Jaysen and Flavia Science Park Chargers

Okinawa Affirmative

1AC
Contention 1: Inherency
The United States remains committed to maintaining an expanded military
presence on Okinawa—plans for the Futenma Replacement Facility in Nago
are being greenlighted by Japan.

Chalmers Johnson, Professor Emeritus of the University of California—San Diego, former consultant for the CIA from 1967–
1973, former head of the Center for Chinese Studies at the University of California—Berkeley for years, and President and Co-founder of the

Japan Policy Research Institute, 2010 (“Another battle of Okinawa,” Los Angeles Times, May 6th, Available Online at
http://articles.latimes.com/2010/may/06/opinion/la-oe-johnson-20100506 )

The United States is on the verge of permanently damaging its alliance with Japan
in a dispute over a military base in Okinawa. This island prefecture hosts three-
quarters of all U.S. military facilities in Japan. Washington wants to build one
more base there, in an ecologically sensitive area. The Okinawans vehemently
oppose it, and tens of thousands gathered last month to protest the base. Tokyo is caught in the middle, and it
looks as if Japan's prime minister has just caved in to the U.S. dem ands. In the globe-girdling
array of overseas military bases that the United States has acquired since World War II — more than 700 in 130 countries — few have a sadder
history than those we planted in Okinawa. In 1945, Japan was of course a defeated enemy and therefore given no say in where and how these
bases would be distributed. On the main islands of Japan, we simply took over their military bases. But Okinawa was an independent kingdom
until Japan annexed it in 1879, and the Japanese continue to regard it somewhat as the U.S. does Puerto Rico. The island was devastated in the
last major battle in the Pacific, and the U.S. simply bulldozed the land it wanted, expropriated villagers or forcibly relocated them to Bolivia.
From 1950 to 1953, the American bases in Okinawa were used to fight the Korean War, and from the 1960s until 1973, they were used during the
Vietnam War. Not only did they serve as supply depots and airfields, but the bases were where soldiers went for rest and recreation, creating a
subculture of bars, prostitutes and racism. Around several bases fights between black and white American soldiers were so frequent and deadly
that separate areas were developed to cater to the two groups. The U.S. occupation of Japan ended with the peace treaty of 1952, but Okinawa
remained a U.S. military colony until 1972. For 20 years, Okinawans were essentially stateless people, not entitled to either Japanese or U.S.
passports or civil rights. Even after Japan regained sovereignty over Okinawa, the American military retained control over what occurs on its
numerous bases and over Okinawan airspace. Since 1972, the Japanese government and the American military have colluded in denying
Okinawans much say over their future, but this has been slowly changing. In 1995, for example, there were huge demonstrations against the bases
after two Marines and a sailor were charged with abducting and raping a 12-year-old girl. In 1996, the U.S. agreed that it would be willing to give
back Futenma, which is entirely surrounded by the town of Ginowan, but only if the Japanese would build another base to replace it elsewhere on

Nago is a small fishing

the island. So was born the Nago option in 1996 (not formalized until 2006, in a U.S.-Japan agreement).

village in the northeastern part of Okinawa's main island and the site of a coral reef
that is home to the dugong, an endangered marine mammal similar to Florida's
manatee. In order to build a large U.S. Marine base there, a runway would have to
be constructed on either pilings or landfill, killing the coral reef. Environmentalists
have been protesting ever since, and in early 2010, Nago elected a mayor who ran on a
platform of resisting any American base in his town. Yukio Hatoyama, the Japanese prime minister who
came to power in 2009, won partly on a platform that he would ask the United States to relinquish the Futenma Marine Corps Air Station and
move its Marines entirely off the island. But on Tuesday, he visited Okinawa, bowed deeply and essentially asked its residents to suck it up. I find
Hatoyama's behavior craven and despicable, but I deplore even more the U.S. government's arrogance in forcing the Japanese to this deeply
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Okinawa Affirmative

The U.S. has become obsessed with maintaining our empire of

humiliating impasse.

military bases, which we cannot afford and which an increasing number of so-
called host countries no longer want. I would strongly suggest that the United States
climb off its high horse, move the Futenma Marines back to a base in the United
States (such as Camp Pendleton, near where I live) and thank the Okinawans for their 65 years of
forbearance.

