Gates to Japan: No Futema Relocation, No Relocation of Marines to Guam
Guam - Japan's Kyodo news service is reporting that U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has laid out a stark choice for the new Japanese Government. Either agree to the Futenma Airfield relocation or there will be no move of Marines to Guam and no return of land to Okinawa.
Read the Kydoo Article
The visiting U.S. Defense Secretary arrived late yesterday in Japan where he said he wants Tokyo to "expeditiously" implement a 2006 bilateral accord to relocate the Futemma air base within Okinawa, warning that if the relocation fails to materialize, the land currently occupied by the base would not be returned to Japan.
Kyodo quotes Gates as saying that "Our view is clear," Gates said. "The Futemma relocation is a linchpin of the realignment roadmap" for U.S. forces stationed in Japan as stipulated in the accord.
Without the relocation of the airfield, "there will be no relocation (of Marines in Okinawa) to Guam. Without relocation to Guam, there will be no consolidation of forces and return of land in Okinawa," he said.
Gates made the remarks during a joint press conference with Defense Minister Toshimi Kitazawa after holding talks earlier in the day with Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama and the Japanese defense chief.
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