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Mission Creep Dispatch: C. Douglas Lummis
As part of our special investigation "Mission Creep: US Military Presence Worldwide," we asked a host of military thinkers to contribute their two cents on topics relating to global Pentagon strategy. (You can access the archive here.) The following dispatch comes from C. Douglas Lummis, a former US Marine who teaches at Japan's Okinawa International University, and the author of Radical Democracy.
Pentagon Promise Breakers: Friday the 13th in Okinawa
In her article "How to Stay in Iraq for 1,000 Years," Frida Berrigan takes up the issue of status of forces agreements (SOFAs), those treaties that determine the standing of US troops based or operating in foreign countries. She mentions that the special privileges granted under the US-Japan SOFA have been a particular source of resentment in Okinawa, where time after time GIs who had committed crimes against Okinawans were spirited away by US military police and disappeared, apparently transferred back to the US, leaving it unclear whether they were ever charged in a military court.
The Okinawa experience brings into focus the humiliation of this extraterritoriality, but a recent incident here raises another question: When push comes to shove, to what extent is the US military willing to abide by even its own agreements?
In August 2004, on Friday the 13th, a helicopter from the US Marine Air Station at Futenma smacked into the side of a building inside Okinawa International University, fell to the ground, exploded, and burned. Miraculously, no one other than the crew was injured. But what happened afterward was just as extraordinary.
Immediately, scores of Marines came pouring over the fence (the base and the university are back-to-back), and occupied the university. They set up a cordon of yellow tape around the accident site, and kicked out not only reporters and cameramen, but also the Okinawan firemen who had come to put out the blaze, the local police who had come to investigate the cause of the accident, and even the mayor of the town.
That evening a friend drove me through some backstreets, avoiding roadblocks, and we managed to get into the university, as far as the yellow tape blockade. Standing behind the tape was a line of Marine MPs, pistols on their belts. Behind them, Marines were dismantling the wrecked helicopter and loading it into trucks (from a police standpoint, destroying the evidence).
This behavior naturally drew a lot of protest, but most Okinawans came to the same conclusion: It only proved once again that the SOFA needed to be revised. Wondering about this, I found a copy of the agreement and searched for the clause that permits the US military to occupy turf outside its bases.
There is no such clause.
Moreover, concerning the right of MPs to operate outside their bases, the SOFA is clear. If American GIs are making, or involved in, some kind of trouble off base, then US military police may, after notifying Japanese police of their intentions, go to where the trouble is and use their police powers against those GIs. But the MPs have no police powers over Japanese citizens outside the bases.
So what were those pistols, then? We can be sure that Marine MPs don't go on duty carrying empty pistols. And the fact that they were carrying pistols was surely a big factor in their success in extracting obedience from the people they were keeping outside the cordon. But under the existing SOFA, they had no legal basis for threatening people outside the base with violence. (Make no mistake: When someone carrying a gun issues an order, that is a threat of violence.)
When a military unit, carrying weapons, takes control of a piece of foreign territory without the permission of that territory's government, what do we call it? The proper term, I believe, is a military incursion. The occupation of Okinawa International University was small-scale and short-lived, and, fortunately, no one was hurt. But in the context of international law, that's what it was.
The incident is telling as to how the US military understands its status in foreign countries. That is, it will obey the status of forces agreements when it's no big inconvenience, but in the case of a crisis, it will operate at will.
In the case of Okinawa, should the US ever get involved in a war with a nearby enemy—so far the US has used its Okinawa-based forces only against enemies that lack the capacity for long-range retaliation—we can be sure that the military will treat the entire archipelago, and not just certain designated areas, as its base. Of course, this could be a special characteristic of Okinawa, which the US military, and especially the Marine Corps, still partly views as its own turf, the spoils of an earlier war. Maybe in some other countries the military will be more respectful, even in crisis, of local sovereignty. But I wouldn't be too sure.
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[Editor's Note: This was posted on behalf of Doug Lummis, who is laid up in the hospital following an accident.]
I want to thank Major Hurt once again for his thoughtful and detailed response, and for his help in thickening the plot, as it were. And I apologize for my delay in preparing an answer.
Major Hurt's note contains an important correction. The right of the US Marines to occupy a university outside their base, set up an armed cordon around the accident site, keep out police and fire inspectors, and dismantle and haul away their wrecked helicopter isn't derived from the right inherent in an "instrument of sovereignty" after all. I was glad to hear that, as I had never heard of such a thing. Now he tells us that it is an extension of the right of diplomatic immunity held by embassies, consulates and other diplomatic missions. Of course, we all know that embassies and consulates are guarded by military units from their home countries. Major Hurt wants to persuade us that this diplomatic immunity applies to military equipment wrecked in foreign countries ? so long as the equipment is not there illegally. This is an interpretation that stretches the customary meaning of diplomatic immunity pretty thin. I'm beginning to understand why Major Hurt is careful to say that these are his personal opinions and not those of his employer, the US Army. I will return to this point.