Thus the Plan: The United Stated Federal Government should

withdraw the Okinawa Prefecture of Japan. We will clarify.

Contention 2: Harms – US/Japanese Alliance in Danger

Japanese opposition to Futenma in consultations with the US is fracturing the
alliance, despite the irrelevance of the base militarily.

John Feffer 3-6-10 the co-director of Foreign Policy in Focus at the Institute for Policy Studies “Okinawa and the new domino
effect” http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Japan/LC06Dh02.html

For a country with a pacifist constitution, Japan is bristling with weaponry. Indeed, that Asian land has long functioned as a huge aircraft carrier
and naval base for United States military power. We couldn't have fought wars in Korea (1950-1953) and Vietnam (1959-1975) without the

Japan remains the anchor of

nearly 90 military bases scattered around the islands of our major Pacific ally. Even today,

what's left of America's Cold War containment policy when it comes to China and
North Korea. From the Yokota and Kadena air bases, the United States can dispatch troops and bombers across Asia, while the
Yokosuka base near Tokyo is the largest American naval installation outside the United States. You'd think that, with so

many Japanese bases, the United States wouldn't make a big fuss about closing one
of them. Think again. The current battle over the US Marine Corps air base at
Futenma on Okinawa - an island prefecture almost 1,600 kilometers south of Tokyo that hosts about three dozen US bases and
75% of American forces in Japan - is just revving up. In fact, Washington seems ready to stake its

reputation and its relationship with a new Japanese government on the fate of that
base alone, which reveals much about US anxieties in the age of President Barack Obama. What makes this so strange, on the surface, is
that Futenma is an obsolete base. Under an agreement the George W Bush administration reached with the previous

Japanese government, the US was already planning to move most of the Marines now at

Futenma to the island of Guam. Nonetheless, the Obama administration is

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Okinawa Affirmative

insisting, over the protests of Okinawans and the objections of Tokyo, on completing that agreement by
building a new partial replacement base in a less heavily populated part of
Okinawa. The current row between Tokyo and Washington is no mere "Pacific squall", as Newsweek dismissively described it. After
six decades of saying yes to everything the United States has demanded, Japan
finally seems on the verge of saying no to something that matters greatly to Washington, and the
relationship that Dwight D Eisenhower once called an "indestructible alliance" is
displaying ever more hairline fractures. Worse yet, from the Pentagon's
perspective, Japan's resistance might prove infectious - one major reason why the
United States is putting its alliance on the line over the closing of a single
antiquated military base and the building of another of dubious strategic value.

And, while Obama can force Japan to cave on the Futenma issue, it will be a
Pyrrhic victory – we’ll win the battle but lose the alliance in the long run.
Joseph S. Nye Jr., 1-6-10 “An Alliance Larger Than One Issue” The New York Times a professor of government at Harvard
and the author of “The Powers to Lead,” was an assistant secretary of defense from 1994 to 1995.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/07/opinion/07nye.html

We are allowing
Even if Mr. Hatoyama eventually gives in on the base plan, we need a more patient and strategic approach to Japan.

a second-order issue to threaten our long-term strategy for East Asia. Futenma, it is
worth noting, is not the only matter that the new government has raised. It also
speaks of wanting a more equal alliance and better relations with China, and of creating an
East Asian community — though it is far from clear what any of this means. When I helped to develop the Pentagon’s East Asian Strategy Report
in 1995, we started with the reality that there were three major powers in the region — the United States, Japan and China — and that
maintaining our alliance with Japan would shape the environment into which China was emerging. We wanted to integrate China into the
international system by, say, inviting it to join the World Trade Organization, but we needed to hedge against the danger that a future and

the United States and Japan

stronger China might turn aggressive. After a year and a half of extensive negotiations,

agreed that our alliance, rather than representing a cold war relic, was the basis for
stability and prosperity in the region. President Bill Clinton and Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto affirmed that in
their 1996 Tokyo declaration. This strategy of “integrate, but hedge” continued to guide American foreign policy through the years of the Bush

The two countries will miss a

administration. This year is the 50th anniversary of the United States-Japan security treaty.

major opportunity if they let the base controversy lead to bitter feelings or the
further reduction of American forces in Japan. The best guarantee of security in a
region where China remains a long-term challenge and a nuclear North Korea
poses a clear threat remains the presence of American troops, which Japan helps to maintain with
generous host nation support. Sometimes Japanese officials quietly welcome “gaiatsu,” or foreign pressure, to help resolve their own

if the United States undercuts the new Japanese

bureaucratic deadlocks. But that is not the case here:

government and creates resentment among the Japanese public, then a victory on
Futenma could prove Pyrrhic.
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A strong alliance relationship between the United States and Japan is crucial
to avoiding North East Asia’s many flashpoints for conflict.

