American tax dollars at work in Japan

[Guchi_Jnr]

Police in Okinawa Prefecture arrested a 38-year-old U.S. Marine on Monday on suspicion of raping a 14-year-old local girl, sparking stern protest from both central and local government officials against the United States and the U.S. military.

The suspect is identified as Tyrone Hadnott, a staff sergeant who belongs to the Camp Courtney base in the southernmost Japanese prefecture. He has denied raping the girl, saying he only forced her down and kissed her, the police said.

Just how many times does this need to happen, before Japan grows some balls and kicks them the fuck out.. 

[BigDnm01]

THIS CANNOT STAND!  Stupid ass military men think they can do whatever they want and get away with it?  Cut off their balls. This and similar incidents is why the world is starting to hate Americans (i'm American, too btw). 

soldiers are to protect and serve the country and fight for peace for freedom.  NOT COMMIT CRIMES, ESPECIALLY INHUMANE ONES LIKE THIS!  WHERE IS THE DISICIPLINE?! 

[Asmodai]

There is discipline in the military most of the time.

Percent of US military people (including families) compared to the total population of Okinawa in 2000: 3.77%
Percent of police cases involving US military or related people in Okinawa in 2000: 0.85%
Revenues generated by the US bases in Okinawa in 2000: 187.3 billion yen.

This site also dispels some of the more common myths http://www.dprkstudies.org/documents/asia015.html as does this one (although it's from a somewhat biased source): http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=42262&archive=true

Basically, notwithstanding the occasional media circus around isolated cases, a member of the US military is five times less likely to commit a serious crime than a native Okinawan. There are other reasons why the US military maybe shouldn't be there (problems with Okinawa's tourism, etc.) and reasons why it should stay (it's 25% of Okinawa's economy and Okinawa already isn't the richest part of Japan), but crime just isn't one of them.

Personally, I think we should move more of the US military presence in Asia to Korea and the Philippines which (a) generally appreciate our   presence more and (b) need the economic stimulus more than Japan does.

A lot of this comes down to plain old fashioned racism too. The US military is disproportionately African-American, and the Japanese media uses that to prey on people's fears.

Not that any of that excuses the individual. If he did it than he should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

[BigDnm01]

I didn't really mean the US military have no disicipline,  I believe they do, no disrespect to our great countrymen protecting our freedom overseas. 

It's just some choose to commit crimes and it results in making them look bad.  MAKE US AMERICANS LOOK BAD!  US military are the strongest miltary in terms of technology and capabilites, they are to be revered and look up to. 
but whenever something like this happens anywhere, they then become viewed in such an ugly light and destroys their reputation what everything else they stand for and upheld.  how can the general public stand something like this when a soldier that is supposed to upheld justice and freedom commit a crime that goes against the very thing they stand to do?
The USA need to carefully solve this problem, if not they will look like those who abuse their powers. 
Sadly, this is not the first, and not just in Japan.
ex. couple of years back, a similar incident happen in South Korea and it enraged the entire nation. 

It's just how someone mess could effect the entire group.  a soldier mistake end up costing the entire military/govt/nation.

[Asmodai]

Yeah, but the trouble is there's going to be a few bad eggs in any group. The military does a pretty good job of screening out most of them. If we're able to finish and get out Iraq soon, then they'll be less need for soldiers. Hopefully then the military can be more selective and have fewer cases like this. The idea that an army of over a million will be completely perfect impossible though.

The 1995 incident got a lot of attention and caused a lot of hard feelings because the military was seen as screening and protecting the criminals. They've changed things since so the local police arrest them (as in this case) and the military stays hands off. Hopefully that will cause people to blame the individual rather than the group.

[Bleachhh]

LOL... U.S marines.. 

[Guchi_Jnr]

You (America) can throw as many statistics* as you please at this, in an effort to make yourselves feel better about being American, but this simply boils down to, if he wasn't stationed here, this poor kid would've been raped.. Which is exactly how the Japanese public and media will see it..

Don't think this case will change anything though, since nothing has really happened after all the other rape cases..

For those of you that don't know about the "1995 incident", 3 marines bashed and raped a 12year old kid..


* they're crap!! 
They don't give any figures on the type of crimes Japanese committed, just a total.. So there's no way to tell what % are for what crimes... It should show "Assaults by SOFA" compared to "Assaults Total"..

