Same as it ever was: Obama’s Asia-Pacific agenda

At a speech in Tokyo, President Obama said “Asia and the United States are not separated by this great ocean; we are bound by it.” But he has misappropriated a concept originally put forward by the taro-roots peace and justice movements of the Pacific such as the Nuclear Free and Independent Pacific (NFIP) that the peoples of the Pacific are not divided by the sea; rather they belong to a vast oceanic continent, Ka Moana Nui (The Great Ocean). In distorting the metaphor of Ka Moana Nui, Obama perpetuates the imperialist violence of erasure against the places and peoples of the Pacific.

Obama’s words reveal that he, like so many before him, only see the “rim” in “Pacific Rim”, only the “Asia” in “Asia-Pacific”. Despite claiming to be the first “Pacific” President of the U.S., he still relates to Asia as if the Pacific were merely a defensive moat to cross in order to bridge East and West – an American Lake – as if the Pacific did not have its own people, its own history, hopes and dreams, as if it did not exist.

It is not surprising, then, that the President who campaigned and rode a wave of change, really did not change the course of America’s empire in the Pacific. In fact, the wave that Obama rode to the Presidency now seems to be plowing across the Pacific, a tsunami of military expansion in Hawai’i, Guam, the Marshall Islands, Okinawa, Korea, and the Philippines. America’s empire of bases in the Asia-Pacific is a dangerous and provocative spectre of “great power” rivalries in Asia and a catastrophe for the freedom, security and self-determination of the nations of the Pacific. If Obama truly wanted to create “spheres of cooperation” rather than “competing spheres of influence”, he ought to take the lead in restructuring the post-World War II security arrangements in the Pacific. If he is sincere about America respecting the human rights and human dignity of all people, then he should transform America’s colonial relationship to the northern Pacific nations to one of equality and cooperation.

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Obama Lays Out America’s Asia-Pacific Agenda

By Jim Garamone

American Forces Press Service

http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=56699

WASHINGTON, Nov. 14, 2009 – The United States is a Pacific nation, and America wants to strengthen alliances and understandings in the region, President Barack Obama said in Tokyo today.

Obama gave a major policy speech at Suntory Hall to 1,500 Japanese leaders. He met with Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama and with the emperor and empress of Japan.

The president praised the U.S-Japanese alliance as a partnership based on mutual interests and respect. The alliance has served both nations well in the past, and he expects it will change and deepen in the future, he said.

The United States pledged to defend Japan when a treaty was signed almost 50 years ago. Security is part of the overall relationship between the nations, and the two leaders agreed to move expeditiously through a joint working group to implement the security agreement on restructuring U.S. forces in Okinawa, Obama said.

While Japan is the anchor of American interests and commitments in the Pacific, “it doesn’t end here,” the president said.

“Asia and the United States are not separated by this great ocean; we are bound by it,” he said. “We are bound by our past – by the Asian immigrants who helped build America, and the generations of Americans in uniform who served and sacrificed to keep this region secure and free.”

Prosperity binds the regions together, the president said, and he noted that millions of Americans trace their ancestry to Asia. “So I want everyone to know, and I want everybody in America to know, that we have a stake in the future of this region, because what happens here has a direct effect on our lives at home,” Obama said.

Japan and China are two of America’s largest trading partners, and the nations of Southeast Asia – especially Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore – are growing in importance to the American economy.

But the United States is interested in the region not only for economics, Obama said, but also for security.

“This is a place where the risk of a nuclear arms race threatens the security of the wider world, and where extremists who defile a great religion plan attacks on both our continents,” he said.

Obama said the United States will engage with old friends and seek new ones throughout the region. Alliances with Japan, South Korea, Australia, Thailand and the Philippines “continue to provide the bedrock of security and stability that has allowed the nations and peoples of this region to pursue opportunity and prosperity that was unimaginable at the time of my first childhood visit to Japan,” he said.

“And even as American troops are engaged in two wars around the world,” he added, “our commitment to Japan’s security and to Asia’s security is unshakeable, and it can be seen in our deployments throughout the region – above all, through our young men and women in uniform, of whom I am so proud.”

The United States looks for nations such as Indonesia and Malaysia to play larger roles regionally, he said, and he stressed that the national security and economic growth of one country need not come at the expense of another.

“I know there are many who question how the United States perceives China’s emergence,” he said. “But as I have said, in an interconnected world, power does not need to be a zero-sum game, and nations need not fear the success of another. Cultivating spheres of cooperation – not competing spheres of influence – will lead to progress in the Asia-Pacific [region].”

This does not mean that China has a blank check, the president noted.

“America will approach China with a focus on our interests,” he said. “It’s precisely for this reason that it is important to pursue pragmatic cooperation with China on issues of mutual concern, because no one nation can meet the challenges of the 21st century alone, and the United States and China will both be better off when we are able to meet them together.”

America welcomes China’s effort to play a greater role on the world stage – a role in which their growing economy is joined by growing responsibility, he said.

“China’s partnership has proved critical in our effort to jumpstart economic recovery,” the president said. “China has promoted security and stability in Afghanistan and Pakistan. And it is now committed to the global nonproliferation regime, and supporting the pursuit of denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.”

The United States does not seek to contain China, nor does a deeper relationship with China mean a weakening of American bilateral alliances in the region, Obama said.

“On the contrary, the rise of a strong, prosperous China can be a source of strength for the community of nations,” he said. “So in Beijing and beyond, we will work to deepen our strategic and economic dialogue, and improve communication between our militaries.

