The residents of Takae, a small village in the hills of northern Okinawa, are no strangers to the American military. Since 1957, they’ve been living next to the world’s largest jungle warfare training center – and many of them are old enough to remember the days when the U.S. Marine Corps hired locals to dress up as Vietcong for its war games.
Although the clash between Washington and Tokyo over U.S. military bases on Okinawa has been officially treated as a relatively minor dispute, it has laid bare very serious underlying problems that will continue to plague the alliance. The United States expects greater Japanese engagement and cost-sharing to ensure regional security. To maintain regional stability, Japan must either become more engaged (requiring increases in military spending, and the political and social will to change existing laws and norms) or the alliance must remain asymmetric. Both of these alternatives face perhaps insurmountable obstacles in the local opposition to base expansion and the financial realities facing Japan and the United States.
Russian arms seller Viktor Bout is small potatoes compared to the real pushers.
The green dividend is perhaps our last shot at transforming the U.S. economy. We have been given a second chance. If we blow it this time, there will not likely be another.
Has the Obama administration stooped to tampering with threat levels as Bush & Co. did?
Why did the Japan Coast Guard, on September 7th, arrest a Chinese fishing boat captain and detain his ship, setting off the most serious China-Japan conflict in decades? Investigative journalist Tanaka Sakai offers no definitive answer in the following historically-and geopolitically-informed analysis of the roots of the conflict. He does show, definitively, that the Japanese action marked a striking departure from policies that have been in effect since at least 1978 when China and Japan resumed diplomatic relations and Deng Xiaoping crafted an agreement to defer action on competing claims to the Senkaku/Diaoyutai islands.
Israel is focused on Iran. But the Obama administration should not ignore the few voices inside Israel that want escalation against Hezbollah.
The United States is facing a Soviet-sized crisis. Where is the Gorbachev who can rein in our military?
Iran doesn’t understand how its caginess about its nuclear program compares with Israel’s deceptions about its full-blown nuclear-weapons program.
The Obama administration’s rationale for lifting a ban on U.S. contact with Indonesia’s special forces is that it will serve to improve Unit 81’s human rights record.