Also, gotta love the way people copy the stats part that reads "SOFA committed 1.7% of the crimes", and they seem to skip the part that reads "SOFA counted for 5.2% of arrests".
http://www3.pref.okinawa.jp/site/view/contview.jsp?cateid=14&id=666&page=1

[Asmodai]

You (America) can throw as many statistics* as you please at this, in an effort to make yourselves feel better about being American, but this simply boils down to, if he wasn't stationed here, this poor kid would've been raped.. Which is exactly how the Japanese public and media will see it..

If the US military hadn't been there in the last 50 years, she'd be saluting the sickle and hammer and might have been raped by Russian soldiers instead. I guess that would be preferable since they're not American? (EDIT: Since people are misreading this, I should point out that I'm part Polish. The Russian occupation of Poland makes the Americans in Japan look like saints.)

It's a silly hypothetical, but it's impossible to know what would happen if the US troops weren't stationed there. What we do know is that they carry far more than their weight economically and are generally extremely well-behaved.

No one is arguing that this case isn't horrible if it happened. The point is that it's silly to draw conclusions from one case or tar 50,000 people because of one individual. When you blame the US military presence for the actions of one person, that's exactly what you're doing. It's the same thing as blaming all Arabs for 9/11 or all Asian-Americans for the Virginia Tech shootings.

http://www3.pref.okinawa.jp/site/view/contview.jsp?cateid=14&id=666&page=1

That 5.2% of arrests you quote goes back to the 1970's. Looking back at the last 15 years, it's less than or about 3% - about on par with their percentage of Okinawa's population, or slightly less. In the most recent statistics (2001) the US military was 3.9% of the population and accounted for 2.2% of the crimes - about half the rate of the native population. The military certainly did seem to be out of control in 1978 and 1979. I'm not sure how much that has to do with the current debate given that most of the soldiers stationed there now weren't even alive at the time.

I agree that it would be more useful if the data showed the percentages for each crime.

[Odango]

Not to say it's okay, but Japan did a LOT worse to the countries they occupied before WW2. The army had a LARGE amount of sex slaves in China and Korea, that's why ties with these countries today are still not very great, especially considering China. So if Japan wants to get mad at one soldier doing this, then they should issue that formal apology  that China has been looking for for over the past 50 years for the thousands and thousands of sexual crimes their soldiers comitted against the Chinese.

This is in no way justifying the soldier's actions. As a woman I can feel the pain she must be going through, and am angered by the man and his actions, and definately agree he should be brought to justice. But you can't blame the whole nation for one bad seed. Like the saying goes "Let he who has not sinned cast the first stone." Every nation has a soldier or two that has done wrong to other people, so no one can claim innocence, every nation is guilty. Humans in general are imperfect, whether they're American, Japanese, Chinese, Iraqi, Mexican, etc.

[Guchi_Jnr]

No one is arguing that this case isn't horrible if it happened. The point is that it's silly to draw conclusions from one case or tar 50,000 people because of one individual. When you blame the US military presence for the actions of one person, that's exactly what you're doing.

One case?? More like one a month!!

The governor's petition included the information that, according to Okinawan prefectural police records, during the thirty-year period since Okinawa reverted to Japan's administration (1972-2002), American troops, Pentagon civilians, and military dependents committed 5,157 crimes in Okinawa, of which 533 were the "heinous" crimes of murder and rape. This works out to 17.7 heinous crimes per year or 1.5 per month.

http://hnn.us/articles/2867.html

Japan Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda has expressed anger over the alleged rape of a 14-year-old girl by a US serviceman on the island of Okinawa.

Mr Fukuda says the alleged rape is inexcusable and has vowed to take measures to stop similar cases happening again.

www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/02/12/2161000.htm

The only personal that is allowed to live of base, are married couples and high ranking officers.. Dare say that is going to be trimmed back to only married couples after this..

@Odango
Was wondering how long it would take to before "but Japan did a LOT worse" was thrown in this topic..

[Fracture]

Whoa, you predicted that your one-sided criticism of US soldiers in Japan would be met with criticism of Japanese soldiers elsewhere.  You must be psychic   God forbid anyone try to offer some kind of perspective.

FYI, I don't need anything to make me feel better about being an American.  I have no guilty conscience for the crimes of someone I've never even heard of before now.  Guchi, you make it sound like we're some kind of criminal culture tainting a utopian paradise with our presence.  If I were to say the same about the crimes of non-citizens where I live - of which there are many - I would be laughed at and called a bigot.  But since it's the Evil Empire of America we're talking about, those kinds of generalizations are okay, right?