“Of course, we will not agree on every issue,” he continued, “and the United States will never waver in speaking up for the fundamental values that we hold dear – and that includes respect for the religion and cultures of all people – because support for human rights and human dignity is ingrained in America. But we can move these discussions forward in a spirit of partnership, rather than rancor.”

The president said he also believes multilateral organizations can advance the security and prosperity of the Asia Pacific.

“I know that the United States has been disengaged from many of these organizations in recent years,” he acknowledged. “So let me be clear: Those days have passed. As an Asia-Pacific nation, the United States expects to be involved in the discussions that shape the future of this region, and to participate fully in appropriate organizations as they are established and evolve.”

The security of the 21st century in the area, the president said, is threatened by a legacy of the 20th century: the danger posed by nuclear weapons.

“In Prague, I affirmed America’s commitment to rid the world of nuclear weapons, and laid out a comprehensive agenda to pursue this goal,” he said. “I am pleased that Japan has joined us in this effort, for no two nations on Earth know better what these weapons can do, and together we must seek a future without them. This is fundamental to our common security, and this is a great test of our common humanity. Our very future hangs in the balance.”

But as long as nuclear weapons exist, Obama added, “the United States will maintain a strong and effective nuclear deterrent that guarantees the defense of our allies – including South Korea and Japan.”

Still, he said, an escalating nuclear arms race in the region would undermine decades of growth and prosperity. “So we are called upon to uphold the basic bargain of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty – that all nations have a right to peaceful nuclear energy; that nations with nuclear weapons have a responsibility to move toward nuclear disarmament and those without nuclear weapons have a responsibility to forsake them,” he said.

The United States is pursuing a new agreement with Russia to reduce nuclear stockpiles and also is working to ratify and bring into force a nuclear test ban treaty. “And next year at our Nuclear Security Summit, we will advance our goal of securing all the world’s vulnerable nuclear materials within four years,” Obama said.

Strengthening the global nonproliferation movement is not about singling out individual nations, he said. “It’s about all nations living up to their responsibilities,” the president said. “That includes the Islamic Republic of Iran. And it includes North Korea.”

North Korea has chosen a path of confrontation and provocation, Obama said, and is developing nuclear arms and the means to deliver them.

“It should be clear where this path leads,” the president said. “We have tightened sanctions on Pyongyang. We have passed the most sweeping U.N. Security Council resolution to date to restrict their weapons of mass destruction activities. We will not be cowed by threats, and we will continue to send a clear message through our actions, and not just our words: North Korea’s refusal to meet its international obligations will lead only to less security, not more.”

North Korea can renounce these efforts and be welcomed into the community of nations, Obama said.

“Instead of an isolation that has compounded the horrific repression of its own people, North Korea could have a future of international integration,” he said. “Instead of gripping poverty, it could have a future of economic opportunity – where trade and investment and tourism can offer the North Korean people the chance at a better life. And instead of increasing insecurity, it could have a future of greater security and respect. This respect cannot be earned through belligerence. It must be reached by a nation that takes its place in the international community by fully living up to its international obligations.”

He called on North Korea to return to the six-party talks and uphold previous commitments including the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. He also called for the full and verifiable denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.

The United States will stand with Asian allies in combating the transnational threats of the 21st century: extremism, piracy, disease, poverty and modern-day slavery, the president said. “The final area in which we must work together’” he added, is in upholding the fundamental rights and dignity of all human beings.”

The American agenda in the area is ambitious, and it will not be easy, Obama said. “But at this moment of renewal … history tells us it is possible,” the Hawaiian-born president said. “This is … America’s agenda. This is the purpose of our partnership with Japan, and with the nations and peoples of this region. And there must be no doubt: As America’s first Pacific president, I promise you that this Pacific nation will strengthen and sustain our leadership in this vitally important part of the world.”

November 11, 2009

Gavan McCormack: “Yet Another ‘Battle of Okinawa'”

This Op Ed published in the Japan Times is critical of the “colonial” nature of the so-called Guam Treaty which provides for the relocation of U.S. Marines from Okinawa to Guam, commits Japan to foot most of the bill, allows the expansion of the military base at Henoko, Okinawa, and overrides many of Japan’s own environmental protection laws. The author misses one big point in his analysis, however. The Guam Treaty is colonial for its treatment of the indigenous Chamoru of Guam as much as its disregard for the native Okinawans.

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http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/eo20091111a2.html

Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2009

Yet another ‘Battle of Okinawa’

By GAVAN McCORMACK

Special to The Japan Times

CANBERRA — Elections in August gave Japan a new government, headed by Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama. In electing him and his Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), the Japanese people, like the American people less than a year earlier, were opting for change. Remarkably, however, what followed on the part of President Barack Obama’s United States has been a campaign of unrelenting pressure to block any such change.

The core issue has been the disposition of American military presence in Okinawa and the U.S. insistence that Hatoyama honor an agreement known as the Guam Treaty. Under the Guam agreement of February 2009, adopted as a treaty under special legislation in May, 8,000 U.S. Marines were to be relocated from Okinawa to Guam, and the U.S. Marine base at Futenma was to be transferred to Henoko in Nago City in northern Okinawa, where Japan would build a new base. Japan would also pay $6.09 billion toward the Guam transfer cost.

The Guam Treaty was one of the first acts of a popular “reforming” U.S. administration, and one of the last of a Japanese regime in fatal decline. It set in unusually clear relief the relationship between the world’s No. 1 and No. 2 economic powers. It was worthy of close attention because the agreement was unequal, unconstitutional, illegal, redundant, colonial and deceitful.

