Japan Becomes Largest US Debt-Holder

Actually, I was talking to my uncle about this today, and I found this exact link as of March 16th, too. :o So China's back in first.




...***.

-edit-So Jae, the quoted Bloomberg article is as of March 15th, while the article in your original post is dated February 16th--so they don't contradict. :)

Lol at you talking like the US is giving out free technology and millitary.

Can you please shut the *** up if you don't know what you're talking about?

lol wtf is this kid smoking..

How about the San Francisco Treaty ending WWII and in the treaty the arrangement between the US and Japan where the US would provide military forces there in Japan.

"Negotiating in 1951 with PresidentHarry S. Truman's envoy, John Foster Dulles, Yoshida agreed to the U.S. bases in return for American protection, but refused U.S. pressure for Japan itself to rearm. The result was two treaties. A multinational peace treaty, signed in San Francisco 8 September 1951 (with the Communist nations abstaining), was extraordinarily generous, providing for an end to the occupation, recognizing Japan's “full sovereignty,” and mandating no Japanese reparations to its wartime victims. The same day, the United States and Japan signed a bilateral agreement for U.S. troops to remain indefinitely, even allowing their use against domestic disturbances. On 8 February 1952, both parties signed another treaty authorizing the United States to maintain military bases in Japan and Okinawa."

Overtime there have been less and less US military personal there and overtime Japan has rebuilt their own domestic forces. The US still have 8 bases there in Japan with over 40K troops and their families it costs the US money to maintain there presence there.

How much money would the US save by removing all those troops and their families along with the number civilian jobs occupied by US and Japanese civilians the US employees on those bases?

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. ^^;

Even more recent in 2005 3 marines were arrested for raping 14yr old Okinawa girl. The longer the US Military is there the more they are disliked. One horrible action by a few marines creates a bad stigma for the entire US military. I was there in Okinawa for 6 months as a navy medic attached to the marines. Every weekend we had a lecture from the battalion commander about being responsible and staying out of trouble to keep us off the radar. Everyone was worried about creating and "international Incident" I don't know how 3 marines would be so stupid as to do what they did as all the lectures of staying out of trouble.

Basically the longer the US Military if there the more they get in trouble and give the Japanese more reason to make the US Military leave permanently.

Whoa, cool! You're actually quite well-acquainted with this situation, then. What you're saying makes sense, though, albeit not likely to happen in the next few years or so, unless something completely drastic happens.

Lol I got those same speaches by my CO even when I was stationed in washington state in a heavy navy region. Don't drink too much. Make plans. Don't do stupid ***blah blah blah. Had to make sheets of our plans for long weekends and ***lol. ***like that or other stuff happens semi often just about everywhere and the people get mad. Then they forget and something else happens and it all happens again. Interestingly most the time you hear about it it seems to be the marines that do it lol.

Still I doubt backing out would be smart. Loss of the whole presence of power over there. Um idk probably look like we are weak for leaving and such etc etc. And well the navy big decisions seem often decided out of stubborness and pride. Leading to um interesting and highly wasteful decisions