And it's funny how people (not just you, I've seen this on several other forums today) want play this up like doomsday, but when someone talks about the GOOD things that have come about from the US military presence in Okinawa, it gets shoved right to the margins.  People want to talk about how the Americans are despoiling Eden but not about the billions we've dumped into developing their economy.  How myopic.

And no, I'm not saying that any of this excuses rape, just that your bias is showing   This guy is going to be tried just like any other criminal, please stop trying to put entire nation on trial because of a few bad eggs.

[Shumatsu Samurai]

I cannot really comment on this because I don't have much background information on this and everything that's available is most likely biased in a way. I have, however, been to Okinawa as a tourist and my personal experience is that these bases (and that includes the Japanese) seem to be everywhere. They hinder public transportation, they're huge, ugly, noisy as hell and just a general nuisance.
Okinawa is so small, it feels like half of the island is filled up with military installations. No doubt this makes it much harder for people to live there than in other places that have some sort of base(s). The economic factor can hardly make up for that. And who knows how the situation would be today if there were no bases. Of course we can just speculate, but for the people, I doubt there's much that's worse than having an airforce base as your neighbor.
The pilot of the fighter jet might be the nicest guy on earth, he might even have a Japanese wife and be a great contributor to the community but in the end, he and his workplace are still part of a bigger problem.
In a way I was happy that I was only there for a week...
Looking at the current case with this in mind, I can very well understand why emotions are heated up over this.
How I see it:
Japanese politicians need to realize that you can be a partner and an ally without playing the role of a loyal dog because they don't want to lose US support (how much they actually need it nowadays is a different story and for someone else to comment on). Until they can do that, they're secretly happy for sad situations like this one because they can use it to improve their position because they don't have the guts to just ask for a swift relocation.
I read that some troops are moved to Guam but it'll take until 2014, cost Japan a lot of money and it seems to only be a rather small percentage so I can understand why people are (still) unhappy...
Just my 2 cents.

[Guchi_Jnr]

Whoa, you predicted that your one-sided criticism of US soldiers in Japan would be met with criticism of Japanese soldiers elsewhere.  You must be psychic   God forbid anyone try to offer some kind of perspective.

My point being, what in the hell does WWII have to do with this??
Here, let me do some basic maths for you two..
The victim in this case is 14years old..
WWII ended over 60years ago..
Umm..hello!! She wasn't there!! She wasn't apart of the atrocities that the Japanese Army committed during the war, so to even bring it up IS justifying this horrendous crime in a way..

Which is equally as bad as Asmo's comment..

If the US military hadn't been there in the last 50 years, she'd be saluting the sickle and hammer and might have been raped by Russian soldiers instead. I guess that would be preferable since they're not American?

Fuck dude, any respect I had for you, vanished with that..

Just for the record, I don't consider myself as "anti-american".. Yeah, it's true that I don't really like America (welcome to the world there), but comments like these do help..

That being said, I don't think I need to comment anymore on this, since you guys are making my argument for me..

[jabronisaur]

There's a poor young girl here who has been traumatized. Let's not forget about her. I'd hate her tragedy be used to facilitate a political agenda. This soldier's actions are totally unforgivable! Even if no sexual activity took place, it was still completely irresponsible to put himself in that position to begin with, by even aproaching the child. Regardless of how it effects American's standing in the world, it was wrong on any and all levels and inexcusable. But what I find just as tragic, is the other poor girls who have been forgotten because they were raped by local citizens and not foreign troops. The media doesn't talk about their loss and suffering because it does not sell newspapers.

In truth with our technology and resources, bases in Japan and in other countries are really in fact becoming obsolite. Air craft carriers and new long range bomers and fighters like the raptor, can be deployed in hours and accomplish much the same thing as any land base. I say we should pull out of such territorities and prevent awful crimes like these from happening again.

[Fracture]

Guchi, I'd ask you to justify the obvious straw man in that post, but you're not commenting anymore so...

Suffice it to say that (a) no one here has tried justify what this guy did in any way, (b) calling you out about letting your obvious predisposition toward Americans inhibit your ability to be rational about this does not constitute "making your argument for you", and (c) saying "I'm not anti-American but I don't like America" is something of a contradiction.  With regard to the first point, I have to wonder if we're even reading the same topic.  It must be nice to say silly things like that and then run out of the thread without ever having to answer for them, very convenient.