Dr. Subhash Kapila, South Asia Analysis Group, June 7, 2010

[http://www.southasiaanalysis.org/%5Cpapers39%5Cpaper3848.html]

North East Asia comprises the region China-Taiwan- Japan-Korean Peninsula, Russia and USA. This region today is
overwhelmed by a number of strategic crises endangering regional stability and
peace. The crises today are focused more on North Korea’s nuclear weapons program and its
military provocative adventurism e.g. sinking of South Korea. Navy ship by a North Korea
Navy submarine. Over-arching over all this is the US-China rivalry, this US-Russia

rivalry the Japan- China regional rivalry and Japan’s territorial disputes with all its
neighbors. Each one of these issues are potential flash points in North East Asia. Japan gets
drawn into all these strategic flash points in one way or the other. Japan’s capacity to
manage crises and crisis-response maneuverability gets seriously impaired if it is
plagued by domestic political instability Japan's crisis management capacities get
further impaired when political instability emerges from Japan-US Security
Relationship which so far has provided Japan and USA a combined strategic weight to handle regional crises.

And, a strong U.S.-Japan Alliance is key to solve regional stability, sea

commerce, proliferation, terrorism, and drug trafficking.
Rapp, Council on Foreign Relations- Hitachi International Affairs Fellow at the Institute for International Policy
Studies in Tokyo, in ʻ4 [William, , PATHS DIVERGING? THE NEXT DECADE IN THE U.S.-JAPAN SECURITY
ALLIANCE, January 2004,
https://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/ pdffiles/PUB367.pdf]
neither country has a viable alternative to the alliance for the promotion of
Because

security and national interests in the region, especially given the uncertainties of the
future trends in China and the Korean Peninsula, for the next couple of decades the alliance will
remain central to achieving the interests of both Japan and the United States. A
more symmetrical alliance can be a positive force for regional stability and
prosperity in areas of engagement of China, proactive shaping of the security
environment, the protection of maritime commerce routes, and the countering of
weapons proliferation, terrorism, and drug trafficking. Without substantive change,
though, the centrality of the alliance will diminish as strategic alternatives develop
for either the United States or Japan.
Last, Futenma relocation is the single most important issue in strengthening
US-Japan relations.
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Faleomavaega, United States House of Representative Delegate, American Samoa, Chairman of the House
Subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific and the Global Environment, on 3-17, 2010 [Eni F.H., “U.S.-Japan Relations:
Enduring Ties, Recent Developments”, Hearing of the Asia, Pacific, and the Global Environment Subcommittee of the
House Foreign Affairs Committee]
the most significant issue between our two countries is Japan's decision to
In any case,

reexamine the agreement to relocate the U.S. Marine Corps Air Station from
Futenma to a less populated part of Okinawa. Two months ago I signed a letter with the chairmen and ranking members of the
House Foreign Affairs Committee and Armed Services Committee expressing our continued support for the Guam International
Agreement of February 2009 and our view that any concerns regarding the Futenma replacement facility be addressed through that
accord. As the agreement notes, it is the intent of both parties to reduce the burden of local communities, including those in
the
Okinawa, thereby providing the basis for enhanced public support for the security alliance. It further states, and I quote, "

location of some 8,000 marines and their 9,000 dependents from Okinawa to Guam
shall be dependent on tangible progress made by the government of Japan towards
completion of the Futenma replacement facility as stipulated in the United States
Japan Roadmap for Realignment Implementation of 2006. I believe all of us who signed the letter
recognize that during the campaign the Democratic Party of Japan pledged to review the base

issue and since the Social Democratic Party, one of the Democratic Party of Japan's coalition partners,
adamantly opposes the existing relocation plans and insists that the base be moved
outside of Japan, the decision by the prime minister to put the realignment process on hold after taking office should not
have come as a surprise. After the January Okinawa mayoral election resulting in the

victory of a first time candidate opposed to the plan relocation, the Okinawa
Prefecture Assembly's unanimous approval of a written statement demanding that
the base be moved outside the prefecture and the governor of Okinawa's recent hints that he may take a
similar position in the campaigns for reelection later this year , the issue has clearly become more volatile
locally.