It was unequal because it obliged the government of Japan to construct one new base and to contribute a substantial sum toward constructing another for the U.S. while the American side merely offered an ambiguous pledge to withdraw a number of troops and reserved the right, under Article 8, to vary the agreement at will.

It was unconstitutional since under Article 95 of the Japanese Constitution any law applicable only to one local public entity requires the consent of the majority of the voters of that district and the Okinawan wishes were clearly ignored in the Guam Treaty. The Diet simply rode roughshod over Okinawa.

Since the treaty took precedence over domestic law, it also had the effect of downgrading, in effect vitiating, the requirements of Japan’s environmental protection laws. Any serious and internationally credible environmental impact assessment (EIA) would surely conclude that a massive military construction project was incompatible with the delicate coral and forest environment of the Oura Bay area, but it was taken for granted that Japan’s EIA would be a mere formality and the treaty further undermined the procedure.

The treaty was also redundant. It simply reiterated major sections of earlier agreements (of 2005 and 2006) on which there had been little or no progress. It merely added compulsive force to those agreements and tied the hands of any successor government.

The agreement/treaty was essentially colonial, with the “natives” (Okinawans) to be guided and exploited, but not consulted. The Guam Treaty showed the Obama administration to be maintaining Bush diplomacy: paternalistic, interventionist, antidemocratic and intolerant of Japan’s search for an independent foreign policy.

Finally, the treaty was characterized by what in Japanese is known as “gomakashi” — trickery and lies dressed in the rhetoric of principle and mutuality. Although reported as a U.S. concession to Japan (“troop withdrawal”), it was plainly designed to increase the Japanese contribution to the alliance by substituting a new, high-tech and greatly expanded base at Henoko for the inconvenient, dangerous and obsolescent Futenma. The figure of 8,000 marines to be withdrawn also turned out, under questions in the Diet, to be also false. The more likely figure was less than 3,000.

While working to tie Japan’s hands by the deals with the collapsing Aso administration, the U.S. knew well that the (then) opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ)’s position was clear: No new base should be built within Okinawa, Futenma should simply be returned.

Drumbeats of concern, warning, friendly advice from Washington — that Hatoyama and the DPJ had better not take such pledges seriously, much less actually try to carry them out, and that any attempt to vary the Guam agreement would be seen as anti-American — rose steadily, culminating in the October Tokyo visit by U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who delivered an ultimatum: The Guam agreement had to be implemented.

The intimidation had an effect. Defense Secretary Toshimi Kitazawa suggested that there probably was, after all, no real alternative to construction at Henoko. Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada also began to waver. Weeks after the election victory he had said, “If Japan just follows what the U.S. says, then I think as a sovereign nation that is very pathetic.” And: “The will of the people of Okinawa and the will of the people of Japan was expressed in the elections . . . I don’t think we will act simply by accepting what the U.S tells us. . . .” After the Gates statement, however, he suggested that the Futenma functions might after all be transferred within Okinawa, even though he declined to endorse the Henoko project, proposing instead they be merged with those of the large Kadena U.S. Air Force Base nearby.

The prefecture’s Ryukyu Shimpo newspaper, in a passionate editorial, lamented the incapacity of the new Hatoyama government to counter the “intimidatory diplomacy” of Gates and Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and decried the drift back toward “acceptance of the status quo of following the U.S.”

Nearly four decades have passed since Okinawa reverted from the U.S. to Japan, yet U.S. bases still take up one-fifth of the land surface of its main island. Nowhere is more overwhelmed than the city of Ginowan, reluctant host for the U.S. Marine Corps’ Futenma Air Station. The U.S. and Japan agreed in 1996 that Futenma would be returned, but made return conditional on a replacement, which also would have to be built in Okinawa. Thirteen years on, there the matter still stands.

The “Futenma Replacement Facility,” the subject of such intense diplomatic contention today, is one that has grown from a modest “helipad,” as it was referred to in 1996 to a removable, offshore structure with a 2,500-meter runway, and then in 2006 to its current version: dual-1,800 meter runways plus a deep sea naval port and a chain of helipads — a comprehensive air, land and sea base. Time and again, the project was blocked by popular opposition, but time and again the Japanese government renewed and expanded it.

Yet opinion in the prefecture has, if anything, hardened. An October Ryukyu Shimpo/Mainichi Shimbun poll showed that 70 percent of Okinawans opposed relocation within the prefecture and a mere 5 percent favored the Henoko design endorsed by the Guam Treaty and demanded by Washington. In the August national elections, DPJ candidates who promised they would never allow construction of a new base swept the polls in Okinawa, crushing the representatives of the compliant “old regime.”

Both prefectural newspapers, the majority in Okinawa’s Parliament, and 80 percent of Okinawan government mayors are also opposed, believing any Futenma base substitute should be constructed either elsewhere in Japan or overseas.

There has never been such a postwar confrontation between the U.S. and Japan. With the last shots of Washington’s diplomatic barrage exploding around him and Obama’s visit imminent, Hatoyama continues to study his options. If he rejects the U.S. demands, a major diplomatic crisis is bound to erupt. If he swallows them, he provokes a domestic political crisis and drives Okinawa to despair. Yet choose he must.

Gavan McCormack is an emeritus professor at Australia National University in Canberra. Japan Focus (japanfocus.org) will post an unabridged version of this article.

November 5, 2009

Tip of the Spear

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTrDl8k9CEM

This year US General Bice announced that Guam will be the site of ‘the largest military build-up in the history of the US’. Locals say that the communities indigenous to this small Pacific island will not survive.