If it helps make thing clear, my entire post was in response to this kind of stuff:

You (America) can throw as many statistics* as you please at this, in an effort to make yourselves feel better about being American

This is the point went this topic nose-dived into logical fallacy, and you changed from 'concerned citizen' to 'blind crusader'.  Since you're so keenly against misappropriation of blame, let me remind that of all the marines you'd like to boot, 99%+ of them weren't around when this girl was raped, and I'm willing to bet that they are appalled by it.  The one person that may have been responsible is facing prosecution.  Trying to shift the blame onto America in general, which is what it looks like you're trying to do up there, makes it seem as though you're exploiting the situation to soap-box your own personal diatribe.

[Foxy Brown]

I know this is a divisive issue, but let's keep the discussion civil, please.

[Guchi_Jnr]

I can definitely write more, no problems with that!!

The "you (america)" part was original "you", but that seemed like a personal attack against Asmo for the statistics, so I added "america" since the sites that posted those stats is called "Stars and Stripes"..

But what I find just as tragic, is the other poor girls who have been forgotten because they were raped by local citizens and not foreign troops. The media doesn't talk about their loss and suffering because it does not sell newspapers.

If you read Japanese newspapers and watched Japanese news programs, you would see such stories (a few months ago, a lady was raped in a train, and that was a huge story here), so to say it's because it doesn't sell newspapers just isn't correct.. It just doesn't happen as often..

Food for thought: There's about an equal amount of foreigner teachers as there are of US armed forces here, and how often do you read about foreigner teachers raping people?? Answer.....Never.. And you know that would definitely be a big news story here.. 


More details of the case

A U.S. Marine Corps staff sergeant who is in custody over the alleged rape of a 14-year-old girl in Okinawa Prefecture persistently attempted to get the girl's cell phone number and e-mail address while driving her around in his car, The Yomiuri Shimbun learned Wednesday.

Police suspect that Tyrone Hadnott, a 38-year-old staff sergeant at Camp Courtney in Uruma, tried to contact the girl even after the crime.

According to the police, Hadnott offered the middle school student a ride on his motorbike in central Okinawa city at about 8:30 p.m. Sunday. He later forced her into his house in Kita-Nakagusukuson.

The girl left the house after he kissed her and tried to molest her, the police said. But Hadnott caught up with her in his car, and offered her a ride home. He then took her to a park in Chatancho, where the alleged rape took place.

While driving to the park, Hadnott repeatedly asked the girl to give him her cell phone number and e-mail address, according to the police.

Before raping her, he allegedly again sought her number and address.

After the alleged crime, the girl jumped out of the car. However, Hadnott ran after her to give her back her cap, which she had left in the car. He then followed her in his car to a nearby convenience store, where he got out and talked to her, the police said.

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/20080214TDY02307.htm

[Asmodai]

I can definitely write more, no problems with that!!

The "you (america)" part was original "you", but that seemed like a personal attack against Asmo for the statistics, so I added "america" since the sites that posted those stats is called "Stars and Stripes"..

To be fair, I did mention that it was a biased source, I can't read enough Japanese dig up the original statistics on my own unfortunately. Don't worry, I didn't take it as a personal attack. We just interpret the data differently. Googling trying to find more information revealed that our disagreement is one of the more polite ones on the 'net on this topic.

But what I find just as tragic, is the other poor girls who have been forgotten because they were raped by local citizens and not foreign troops. The media doesn't talk about their loss and suffering because it does not sell newspapers.

If you read Japanese newspapers and watched Japanese news programs, you would see such stories (a few months ago, a lady was raped in a train, and that was a huge story here), so to say it's because it doesn't sell newspapers just isn't correct.. It just doesn't happen as often..

Food for thought: There's about an equal amount of foreigner teachers as there are of US armed forces here, and how often do you read about foreigner teachers raping people?? Answer.....Never.. And you know that would definitely be a big news story here.. 

Part of the trouble is that most rapes in Japan (as everywhere else) aren't reported. That makes it considerably harder to get an idea of what's really going on. This article has some good analysis about why the reported incidence of rape in Japan is so low: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/09/02/world/main571280.shtml

I do know that most teaching programs in Japan are very strict in their training about not having inappropriate contact with students. Most kick you out if they learn of a relationship. I recall at least one training manual states (basically) that you should expect your students to flirt with you, but you're an idiot if you take it for serious interest. Most are also pretty strict about kicking you out if they do discover a relationship. That suggests that maybe there needs to be better training for the soldiers to make them more aware of the consequences - not that it would have made a difference in this particular case based on this facts that we know. For what it's worth, I agree with you that living off base should be restricted to married couples and perhaps flag officers.