2. Environment –

Futemna bases releases chemical waste onto Japanese living areas and
environment
Mackey 08 ( Gary Mackey, Former Marine in Japan, U.S. MARINE CORPS - CAMP BUTLER, OKINAWA,
JAPAN DESTROYED Whistleblower's Career, LIED to Office of the Special Counsel, Covered Up Environmental
Violations, Health and Safety of citizens placed at risk FPO AP Nationwide June 13 2008)
These were not just run-of-the-mill performance problems. These were serious environmental issues,
such as the deliberate dumping of diesel fuel into a ditch which went off-base
into the Japanese living area, a serious chemical fire at Marine Corps Air Station Futenma
which released toxic fumes, almost losing a waste oil disposal contract which would have cost the
Marine Corps over $700,000 in additional disposal charges and mismanagement and gross negligence in not
setting up an efficient program for reacting to spills of petroleum-oil-lubricants and hazardous substances.
These issues went to the very core of protecting the environment as well as
protecting the health and safety of U.S. personnel and the Japanese public at
large. This is a very serious issue on Okinawa where the government there and the Japanese public want the
U.S. bases removed.
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The US military is depleting uranium shells into the ocean, causing increasing
rates of cancer in children and adults and increased mortality rates in Japan
Genuine Security 10 [“Okinawa: Effects of long-term US Military presence” Okinawa: Effects of long-
term US Military presence, http://www.genuinesecurity.org/partners/report/Okinawa.pdf, pg. 5]

Regular training exercises using live ammunition have caused forest fires, soil
erosion, earth tremors, and accidents. In 1996, U.S. Marines fired depleted uranium
shells into the ocean. The U.S. military defines this as a conventional weapon, but,
officially, they are not allowed to fire depleted uranium in Japan. White Beach, a docking
area in Okinawa for U.S. nuclear submarines, is an area where regional health statistics show
comparatively high rates of leukemia in children and cancers in adults. In 1998, for
example, two women from the White Beach area who had been in the habit of
gathering shellfish and seaweed there died of liver cancer . Also local people are affected,
sometimes killed, in traffic accidents caused by U.S. troops. In October 1998, for example, a U.S. Marine killed a
young woman in a hit-and-run accident. Under the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA, Article 4), the U.S. is
not responsible for environmental clean-up of land or water. As in Korea and the
Philippines, host communities do not have adequate information on the extent of
military contamination. The Japanese government does not release information about it. After the
incident with the depleted uranium shells mentioned above, the U.S. government must
inform local officials about military operations, but Okinawan people doubt that
this is really working. ]
The Futenma air station will destroy the coral reefs – pushing many species
towards extinction
Center for Biological Diversity, et al. 2010 [ Center for Biological Diversity, Earthjustice,
American Friends Service Committee, Animal Welfare Institute, Big Wildlife, Endangered Species Coalition (on
behalf of more than 400 organizations, see below*), Environmental Protection Information Center, Fellowship of
Reconciliation, Greenpeace, Humane Society of the U.S. and Humane Society International, International Marine
Mammal Project of the Earth Island Institute, Natural Resources Defense Council, No Nukes North, Rainforest
Action Network, Sea Turtle Restoration Project, Turtle Island Restoration Network, Western Nebraska Resources
Council, The Whaleman Foundation, Wild Equity Institute, Xerces Society, Biological Organizations, 2010,
http://cop10.org/issues/military/106-henokodugongs]