Guam is a political anomaly: A US territory where citizens do not have US voting-rights and where island politics are controlled by Washington. The indigenous population, the Chamarro, live in poverty and preserving their traditional way of life is a struggle. ‘We are certainly on the endangered species list’, says Chamorro leader Debbie Quintana. Now the US plans to make Guam the lynchpin of its military strategy in the western Pacific, and the mood in Guam is of anger and disbelief. ‘We are a strategic location, a possession, a bounty of war’, Quinata says. ‘And if we don’t like it, tough’.

Produced by SBS/Dateline
Distributed by Journeyman Pictures

November 4, 2009

Abercrombie defends military expansion on Guam

The debate in the news media has been between setting higher prevailing wage standards and American hiring preferences for Guam military construction jobs or allowing companies to pay foreign workers at lower rates. But the real issue is the illegality and immorality of the U.S. military expansion on Guam. Many Chamoru have voiced their opposition to the military buildup. But here is a classic case of imperial arrogance – the colony has no voice nor choice in the matter.

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The Guam Military Buildup: An Opinion/Editorial By Rep. Neil Abercrombie

Saturday, 11 July 2009 09:41

By Neil Abercrombie

Some in Guam have expressed strong opposition to provisions in the 2010 National Defense Authorization Act, passed overwhelmingly this week by the U.S. House, concerning military construction in Guam.

The measure authorizes a multi-year, multi-billion dollar building program to construct a new home for the 3rd Marine Expeditionary Forces and elements of other units stationed on the island of Okinawa and in mainland Japan for many years. This means building permanent military facilities to accommodate about 8,000 military personnel and as many as 9,000 family members. The move is the result of a lengthy and detailed agreement between the United States and Japan, under which the U.S. will pay about 40% of the cost.

When Members of the House Armed Services Committee considered the matter, we had two aims: 1.) to assure our men and women in uniform and their families high quality, comfortable and durable buildings and facilities in a secure environment in which they can work, train and live, and 2.) create stable, well-paid jobs for skilled American building and construction workers to replace some of the thousands of jobs lost in this economic recession,.

This five-year project will require 15,000 or more construction workers. Thousands will have to be recruited to relocate to supplement the local workforce. The legislation reserves 70% of those jobs for American workers.

My ideal for the quality of housing and facilities we want on Guam are the military construction projects in Hawaii and across the country through public-private joint ventures, in which companies win multi-year contracts to build, maintain, repair and manage family housing and other structures on a base. The company builds out the project and makes its money from the Basic Allowance for Housing paid by the military families who live in the housing. In Hawaii, we negotiated 50-year agreements with our construction companies at Schofield Barracks, Hickam Air Force Base, Pearl Harbor Naval Station and Marine Base Kaneohe. The product and the process have been widely praised by military families and military leaders.

Wages should be commensurate with the experience and skills of the building trades workers who can provide the quality construction our military personnel deserve. The legislation established wages at the level for similar projects in Hawaii, the closest U.S. labor market. Guam’s prevailing wage is significantly less than most U.S. labor markets; its tax base is limited; and its workforce has only a fraction of the trained and skilled people needed for this job.

The alternative is to outsource to Japanese companies that will bring in foreign workers, for which the Guam government collects a bounty of $1000 per head. This will open the door to profiteering and continued wage bondage, and be a slap in the face of every qualified, unemployed American worker.

Relocating thousands of military personnel and their families is a massive undertaking, and will dramatically alter Guam’s future. Building a new military base from scratch will take several years and billions of dollars. The project will offer thousands of local jobs, thousands more from outside, create opportunities for local small businesses and transform the economy of the island. It is also a singular opportunity to put Americans to work, in an American territory, building America’s future in the Pacific region. Economic security and national security go hand in hand.

Neil Abercrombie chairs the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Air and Land Forces. He represents the First District of Hawaii.

Guam News Factor has posted this Opinion/Editorial at the request of Congressman Abercrombie’s office.

Source: http://www.guamnewsfactor.com/20090710645/Opinion/The-Guam-Military-Buildup-An-Opinion/Editorial-By-Rep.-Neil-Abercrombie.html

October 31, 2009

Asia Pacific military leaders met in Hawai’i

Source: http://us-pacific-command.blogspot.com/2009/10/senior-leaders-to-meet-at-chiefs-of.html

Friday, October 23, 2009

Senior Leaders to Meet at Chiefs of Defense Conference

Senior military officers of 22 nations will gather in Hawaii next week for the 12th annual Chiefs of Defense Conference (CHOD), which is scheduled to run Oct. 26-29.

This year’s conference is hosted by Adm. Robert Willard, commander of U.S. Pacific Command.

The purpose of the conference is to bring together senior military leaders from nations in the Asia-Pacific region to meet and discuss mutual security challenges, improve mutual relationships and foster security cooperation. The conference theme is Common Defense Challenges in the Asia-Pacific Region.

Nations attending this year’s conference include: Australia, Bangladesh, Brunei, Cambodia, Canada, France, Indonesia, Japan, Laos, Malaysia, Maldives, Mongolia, Nepal, New Zealand, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Singapore, Republic of Korea, Thailand, Tonga, Vietnam, and the United States.

Last year’s conference was co-hosted by the U.S. and Indonesia, and held in Bali.

October 21, 2009October 21, 2009

New PACOM Commander installed

Here’s the press release from the Pacific Command about the change in Command from Adm. Keating to Adm. Willard. It will be interesting to see how Willard makes his mark.

