The loud dispute over the future of the U.S. Marine Air Station at Futenma, Okinawa, is puzzling. Even U.S. officialdom agrees that this base causes enormous inconvenience to the residents of Ginowan city who are forced to live alongside. Plans to have it moved have been around for years. But to where?
Even the very reasonable proposal by Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada that the noisy helicopter base functions be moved to the vast U.S. air base at nearby Kadena is rejected. There are technical problems, it is claimed. Sources say the real problem is traditional U.S. Marine-Air Force antagonism: that the Air Force has yet to be reconciled to the idea that the originally sea-based marines should have air power also.
So Japan is thrown into base chaos simply because of an irrational U.S. military factional dispute?