The island of Okinawa has been called the “Galápagos of the East” because of the
incredible variety of marine and terrestrial life it supports. Unfortunately , a joint
military project proposed by the U.S. and Japanese governments threatens to destroy one of
the last healthy coral-reef ecosystems in Okinawa, pushing many magnificent
species to the brink of extinction . You have the power to protect these unique and priceless creatures.
Under a 2006 bilateral agreement, U.S. and Japanese governments agreed to relocate the contentious U.S. Marine
Corps’ Futenma Air Station to Camp Schwab and Henoko Bay. This shortsighted plan does not take into
consideration that the relocation will destroy a valued ecosystem, including the nearly 400
types of coral that form Okinawa’s reefs and support more than 1,000 species of
fish. It will also hurt imperiled sea turtles and marine mammals . Current plans call for
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Okinawa Affirmative

habitat this project

construction of the new military base near Henoko and Oura bays in Okinawa. But the
would destroy supports numerous endangered species — animals protected by
American, Japanese, and international law for their biological and cultural
importance. These species include: Okinawa dugong: The critically endangered and culturally treasured
dugong, a manatee-like creature, relies on this habitat for its very survival in Okinawa. Japan’s Mammalogical
Society placed the dugong on its “Red List of Mammals,” estimating the population in Okinawa to be critically
endangered. The U.S. government’s Marine Mammal Commission and the United Nations Environmental Program
fear the project would pose a serious threat to this mammal’s survival. The World Conservation Union’s dugong
specialists have expressed similar concerns and have placed the dugong on its Red List of threatened species. The
Okinawa dugong is also a federally listed endangered species under the U.S. Endangered Species Act. The Okinawa
dugong has extreme cultural significance to the Okinawan people, and only about 50 dugongs are thought to remain
in these waters. The base construction will crush the last remaining critical habitat for the Okinawa dugong,
destroying feeding trails and seagrass beds essential for dugong survival.

This creates two impact scenarios –

First – The loss of the coral reefs cause a chain reaction of extinctions -
causing world poverty which endangers nations and a loss of biodiversity
Red Orbit 10 (Staff Writer March 26 2010 Coral Reef Extinction Could Have Catastrophic Effect)
http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1842159/coral_reef_extinction_could_have_catastrophic_effect/index.html
Were that to occur, the results could be catastrophic. Coral
reefs are eaten or inhabited by many
of the oceanic fish population, which in turn provide a food or income source
for an estimated one-billion people around the world. In addition to hunger and
poverty, some predict that severe political unrest could also result, should
the coral reef actually become extinct.
"You could argue that a complete collapse of the marine ecosystem would be one of the consequences of
losing corals," Carpenter told Brian Skoloff of the AP on Thursday. "You're going to have a tremendous
cascade effect for all life in the oceans."
"Whole nations will be threatened in terms of their existence," added Carl Gustaf
Lundin of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.
According to Skoloff, "Experts say cutting back on carbon emissions to arrest rising sea temperatures and
acidification of the water, declaring some reefs off limits to fishing and diving, and controlling coastal
development and pollution could help reverse, or at least stall, the tide."
Such measures have met with resistance, however. Earlier this week, in fact, a proposed set of restrictions
on the trade of coral species was rejected by the member nations of the Convention on the International
Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora.
Failing to establish such regulations, however, could create a chain effect
that could wipe out other seagoing species, such as grouper, snapper,
oysters, and clams, and destroy a fishing industry that directly employs at
least 38 million individuals worldwide.
"Fish will become a luxury good," Cassandra deYoung of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization
told Skoloff. "You already have a billion people who are facing hunger, and this is just going to aggravate
the situation. We will not be able to maintain food security around the world."

Poverty will create resource wars and multiple nuclear wars which will kill
hundreds of millions of people
Pfeiffer ’4 (Dale Allen Pfeiffer -- not Damien Pfister -- Contributing Editor for Energy for From the Wilderness
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Publications, and a published author – including titles such as The End of the Oil Age -- Global Climate Change and
Peak Oil (http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/041304_climate_change_pt1.html)

From such a shift, the report claims, utterly appalling ecological consequences would follow. Europe and
Eastern North America would plunge into a mini-ice age, with weather patterns resembling present day
Siberia. Violent storms could wreak havoc around the globe. Coastal areas such as The Netherlands, New
York, and the West coast of North America could become uninhabitable, while most island nations could be
completely submerged. Lowlands like Bangladesh could be permanently swamped. While flooding would
become the rule along coastlines, mega-droughts could destroy the world's breadbaskets. The dust bowl could
return to America's Midwest. Famineand drought would result in a major drop in the
planet's ability to sustain the present human population. Access to water could
become a major battleground – hundreds of millions could die as a result of
famine and resource wars. More than 400 million people in subtropical regions
will be put at grave risk. There would be mass migrations of climate refugees, particularly to southern
Europe and North America. Nuclear arms proliferation in conjunction with resource
wars could very well lead to nuclear wars.8 And none of this takes into account
the effects of global peak oil and the North American natural gas cliff. Not
pretty.