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http://www.pacom.mil/web/Site_Pages/Media/News%20200910/20091019-ChangeOfCommand1.shtml

Keating Passes PACOM Torch to Willard

By Donna Miles

American Forces Press Service

CAMP H.M. SMITH, Hawaii – Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, presided over a change-of-command ceremony here Oct. 19, as Navy Adm. Timothy J. Keating passed the U.S. Pacific Command helm to Navy Adm. Robert F. Willard.

Willard assumed command of the 250,000-member command that includes all military forces in the Asia-Pacific region during a ceremony at PACOM headquarters, high on a hillside overlooking Pearl Harbor.

It was a stirring ceremony with ship’s bells and a boatswain’s pipe announcing the arrival of the official party, followed by a 19-gun salute. Jim Nabors sang the national anthem and Ciana Pelekai, the Hawaii state song.

Gates lauded Keating’s 42-year naval career in the cockpit, on land and at sea. A U.S. Naval Academy graduate, Keating is an F-18 Hornet pilot with 5,000 flight hours and 1,200 landings on the deck of an aircraft carrier.

But he also distinguished himself on land, as commander at U.S. Northern Command, Gates said. Recognizing his accomplishments there, as well as his “unique skills and strategic vision,” the secretary said, he recommended Keating for his most important assignment at the oldest and largest U.S. combatant command.

PACOM’s area of responsibility stretches across 36 nations that include more than half the world’s population, and that represent more than $1 trillion in annual trade with the United States.

“Leading a military organization in this part of the world requires a deft touch, a diplomat’s sensibilities, a scholar’s sense of the past and a commercial tycoon’s business savvy,” Gates said. “Admiral Keating has provided all of that and more.”

Gates ticked off some of PACOM’s challenges: complex national and international agreements, relations and rivalries; vast distances within its boundaries; the ever-present danger of manmade and natural disasters; and the threat of international terrorism, among them.

“The relative stability of the region belies the historic, economic and cultural rip currents that exist just below the visible surface,” he said.

Keating has visited 29 of the 36 countries within PACOM since taking command two and a half years ago, fostering long-standing alliances along with new partnerships with other nations, Gates noted.

That outreach took him to Japan a dozen times, the Philippines about six times, Indonesia three times and China and India twice. Keating said he had hoped to visit China more frequently, a goal foiled after China cut off military-to-military relationships after the United States announced arms sales to Taiwan.

Mullen also praised Keating, who he said “understood the power of relationships and how to turn relationships into partnerships and partnerships into friendships.”

Keating oversaw the revision of the PACOM strategy, built on three major tenets: partnership, readiness and presence. These, Mullen said, ensured Pacom remained “a cohesive and lasting power for peace and readiness.”

Mullen wished Keating and his wife, Wanda Lee, “fair winds and following seas” as he welcomed Willard and his wife Donna to “the best job a Navy officer could have.”

In his remarks, Keating evoked the vision of the founding fathers and said it’s embodied in the servicemembers of Pacom who have served and sacrificed to keep it a reality.

But he also cited a less vaunted visionary, singer Jimmy Buffet, who sang of a world where “kids play on the shore all day and all are safe within.”

This, Keating said, captures the same sentiment as lofty statements of strategy. And, he said, is the vision that drives the men and women of PACOM.

“It’s been a grand adventure,” Keating told Hawaii-based reporters as he summed up his time at PACOM. “I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”

Willard, who spent two and a half years as commander of U.S. Pacific Fleet, is a U.S. Naval Academy graduate with extensive experience in the Pacific region and knowledge of its history.

Willard said he’s deeply honored to follow in Keating’s footsteps, noting, “Yours will be large shoes to fill.”

He vowed to emulate Keating, both in his dedication to his staff that engendered tremendous loyalty, and by clear-eyed focus on Asia and the Pacific

As the region has changed, the growing importance of Asia has remained a constant, Willard said.

He said he’ll work tirelessly to ensure PACOM lives up to that challenge and that its role in U.S. national defense is understood.

“Our nation’s interests are here,” he said

October 21, 2009October 21, 2009

New Pacific Air Force Commander awaits F-22s

The F-22 program was one of the expensive and wasteful projects that the Pentagon and the Obama administration wanted scrapped. So why are these planes still coming to Hawai’i? According to a leading analyst of defense spending, Senator Inouye has employed legislative tricks to “breath life back into the F-22”. In 2007, twelve F-22s left Hawai’i on their first foreign deployment to Japan, but had the turn back because of a navigation system malfunction. There have been serious problems with the F-15s, which the F-22s are supposed to replace. In February 2008, an F-15 crashed into the sea off O’ahu. “The $43.7 million plane sank in 2,500 feet of water.”

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http://www.starbulletin.com/news/hawaiinews/20091021_Pilot_begins_training_while_Raptors_awaited.html

Pilot begins training while Raptors awaited

By Gregg K. Kakesako

POSTED: 01:30 a.m. HST, Oct 21, 2009

The Hawaii Air National Guard has sent the first of its 22 pilots to be trained at a Florida base to fly the highly sophisticated, single-seat F-22 Raptor jet fighter.

Gen. Gary North, the Pacific Air Forces four-star commander, told reporters yesterday that Hickam Air Force base will receive two of its 20 $137 million Raptors from Langley Air Force Base by early summer.

He said the Hawaii Air National Guard’s Lt. Col. Christopher “Frenchy” Faurot, who has been flying with the Guard since 1991, is now at flight school at Tyndall Air Force Base in Panama City, Fla.

