US should return $ 833.8 million Japan paid for relocating US Marines to Guam
February 17, 2012
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2012 February 15 - 21 TOP3 [US FORCES]
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In the face of a financial crisis, the United States is reviewing the plan to build another base in Guam. However, Japan has continued to pay the U.S. for the projected cost of relocating part of the U.S. Marines from Okinawa to Guam.
The Japanese government should demand that the U.S. administration return about 81.3 billion yen that Japan has already paid to the U.S. Department of Treasury, and should stop further payments.
The U.S. administration has so far used only a part of the money Japan has sent. Most of it sits in a Treasury Department account.
The 2006 Japan-U.S. agreement requires Japan to pay 6.09 billion dollars or 60% of the expenses in the construction of a U.S. base in Guam. Based on this agreement, Japan remitted 336 million dollars (about 34.5 billion yen) in FY 2009 and 497.8 million dollars (about 46.8 billion yen) in FY 2010.
In the meantime, the U.S. Congress froze the budget allocation for the construction of a Guam base in the FY 2012 budget. There is no guarantee that the Pentagon’s budgetary request of 26 million dollars (about 2 billion yen) will obtain congressional approval in the next fiscal year for the Guam base construction.
Japan has already posted 700 million yen for the construction of a U.S. base on U.S. territory and another 6.7 billion yen for prior development of infrastructure in the next fiscal year budget draft.
Where else on earth is a country bearing the cost for the construction of a foreign military base in a foreign land at a time when the country must focus on recovery from a major catastrophe? That country is now asking its people to bear more taxes due to its tight budget.
The Japanese government should demand that the U.S. pay back the money Japan forked out, not use taxpayers’ money for foreign military forces, and use that money for disaster reconstruction and people’s better livelihoods.
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