Second - Oceanic biodiversity prevents collapse of the entire life system

Cousteau, President, Ocean Futures Society, in ʻ2K
[Jean-Michel, “What We Can't See Can Hurt Us,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 3/14 p. A11]
Loss of oceanic biodiversity means loss of genetic diversity. Losing species is like
removing rivets from the airplane in which we are flying. As in any Boeing airplane, nature has
some built-in redundancy. Not all species are needed to keep it going. But just as passengers don't know which

rivets are the important ones, we do not know which species can be lost without
endangering our own lifesupport system. The North Pacific and its once amazingly productive estuaries,
including Puget Sound, are hardly immune from the vastly destructive impact we humans are having upon the life of the seas. Here
salmon are already on the endangered species list. Many marine fish that spend their entire lives in Puget Sound, such as herring,
cod and rockfish, are in shocking population declines that will put them on that list, too. Puget Sound's famous orcas - the killer
whales - are so laced with PCBs (built-up from their salmon and seal-rich diet) that they are now the most chemically contaminated
mammals on the planet, putting their immune, neurological and hormone systems at risk. Puget Sound's shoreline habitats, the
nursery for many species, are being decimated by an insidious process of one more dock, one more bulkhead all the while ignoring
the deadly cumulative impact. When I look to the ocean or the Sound, like most people I see the beauty of light on the water, but I
The oceans are not as vastly
am also aware that my actions on land affect what goes on beneath the surface.

productive as they once were. Nor are near shore marine habitats anywhere near as
healthy as their surface beauty might suggest. The oceans and their fragile reefs
and estuaries have real biological limits, and we have reached them. Out of sight is no
longer out of mind.

And, single species extinction can cause waves of cascading secondary

extinctions.
Santos, Professor, Natural Sciences, CUNY-Baruch, in ʻ99
[Miguel A., The Environmental Crisis, p. 35-36]
the impact of species extinctions may be devastating.
In view of their ecologic role in ecosystems,

The rich diversity of species and the ecosystems that support them are intimately
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connected to the long-term survival of humankind. As the historic conservationist Aldo Leopold stated
in 1949, The outstanding scientific discovery of the twentieth century is not television or radio but the complexity of the land
An endangered species may
organisms..... To keep every cog and wheel is the first precaution of intelligent thinking.

have a significant role in its community. Such organism may control the structure
and functioning of the community through its activities. The sea otter, for example, in relation to its
size, is perhaps the most voracious of all marine mammals. The otter feeds on sea mollusks, sea urchins, crabs, and fish. It needs
to eat more than 20 percent of its weight every day to provide the necessary energy to maintain its body temperature in a cold
The extinction of such keystone or controller species from the ecosystem
marine habitat.

would cause great damage. Its extinction could have cascading effects on many
species, even causing secondary extinction.

Biodiversity is key to human survival

Irish Times 02 (7/27, LN)
biodiversity is a good thing: human
Such pleasure is probably the least important reason why
survival is more to the point. Conservationists insist that biodiversity is basic to the
Earth's life-support system and that the progressive loss of species - as in the current
destruction of natural forest - could help destabilize the very processes by which the
planet services our presence and wellbeing. Most ecologists, probablygo along with the idea
that every species matters. Like rivets in an aeroplane, each has its own, smallimportance: let too many pop
and things start to fly apart. But some are now arguing that since so manyspecies seem to do much the same
job, mere "species richness" may not be essential: so long as "keystonespecies" are identified and cared for,
their ecosystems will probably still function.