Faurot is the Hawaii Air Guard F-22 integration project officer and was one of four fighter pilots who scrambled to protect island skies following the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

In February last year, Faurot was forced to eject from his F-15 jet fighter when both of the rudders failed during a training mission 60 miles south of Oahu. The $43.7 million plane sank in 2,500 feet of water.

The Raptors will be flown by a hybrid squadron made up of 22 pilots from the Hawaii Air Guard’s 199th Fighter Squadron and 10 from the active Air Force’s 531st Fighter Squadron.

North said that $145 million will be spent to upgrade Hickam’s Air National Guard facilities and should be operational by the end of 2013.

The 62-foot Raptor, which will replace the F-15 Eagles that the Hawaii Air Guard has flown since 1987, can fly at 1.5 times the speed of sound and can lock onto an enemy fighter 40 miles away and take it out with a missile before the other aircraft’s pilot realizes he has been targeted. Faurot said the Raptor’s speed and stealth capabilities give his pilots “the first look, first shot, first kill” advantage.

North said that shortly after assuming command of 45,000 airmen and civilians on Aug. 19, he made a point to visit his bases in Guam, Japan, South Korea and Alaska.

“My goal was to get out as quickly as I could to see the wing commanders and other commanders,” said North, pointing out that his command covers an area extending from the West Coast to the Indian Ocean and from the Arctic to the Antarctic.

North said the Air Force has maintained “a continued presence on Guam” because it is “a great facility for training” and to execute long-range training missions to Australia and South Korea. Since 2000 the Air Force has steadily increased the number jet fighters and bombers and stockpiles of munitions and jet fuel on Guam, 3,800 miles west of Hawaii.

Before coming to Hickam, North, a 33-year veteran, led the air campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan for 3 1/2 years as commander of the 9th Air Force and U.S. Air Forces Central Command at Shaw Air Force Base in South Carolina. From July 2004 to January 2006, North, a command jet fighter pilot with 4,500 flight hours and 83 combat missions, was director of operations at U.S. Pacific Command.

U.S. Pacific Air Forces

It is one of two Air Force Major Commands out of the continental U.S.; the other is in Europe.

» Personnel: 45,000 civilian and military

» Area of responsibility: 100 million square miles

» Facilities: Nine in Hawaii, Alaska, Japan, Guam and South Korea

» Aircraft: 300

» Major units: 3rd Wing at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Alaska; 8th Fighter Wing in Kunsan, South Korea; 15th Airlift Wing at Hickam Air Force Base; 18th Wing at Kadena Air Base in Okinawa; 51st Fighter Wing in Osan, South Korea; 354th Fighter Wing at Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska; 35th Fighter Wing in Misawa, Japan; 374th Airlift Wing at Yokota Air Base, Japan; and 36th Wing at Andersen Air Force Base, Guam

Source: U.S. Air Force

October 12, 2009October 12, 2009

Marshall Island Chief sues over illegal taking of Kwajalein for U.S. missile base

MARSHALLS CHIEF FILES SUIT AGAINST U.S. BASE

Former president Kabua says lease treaty illegal

By Giff Johnson

MAJURO, Marshall Islands (Marianas Variety, Oct. 12, 2009) – A powerful traditional chief in the Marshall Islands has stepped up the battle for control of a United States missile testing range by filing a court challenge to a treaty that gives the U.S. control of the base after 2016 when the current lease expires.

Former Marshall Islands President and powerful traditional chief Imata Kabua said Thursday the Marshall Islands government illegally “took the lands at Kwajalein Atoll and gave them to the United States of America to occupy and use exclusively, first from 2016 to 2023, and then to 2066” in Compact of Free Association approved by the two governments in 2003.

His lawsuit filed in the High Court says the government took islands at Kwajalein Kwajalein Atoll “without a lease and has failed and refused to engage in good faith bargaining to secure a new lease” and instead “has demanded that (Kabua) accept the terms dictated by defendant.”

Since the early 1960s, Kwajalein has been a center of U.S. anti-missile defense testing. It is the target for long-range intercontinental ballistic missiles fired from California and many of the islands in this boomerang-shaped coral atoll are studded with radar and other sophisticated missile tracking gear.

An agreement for extension of American use of the Reagan Test Site at Kwajalein was approved by the two governments in 2003, but Kabua has refused to sign a “land use agreement” needed to implement the U.S.-Marshall Islands treaty. Landowners have been at loggerheads with the U.S. over rent. The U.S. is providing $15 million annually, now about $17 million because of inflation adjustment, while the landowners demanded $19 million.

An existing land use agreement from the first Compact of Free Association expires in 2016. The second Compact increased the rent payments, while extending American use of Kwajalein to 2066, with an option to renew to 2086. Last month, Marshall Islands President Litokwa Tomeing flew to Kwajalein to present a draft land use agreement to Kwajalein leaders. While three other traditional chiefs who control land at Kwajalein say they are ready to approve the deal, Kabua, whose domain includes the most land at the missile range, has not budged.

The lawsuit says the action by the Marshall Islands government to “take” the lands over which Kabua is paramount chief is a direct violation of the country’s constitution. All land in the Marshall Islands is privately held, and the Constitution requires the approval of landowners for any lease or sale of property.

“It’s not money I’m after (with the lawsuit),” Kabua said in an interview from Honolulu. “It’s my rights under the Constitution.”

More than $25 million — the accumulated increase in rent payments since 2003 — is sitting in a bank account waiting for landowner signatures on a new land use agreement before it will be released.

