraq. 

An important question is whether she will recognize the desires of the people of Japan to retain its unique and important Article 9 “No War” section of its Constitution and convince the Obama administration not to undermine it.

 To do so would be an incredible act of political courage as an American Ambassador, one that would be worthy to be included in an updated version of r father’s book, “Profiles in Courage.”

About the Author:  Ann Wright is a 29 year veteran of the US Army/Army Reserves.  She retired as a Colonel.  She was also a U.S. diplomat for 16 years and served in U.S. Embassies in Nicaragua, Grenada, Somalia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Sierra Leone, Micronesia, Afghanistan and Mongolia.   She resigned from the U.S. Department of State in 2003 in opposition to the war on Iraq.

Issue 79 of ColdType magazine is now on line at http://coldtype.net. 68 pages. Great stories. Outstanding photo journalism.

It's also posted at Issue - http://issuu.com/audsley/docs/1113.coldtype79

By Ann Wright

In a memorable ceremony on October 25, 2013, a delegation of Japanese citizens made an emotional apology to the citizens of Nanjing, China for the massacre by the Japanese Imperial Army of 300,000 Chinese in the city of Nanjing in a six week period in 1937 during the Second Sino-Japanese War and the rape of thousands of women before they were put to death.

The Japanese government has disputed the number of persons slaughtered by their Army and efforts by the Japanese government in rewriting the history of the “Rape of Nanjing” in educational materials have drawn sharp criticism.

One hundred Japanese and ten South Korean citizens travelled two hours by “bullet train” from the PEACE BOAT docked in Shanghai, China to the holocaust museum in Nanjing, China to learn the details of the 1937 massacre.  500 Japanese and 500 South Koreans were on the 8 day voyage of the PEACE BOAT Voyage for Understanding to Taiwan, Okinawa, Shanghai, South Korea and Japan.

As the only American citizen onboard the ship, I wanted to observe the reactions of the Japanese delegation as they toured the graphic displays of photographs and documents in the museum that reveal the horrific slaughter in Nanjing. As an American seeing several years ago at the Hiroshima Peace Museum, the displays of the deaths of 180,000 from the U.S. atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, I know the impact of witnessing through photographs the destructive power of one’s military, no matter the rationale the government gives for the necessity of using such force.

88 year old Cui Ying Yang told the delegation that she was 12 years old when the Japanese Army killed her 2 year old brother, her father and her grandfather in one day.  She said that her 2 year old brother was killed in front of her.  Her mother cried so much that she lost her eyesight.  At age 12, Ms. Yang was forced to work in a Japanese military factory until the war ended in 1945.

Ms. Yang was joined by Ms. Yong-Soo Lee from our delegation.  Ms. Lee, a South Korean citizen and now 84 years old, had been forced to be a “comfort woman” for Japanese military forces.  Estimates range from 50,000 to 200,000 women from China, Korea, the Philippines, Taiwan, Burma, Indonesia and Japan were forced into sexual slavery for the Japanese Army.  Less than 200 of the women are alive today. Ms. Lee testified before the U.S. Congress in 2007 after Japanese Prime Minister Abe had disputed whether the women were coerced into sexual slavery.  A U.S. Congressional resolution based on the testimony of three women prodded Abe government to issue a formal apology, which it did not do.  Abe is again the Prime Minister of Japan.
 
Upon meeting each other, the two elderly women broke into tears.  The weight of what each woman had endured at the hands of the Japanese military was quite evident on the faces those in the Japanese delegation.

A young Japanese researcher, Natsuki Hatae, one of the other guest speakers on the ship and co-founder of Bridge for Peace, made a tearful apology to the people of Nanjing.  She explained that she never learned in school about the atrocities committed by the Japanese Army.  She now conducts interviews with elderly Japanese who were former soldiers in the Japanese Army and who regret their roles in the military operations.  She shows the videos to Japanese schools.  She also goes to South Korea, the Philippines and China and records the reactions of families who had family members killed by the Japanese Army.

