The relocation of MCAS Futenma on Okinawa is starting to turn into the Yongsan Garrison relocation boondoggle that Korea experienced over multiple decades:
This Aug. 2018, file aerial photo shows preliminary construction work off Henoko, in Nago city, Okinawa prefecture, Japan, where the Japanese government plans to relocate a U.S. base from one area of Okinawa’s main island to another.
The relocation of a U.S. Marine Corps base to a less-crowded area of the southern Japanese island of Okinawa will take more than twice as much money and time as previously estimated because of the need to stabilize the reclaimed land it will be built on, Japan’s government said Wednesday.
The Defense Ministry said the relocation of U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma from densely populated Ginowanto Henoko on Okinawa’s eastern coast will cost $8.5 billion and take 12 years, pushing its completion into the 2030s. That adds more than a decade to the plan, which has already been delayed by more than 20 years because of local opposition and other reasons.
You can read more at the link, but I wonder if this project will be filled with the shoddy construction and corruption like what we saw in the Yongsan Garrison relocation?
I wonder which US military installation we will see closed first, Futenma in Japan or Yongsan Garrison in Seoul?
Japan will make every effort to achieve the “earliest possible” relocation of the Futenma base to the proposed site further north on the island of Okinawa, new Defense Minister Akinori Eto said Monday.
“We have to avoid keeping the (U.S. Marine Corps) Air Station Futenma in the center of Ginowan, which is densely packed with houses and schools,” Eto, 58, said in a group interview at the Defense Ministry. “Though we are fully aware of the various opinions among the local public, the only solution to avoid continuous use of the Futenma air station is its relocation to (the shores of) Camp Schwab” in the city of Nago.
Eto stressed that the ministry will be tenacious in explaining the significance and benefits of the relocation to Okinawa’s residents. [Stars & Stripes]