Kabua accused his government of “applying economic pressure on (Kabua) to accept a lease on terms dictated by (the government).”

Kabua called the land use agreement proposed by the President as “one-sided” and not offering “just compensation” to him for use of the lands beyond 2016.

He said that if the government’s “failure and refusal to comply with the Constitution and the laws of the Republic is allowed to continue unabated, (Kabua) will suffer irreparable harm and injury to his Iroijlaplap (paramount chief) title and interest in land.”

Through his California-based attorney David Lowe, Kabua is asking the High Court to resolve the legal status between Kabua and the Marshall Islands government regarding Kwajalein lands “particularly as to (Kabua’s) right to occupy, use and have the quiet enjoyment of (these) lands from and after termination of the Land Use Agreement (in 2016).”

Marianas Variety:

www.mvariety.com

October 10, 2009

Navy to conduct live-fire exercises on Farallon de Medinilla

Several years ago, the Navy was blocked from bombarding Farallon de Medinilla by lawsuits from U.S. environmental groups under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. But the military forced through broad exemptions for itself from a number of U.S. environmental laws.

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http://www.saipantribune.com/newsstory.aspx?cat=1&newsID=94224

Saturday, October 10, 2009

Navy to conduct live-fire exercises on Farallon de Medinilla

SANTA RITA, Guam-The U.S. Navy will conduct live-fire training exercises on the island of Farallon de Medinilla from 7am to 1am on Oct. 13-14, 16 and 18.

The general location of this activity will be on the island of Farallon de Medinilla Training Area on a 10-nautical mile radius on all quadrants. The general public especially fisherman, commercial pilots and marine tour operators are advised to stay clear from this area during the time and date indicated.

Farallon de Medinilla plays a special and unique role in national defense because its location provides access frequency that supports established training requirements. In addition, the air and sea space in the Farallon provides sufficient room for the many different attack profiles necessary to replicate training opportunities in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. (PR)

October 9, 2009October 9, 2009

Julian Aguon on Democracy Now! Speaks Against U.S. Military Buildup on Guam

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/10/9/guam_residents_organize_against_us_plans

Guam Residents Organize Against US Plans for $15B Military Buildup on Pacific Island

The United States is planning an enormous $15 billion military buildup on the Pacific island of Guam. The project would turn the thirty-mile-long island into a major hub for US military operations in the Pacific in what has been described as the largest military buildup in recent history. We speak with Julian Aguon, a civil rights attorney from the Chamoru nation in Guam. [includes rush transcript]

Guest: Julian Aguon, Chamoru civil rights attorney and author of three books, including The Fire this Time: Stories of Life Under US Occupation and What We Bury at Night: Disposable Humanity.

Rush Transcript

JUAN GONZALEZ: We turn now to the Pacific island of Guam, where the United States is planning an enormous military buildup to the tune of $15 billion. The project would turn the thirty-mile-long island into a major hub for US military operations in the Pacific. It has been described as the largest military buildup in recent history and could bring as many as 50,000 people to the tiny island.

On Capitol Hill, the conversation has been restricted to whether the jobs expected from the military construction should go to the mainland Americans, foreign workers or Guam residents. But we rarely hear the voices and concerns of the indigenous people of Guam, who constitute over a third of the island’s population.

We’re joined now by a civil rights attorney from the Chamoru nation in Guam, Julian Aguon, who is the author of three books, including The Fire this Time: Stories of Life Under US Occupation and What We Bury at Night: Disposable Humanity.

Welcome to Democracy Now!

JULIAN AGUON: Thank you very much for having me.

JUAN GONZALEZ: Well, this latest buildup, how did this develop? It is now troops that are being moved from Okinawa by the United States to Guam. Could you talk a little bit about the decision in recent years on this buildup?

JULIAN AGUON: OK. The military buildup was first announced in 2005. Basically, the United States had made a bilateral agreement with the Japanese government to transfer some 7,000 US Marines from Okinawa to Guam, in large part due to Okinawan mass protest against military presence, because they shoulder roughly 70 percent of the US military presence in all of Japan in Okinawa. So, that was in 2005.

Fast-forward to 2009, we see that the US has recently announced that the number—it keeps ballooning. It’s really unbelievable, because now it’s set to include 8,000 US Marines and their 9,000 dependents, another thousand troops from South Korea, as well as an outside labor—foreign labor workforce estimated upwards of 20,000 people. So we’re talking about a four- to five-year injection of a population increase of 20 percent in five years.

So that’s really—what we’re concerned about, the indigenous Chamoru community of Guam, is that we haven’t exercised self-determination yet. Guam remains one of only sixteen non-self-governing territories, i.e. UN-recognized colonies, of the world. We don’t even vote for the US president. We have no effective, meaningful representation in the US Congress. And the entire buildup was announced, and it was basically—any Chamoru consideration was really de facto. We’re never really at the table. We were just informed by the US that they were going to bring in outside population of these many tens of thousands of people.

And the entire population of Guam is set roughly at 171,000 only, and the Chomoru population makes up roughly 37 percent of that population. So, really, this demographic change will have irreversible consequences, and we don’t even have the infrastructure, and no money has been really—has been, in essence, promised to the government.

JUAN GONZALEZ: Well, your country, of course, is—the status of your country—

JULIAN AGUON: Yes.

JUAN GONZALEZ: —is familiar to me as an unincorporated territory, because, of course, I come from—I was born in another unincorporated territory or colony of the United States, Puerto Rico, and both of our countries were—came under US sovereignty at the same time as a result of the Spanish-American War. Could you talk a little bit about the history of Guam—

JULIAN AGUON: OK.