PEACE BOAT co-founder Yushioka Tatsuya said that one of the goals of the PEACE BOAT is to take people to areas of conflict to learn first-hand about the issues and to provide an opportunity for passengers to meet people from that place, understand their situation and form bonds of people-to-people friendship.

About the Author:  Ann Wright served 29 years in the US Army/Army Reserves and retired as a Colonel.  She was a US diplomat for 16 years and resigned in 2003 in opposition to the war on Iraq.

Free public screening of The Ghosts of Jeju by Regis Tremblay with Regis Tremblay in town to discuss his film.

Sunday, December 8, 2013, at 7 p.m.

At the Friends Meeting at 1104 Forest Street, Charlottesville, Va.

The Ghosts of Jeju is a shocking documentary about the struggle of the people of Jeju Island, S. Korea. Set in the context of the American presence in Korea after World War II, the film reveals horrible atrocities at the hands of the U.S. Military Government of Korea.

Using previously secret and classified photos, film, and documents, this is the first English-language documentary about the struggle of the brave people of Gangjeong Village who are opposing the military advance of the United States, just as their parents and relatives did in 1947. As then, they are being arrested, jailed, fined, and hospitalized for resisting the construction of a massive naval base that will accommodate America’s “pivot to Asia,” and will destroy their 400 year old village and their UNESCO protected environment.

And yet, the indomitable spirit of the villagers and their supporters, who have not lost hope in spite of overwhelming odds, will inspire and motivate everyone who believes there is a better way to live together on this planet.

Flyer to print and distribute: PDF.

Please sign up and share on FaceBook:
https://www.facebook.com/events/187593698096399

Read a review here.

Visit the film's website here.

From CNDUK.org

Written by Dong-Kyun Kang (guest post)

Read it here.

https://soundcloud.com/davidcnswanson/talk-nation-radio-taking-kent

Laurel Krause is the cofounder and director of the Kent State Truth Tribunal. Her sister Allison Krause was killed at Kent State University on May 4, 1970, along with three other peacefully demonstrating students. Laurel and her colleagues are taking new evidence of state-ordered and orchestrated killing to the High Commissioner of the UN Human Rights Committee on October 17 & 18 in Geneva, Switzerland.  See http://TruthTribunal.org

"What's the matter with peace? Flowers are better than bullets." -- Allison Krause on May 3, 1970.

Total run time: 29:00

Host: David Swanson.
Producer: David Swanson.
Music by Duke Ellington.

Download or get embed code from Archive or  AudioPort or LetsTryDemocracy.

Syndicated by Pacifica Network.

Please encourage your local radio stations to carry this program every week!

Past Talk Nation Radio shows are all available free and complete at
http://davidswanson.org/talknationradio

Tuesday, Sept. 10, Charlottesville, VA: In a unique journey from the oil fields of the Caspian to the refineries and financial centres of Northern Europe, Platform tracks the concealed routes along which the lifeblood of our economy is pumped. The stupendous wealth of Azerbaijani crude has long inspired dreams of a world remade. From the revolutionary Futurism of Baku in the 1920s to the unblinking Capitalism of modern London, the drive to control oil reserves -- and hence people and events -- has shattered environments and shaped societies. Sponsored by Charlottesville Center for Peace and Justice, Charlottesville Sierra Club, WarIsACrime.org, and Charlottesville Amnesty International.

UNAC Statement of Opposition to Military Base Access Talks Between US and Philippine Governments

A new “Framework Agreement for Increased Rotational Presence and Enhanced Defense Cooperation” is being negotiated between the US and Philippines this week, a major step in the US military’s “pivot to the Asia Pacific” wherein 60% of the US’s troops will be moved into the region.  While the agreement is being called new, we can expect the same old results: more troops, more warships, more spy planes, more drones, more weapons and more bases will be heading to the Philippines, and the Filipino people will suffer more displacement, more civilian casualties, more environmental destruction, and more violence against women and children. The United National Anti-War Coalition is in full support and solidarity with the Filipino people who are fighting against this military agreement.