In you're original post you editorialized: "Just how many times does this need to happen, before Japan grows some balls and kicks them the fuck out.. " I think it's valid to point out that this happens extremely rarely and that kicking them out, putting tens of thousands of Okinawans whose jobs stem from the US presence out of work and creating a security vacuum in the region at a time that Russian is aggressively asserting control over the northern islands, North Korea is test firing missiles across Japan, and China is developing a bigger amphibious invasion capacity than the allies had on D-Day (aimed at Taiwan, but nonetheless), isn't the best idea for Japan or the US. You may disagree with those risks or decide that the prevention of a few crimes is worth condemning thousands to joblessness and poverty. That's your right, and since it's all speculative there's no perfect answer, only best guesses and opinion.

[shirenuファクトリー]

If the US military hadn't been there in the last 50 years, she'd be saluting the sickle and hammer and might have been raped by Russian soldiers instead. I guess that would be preferable since they're not American?

Wow you managed to offend Russians, too...

Not cool guys, not cool...

[Guchi_Jnr]

I do know that most teaching programs in Japan are very strict in their training about not having inappropriate contact with students. Most kick you out if they learn of a relationship. I recall at least one training manual states (basically) that you should expect your students to flirt with you, but you're an idiot if you take it for serious interest. Most are also pretty strict about kicking you out if they do discover a relationship. That suggests that maybe there needs to be better training for the soldiers to make them more aware of the consequences - not that it would have made a difference in this particular case based on this facts that we know.

I have personally done the teacher training in Japan, and yes the company I taught at, did tell us we couldn't "fraternize with students", which meant we weren't even allowed to talk to them outside the classroom.. Other schools actually encourage friendship between students and teachers, and having a relationship is perfectly fine.. But they didn't say "oh, and by the way, don't rape anyone.", which is a part of the "education program" the military wants to do to stop this from happening again..

For the life of me, I just can't get my head around that.. That people need to be told that rape is bad..

And it's not going to make any difference at all, because they are marines.. Just a bunch of knuckleheads with guns who believing they are bigger than god..

Ok, that was a bit harsh.. I do have a few close friends in the forces and they aren't so bad, but I've also met a bunch that have less maturity than a 6year old, so generally speaking...knuckleheads..

[off-topic]
I consider marines the same as jocks..
When I was in Australia, I lived in a place called St.Kilda in Melbourne.. People considered St.Kilda as the most dangerous/violent area, due to all the prostitution and drugs, and the bars there, a big no go.. Now I was always in those bars, and they were packed with druggies, hookers, pimps, bikers, skinheads, punks..the works, and I never once saw a fight..
The "safe" places on the other hand were "sport bars" in the city.. These places were full of footballers, rugby players, etc., and there were always fights.. Just a bunch of macho he-men knuckle draggers, acting all tough and shit... Which is exactly what I think of most marines.. They are the same as these guys, but were crap at sport..
[/off-topic]

I think it's valid to point out that this happens extremely rarely

The last reported rape by a marine was in October, so I would hardly call it extremely rare.. And as you pointed out, a lot of rape cases aren't reported, and if anything, even less would report one against a marine, since it would be so much harder to prove..

No-one knows how Okinawa would go without the military presence, but I don't think it would be that bad..
America is using 75% of the land, which means 1.2million Japanese live in 25%.. With that 75% cleared for Japanese, the population could increase to around 5million, and with that, there would be a lot more work.. Not to mention the tourism there would boom, since people would believe it to be safer..

It's true that Japan relies on the US military for protection, but they don't have a choice since their American written constitution states

ARTICLE 9
Aspiring sincerely to an international peace based on justice and order, the Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes. (2) In order to accomplish the aim of the preceding paragraph, land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained. The right of belligerency of the state will not be recognized.

So with this, North Korea could say something like "Tomorrow at noon, we are going to fire these missiles from these bunkers and bomb the hell out of you." and Japan aren't allowed to do anything to protect itself.. But America could fly over, bomb the bunkers and save the day.. So yeah, America is needed...they made it that way..

:sidenote: You gained some respect with that post..