Okinawa's newspapers: At war with the U.S. military?

Okinawa's newspapers: At war with the U.S. military?
By David Allen and Chiyomi Sumida, Stars and Stripes
Pacific edition, Sunday, May 11, 2008

CHATAN, Okinawa — Ask military public affairs officers in private and they’ll tell you Okinawa is one of the most political places they’ve been assigned.

They say, if there’s a bad angle to be found in a story about Marines cleaning a local beach, the Japanese-language newspapers will find it. And if there’s a report of a crime committed by an airman or a sailor, protests by island officials and rallies by well-organized anti-base groups are sure to follow.

Crimes by U.S. servicemembers on the Japanese mainland don’t generate the same sense of public outrage. But on Okinawa, even a report of a drunken Marine stumbling into a stranger’s house and falling asleep on the sofa is likely to get at least a formal complaint filed by the local town or city hall.

The irony? Americans connected to the military commit far fewer crimes per capita than their Okinawan counterparts.

In an op-ed piece that ran in the Japan Times in February, frequent contributor Michael Hassett examined crime statistics released by the National Police Agency and determined that the arrest rate for Americans on Okinawa under the Status of Forces Agreement in 2006 was about half that of the prefecture’s general population. He was stunned.


Rest of article at: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=54691

into my home and fell asleep, I'd probably beat the person with a frying pan or a bat.. then call the police..

I am FLABBERGASTED!

pnorman