The US military pivot to Asia Pacific runs counter to the interests of the people in the region. Under the guise of fighting the “war on terror” and “war on drugs,” the real objective of the US pivot is to further expand and consolidate its hegemony in order to maintain its global economic, geopolitical and military supremacy in the midst of persistent financial crisis and economic decline.  US imperialism aims to ensure and perpetuate US control over markets, strategic resources and communications and transport lines in the Asia Pacific region, at the expense of the vast majority—the 99%--who will only experience a deterioration of their livelihoods.  Americans, too, bear the cost of US militarism in the Philippines and the entire region, as billions of dollars continue to be poured into the military industrial complex and siphoned away from fundamental public services.

The US is opportunistically exploiting territorial disputes between the Philippines and China to justify its expansion and subdue its critics. Contrary to its claim of safeguarding and promoting regional stability as well as assisting the Philippine military with modernizing and enhancing its defense capability, the US pivot will feed further instability and conflict within the Philippines as well as between and among the Philippines and other countries as US imperialism employs the divide-and-rule strategy.

US aggression and intervention in the Philippines is made possible by the willing collaboration of the government of President Benigno Aquino III and members of the ruling elite who have vested political and economic interests tied to US economic, geopolitical and corporate interests.  When pressed by members of the concerned public to be transparent about the basic details of the agreement, Aquino’s chief negotiators remained silent or gave vague descriptions at best.  Already-existing military agreements between the US and the Philippines such as the Visiting Forces Agreement are considered unconstitutional, portending a similar shredding of Philippine sovereignty by the new agreement with the full acquiescence of the Aquino administration.

The US has used the Philippines as its launching pad for war and exploitation for too long.  The US has no right to trample on the sovereignty of the Philippines or any other nation.

We demand:

·         US Out of the Philippines!

·         Self-Determination of the Filipino People!

·         Stop the US Pivot to the Asia Pacific!

·         No to US Militarism, Intervention and War!

·         Defend National Sovereignty and Promote Global Peace!

·         Fight US Imperialism!

https://soundcloud.com/davidcnswanson/talk-nation-radio-tim-shorrock

Tim Shorrock, who writes for The Nation and blogs at TimShorrock.com, is recently returned from Korea where he participated in marking the 60th anniversary of the armistice and in the movement for demilitarization and peace.  He disagrees with President Obama's assessment of the Korean War, and also with the approach that many activists in the United States have taken toward Korea.  Shorrock is a Washington-based investigative journalist who grew up in Japan and South Korea. He is the author of SPIES FOR HIRE: The Secret World of Outsourced Intelligence.  His work has appeared in The Nation, Salon, Daily Beast, Mother Jones, The Progressive, Foreign Policy in Focus and Asia Times.

Total run time: 29:00

Host: David Swanson.
Producer: David Swanson.
Music by Duke Ellington.

Download or get embed code from Archive or  AudioPort or LetsTryDemocracy.

Syndicated by Pacifica Network.

Please encourage your local radio stations to carry this program every week!

Past Talk Nation Radio shows are all available free and complete at
http://davidswanson.org/talknationradio

Wars exist because lies are told about past wars.

When President Obama escalated the war on Afghanistan, he revived virtually every known lie about the war on Iraq, from the initial WMD BS to the "surge."  While Americans remain unfathomably ignorant about the destruction of Iraq, a majority says the war shouldn't have been fought.  A majority says the same about the war on Afghanistan.  This is, pretty wonderfully, impeding efforts toward a U.S. war on Syria or Iran.

The new wars were supposed to cure the Vietnam Syndrome -- that public reluctance to support mass murder for no good reason.  The Pentagon is now turning to the source of the disease.  The war in most need of beautification for Americans, the military has decided, is the war the Vietnamese call the American War. 

MORE HERE.