And, the loss of biodiversity is the greatest impact

Chen, 2000 (Jim Chen, Prof. of Law Globalization and Its Losers 9Minn. J. Global Trade 157)
The value of endangered species and the biodiversity they embody is
"literally ... incalculable." What, if anything, should the law do to preserve it? There are those
that invoke the story of Noah's Ark as a moral basis for biodiversity preservation. Others regard the entire
Judeo-Chhstian tradition, especially the biblical stories of Creation and the Flood, as the root of the
West's deplorable environmental record. To avoid getting bogged down in an environmental exegesis of
Judeo-Christian "myth and legend," we should let Charles Darwin and evolutionary
biology
determine the imperatives of our moment in natural "history." The loss of
biological diversity is quite arguably the gravest problem facing humanity.
If we cast the question as the contemporary phenomenon that "our
descendants [will1 most regret" the "loss of genetic and species diversity
by the destruction of natural habitats" is worse than even "energy depletion,
economic collapse, limited nuclear war, or conquest by a totalitarian
government." Natural evolution may in due course renew the earth with a
diversity of species approximating that of a world unspoiled by Homo
sapiens - in ten million years, perhaps a hundred million.
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Contention 3: Solvency
Only a total withdrawal of Okianawa—it protects the environment, prevents
disastrous entanglements, and preserves unit integration.

Seigen Miyasato, Chairman of the Study Group of Okinawa External Affairs and Professor and Director of the
Center for Japan-U.S. Relations at the International University of Japan, et al., with 17 co-signers, 2009 (“A Letter
to President Obama from Okinawans,” Close The Base—a project of the Institute For Policy Studies, November 9 th,
Available Online at http://closethebase.org/background/letter-to-the-president/)

Dear President Barack Hussein Obama, We are residents of Okinawa and we

would like to express our views regarding the United States Marine Corps Futenma
Air Station and the current agreement to build a new base in Nago City, Okinawa.
We urge you to withdraw all of USMC from Okinawa. The people of Okinawa
have been and will continue to be firmly opposed to the current US plan to relocate
the dangerous Futenma Air Station to another location within Okinawa. We
demand that the Futenma Air Station be shut down and returned unconditionally.
The USMC has been stationed in Okinawa since the mid 1950s. The only real
solution to the Futenma problem is a total withdrawal of the USMC from Okinawa.
Here we respectfully state the reasons for our demand. First, the current agreement
between the US and Japanese governments regarding the construction of a new
USMC base in Nago City was reached without consultation with the government
or the people of Okinawa in 2005 and 2006. As many recent election results and
public opinion polls show, Okinawa’s people have been calling for relocating
Futenma out of Okinawa. Second, the sea area of the new base, located off shore of
USMC Camp Schwab in Nago City, is a habitat for various endangered species,
including jugong, the Asian manatee. It is unacceptable to destroy the highly
valuable ocean environment with the construction of a military base. Third, the US
and Japanese governments agreed to close the USMC Futenma and return its land
to Okinawa in 1996, with the condition that a replacement facility be constructed
in Okinawa. However, the new facility has not yet been built. The fourteen years
since have proven that it is simply not possible to squeeze a new military base in
Okinawa, which has long suffered an overburden of US military presence. Finally,
when the closure of Futenma Air Station was first discussed, it was assumed that
the ground combat element and logistic combat element would remain in Okinawa.
However, since there is virtually no possibility of building a new air station in
Okinawa, the USMC should relocate both the ground combat element and aviation
combat element out of Okinawa. Indeed, it would be more logical and beneficial
for the USMC if all the elements of the Marine Air-Ground Task Force were
relocated together. Our proposal of a total withdrawal of USMC from Okinawa
would actually fit the necessity of the MAGTF’s integration of elements most
Jaysen and Flavia Science Park Chargers
Okinawa Affirmative

effectively. By withdrawing from Okinawa, the USMC could avoid the

unreasonable arrangement of keeping some troops in Okinawa and stationing
others in Guam or Hawaii. It would be more desirable for the USMC, while at the
same time preserving the highly valuable ocean environment and satisfying the
demands of the people of Okinawa. In conclusion, we wish to urge the United
States and Japanese governments to begin the process of planning for a total
withdrawal of the USMC from Okinawa. Now is the time to act for “CHANGE” to
create a better relationship between Japan and the United States. Both countries
would benefit from a break with the status quo and a fresh perspective on the
Futenma issue.