Garuda.Poetsave said:
Ragnarok.Blindphleb said:
My point was Japan has a much larger military presence than you let on. They have an Air force, Navy, and Army. Your view that America is some sort of body guard 24/7 for Japan is in error.
My initial point was how much money could the US save and turn around and put towards that debt annually if the US left Japan, brought home those troops, their families and did not have the expenses of running 8 military bases in Japan.
Doesn't really seem like it's happening any time soon, as the US is currently focusing more on the relocation of
Futenma Marine Corps Air Station, which Hatoyama Akio is seemingly very vague and indecisive about, even after
being visited by scary lady Hilary Clinton as a stern reminder that they have an agreement to fulfill.
To be honest, Hatoyama's indecisiveness isn't completely unreasonable, as there are a lot of different factors involved as to why or why not the station should be relocated--the $10.3 billion cost of relocation, environmental concerns, past and potential accidents on the surrounding population (Futenma is currently based in Okinawa), as well as the general public's wariness since
three marines from Futenma raped a 12-year-old girl in 1995.
But yeah.
Even now it's a mess, and Hatoyama probably won't be able to meet the deadline of May of this year. :/
Lol. This is
sooooooooo random coming from me, I know. >_>; I've been watching too much NHK World News.... They've been talking about this for a long time, though, and I finally looked into the big story. Then this subject popped up, so... yeah. :D
Btw, feel free to correct me if you're more familiar with the political workings of the current Japanese government, hehe. ^^;