JUAN GONZALEZ: —and the lives of your people under US rule for the last more than a century now?

JULIAN AGUON: OK. Well, Guam is one of the longest-colonized islands in the Pacific. We were colonized by Spain for almost 300 years and then by the United States. We got ceded to the United States under the 1898 Treaty of Paris, along with Cuba, Philippines, Puerto Rico, as you know. So, since 1898 until present, with the exception of a three-year—1941 to 1944, we were occupied by the Japanese imperial forces during World War II, which is a completely other story, which was also horrific. But we basically have been under US colonization since 1898 until the present. So we’re actually coming on 500 years of uninterrupted colonization.

And that’s sort of why being even on this program is so precious for us, because we never, ever get a word in edgewise. And basically, the US uses language all the time to disappear us. We’re often called “where America’s day begins,” a possession, even according to US court cases, “possession.” We’re essentially an instrumentality of the federal government. Or they use words like “unsinkable aircraft carrier” now or “tip of the spear.” All of this language is, you know, really—it’s really clever, and it just disappears us. And so, the outside world, including mainland United States, really they’re allowed to sort of forget that there are people there. There are only ghosts. So, that’s been our experience.

And the military buildup has been no different. We actually situate the current US military buildup as the latest in a very long line of covenant breaches on the part of the United States, because in 1946, the US placed Guam on the, you know, the UN list of non-self-governing territories and basically assumed a, quote, “sacred trust obligation” under international law, by virtue of Article 73 of the UN Charter, to guide Guam toward self-determination. And now, with the military buildup, which—it really seeks to pack the last punch. It will be decisive, because it is so large and it’s so enormous. And basically, the way I see it is, the needs of my people are buckling. We’re not going to be able to withstand so much more weight.

JUAN GONZALEZ: And in terms of the other aspect of life in Guam that most Americans don’t know about, the radiation exposure that your islands were subjected to in the World War II, post-World War II era?

JULIAN AGUON: Mm-hmm. Well, the most well known, or the most notorious, actually, is the nuclear campaign launched by the United States in our neighboring islands, because Guam is part of a region of the Pacific, the western Pacific, known as Micronesia, which includes the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of Palau, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, and this Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. Actually, Guam is only thirty miles long, but it really is the largest and southernmost island in its own natural archipelago, the Mariana island chain. So we were one people, up until 1898. So that’s another reason why that date is so important, because it basically politically divided us in 1898. Guam was taken by the US, and CNMI went to Germany. So, we’re in that part of the region.

Between 1946 to 1958, the US dropped more than sixty nuclear weapons on the people of the Marshall Islands. One bomb, the most notorious, Bravo, that shot—the latest estimate—I speak with senators over there, including Tony deBrum of the Marshall Islands, who’s been such a longstanding advocate in the Marshall Islands, now puts this—this is the number used. That bomb, dropped only 1,200 miles from Guam, is the equivalent of 1.6 or 1.7 Hiroshima bombs every day for twelve years. That’s its total radioactive capacity. And Guam being so close and downwind, we have downwind exposure.

And that’s yet another reason why we’re always at the Congress, you know, throwing ourselves on the funeral pyre of the US Congress, or the UN, like we were on this trip, and we went to the United Nations, as well, to basically keep articulating these rights or trying to get—at least as far as the US is concerned, trying to get compensation for radiation exposure. And there’s no real acknowledgement. It hasn’t happened yet. The Chamoru people of Guam experience such an alarmingly high rate of cancer. So that’s a legacy.

JUAN GONZALEZ: And, of course, in Congress itself, your representation is limited to one non-voting representative?

JULIAN AGUON: Yes, one non-voting representative.

JUAN GONZALEZ: So the people of Guam are US citizens but cannot vote in any kind of federal elections at all.

JULIAN AGUON: Yes. The document that purports to be our foundational or constitution document is actually a document passed by the US Congress, or the Organic Act of 1950, passed on August 1st, 1950. Basically, by virtue of that act, we are statutory citizens. US citizenship was extended to us. However, we’re not allowed to vote for the US president, and we’re not allowed to have a voting—an effective voting representative in the US Congress.

And that’s what’s so ironic, and you hear about—I just heard about the Nobel Peace Prize being awarded to Obama, and that’s great, but for us, it’s really like the US has, you know, really justified its current war on terror, I mean, using all—employing all of the classic language of human rights and international law. And that was my specialty area in law school, international law and human rights, and for indigenous people specifically, as well as for colonized peoples.

And we don’t even have to necessarily talk about human rights in Guam; we’ll settle for civil rights. We just want to vote for president. So, I mean, even in America’s own backyard, nuclear contamination is not cleaned up. We can’t vote for president. We can’t really make changes in the US Congress. Yet, all the decisions made for us are made by people we don’t vote for. I mean, this is such a wildly deficient phenomenon today, I mean, because, really, I mean, I guess the best way to explain the Guam situation is that there’s nothing neo about our colonialism. This is such old school-styled colonialism, it’s unreal. It really is unreal. And I think that’s why the Chamoru people of late, our indignation and our moral outrage is sort of taking a new lease of life.

JUAN GONZALEZ: Well, Julian Aguon, I want to thank you for being with us, a Chamoru civil rights attorney—

JULIAN AGUON: Thank you so much.

JUAN GONZALEZ: —and the author of three books, including The Fire this Time: Stories of Life Under US Occupation and What We Bury at Night: Disposable Humanity.