Major Hurt says that we should look at the record of the press conference that was held at the US Embassy, Tokyo two weeks after the accident to get more accurate information. I have done so, and he is right, it is quite interesting.
For example, the anonymous military spokesperson said that on the day of the crash, the Futenma Airbase air traffic control tower received a distress call from the helicopter at 2:17 PM, that the helicopter crashed at 2:18 PM, and that at 2:19 PM the control tower received a call from another aircraft reporting seeing the helicopter crash and catch fire. Then the spokesperson said that the Marines on the base "scaled two fences to get to the crash site, and pulled the three crew members away from the wreckage before the aircraft burst into flames."
As it happens, I teach at that university, and so last week I climbed up to the top of the building where my class is and took at another look at Futenma Airbase outside the back window. Seen from the university, the airstrip runs left and right, the barracks and administration buildings are on the far side; on the near side are hangers, warehouses, machine shops, etc. Between that work area and the fence there's a thickly wooded area some 20 or 30 yards wide, then there's the high cyclone fence topped with barbed wire. Between the fence and the campus there's a narrow residential strip. After you enter the campus, there's maybe another 200 yards, going through or around buildings, to get to the crash site.
No Olympic runner is going to get through that obstacle course in the time the Embassy spokesperson allowed him.
The Okinawan conspiracy theorists, few but vociferous, believe that the helicopter crash was staged to show the Okinawan people how dangerous Futenma base is, and frighten them into giving up their opposition to the replacement base now being planned in Northern Okinawa. They would have it that there was a detachment of Marines poised in the woods just behind the fence, waiting for the helicopter to crash. And they use the Embassy spokesperson's timeline to support that speculation. I don't believe the conspiracy theory. What I do believe is that the spokesperson's impossibly contradictory claims only show that he or she didn't care much about facticity, and was willing to whatever was convenient.
There's another example. Reporters at the press conference asked the spokesperson why the other CH-53D helicopters, which had been grounded after the accident, were again allowed to fly so soon after. The spokesperson answered that the helicopters were allowed to fly only after that cause of the accident had been found, and it was determined that the trouble was "solely unique" to that one helicopter. It seems that a pin was missing from the tail apparatus, which made it impossible to steer. The reporters pressed the point. Was this some mechanic's error, or what? And how is it that the helicopter, which was on its way back from a training flight, got that far without the pin, and then suddenly went out of control? The answer: "[U]ntil that investigation is incomplete, I think it's premature to speculate what happened." "?I would defer to the investigators to come up with the reason, the cause, and the timeline for that missing piece."
So they didn't know yet what happened, which means that they couldn't possibly have known that the trouble was "solely unique" to that one helicopter, and therefore that it was irresponsible for them to end their grounding before that was known. (The conspiracy theorists believe that the helicopter was sabotaged in such a way that it could get off the ground, fly for a while, and only then malfunction. Again, I think this is nonsense, but you can see how the Embassy spokesperson's waffling responses would give them ammunition.)
But more important in the context of this discussion, the spokesperson did not agree with Major Hurt on diplomatic immunity. The spokesperson says that shortly after the accident Okinawa Police met with Marine Corps officials "to request access to the site to conduct a criminal investigation into the cause of the accident." Now, listen close here. The spokesperson continues: "In response, the Marine officials informed the OPP [Okinawan Prefectural Police] that the Marines would remain in charge of the site, in accordance with a long-standing agreement between the U.S government and the government of Japan, under SOFA" Got that? The Okinawan police "request", the Marines "inform". This means that the Marines have already taken exclusive control of the area, and consider themselves the supreme authority as to who can enter and for what reason.
And the legal basis for that authority? It's SOFA after all. But as I wrote in my original piece, and as I believe Major Hurt agrees, it can't be SOFA. The SOFA agreement contains no clause allowing such action.
Of course, no one is criticizing the Marines for piling over the fence, pulling their buddies out of the helicopter, pouring water on the fire, or even waving people away from the danger area. In a case like that, to Hell with the law, that's what you do. What is at issue is the cordoning off of the area by armed MPs, putting hands over the lenses of TV cameras (that captured on film) and keeping out the local police and fire departments?and the town mayor.
Major Hurt makes a thoughtful case as to why it is "unlikely" that the Marines there would have had guns. But, I'm sorry, I was there, and saw the guns. They were on the belts of MPs, who were in effect exercising police power over Japanese nationals outside the base?including, exercising police power over the Japanese police. This is a right that SOFA specifically does not give to the US military:
Article XVII, 16. Outside these facilities and areas [the bases], such military police shall be employed only subject to arrangements with the authorities of Japan and in liaison with those authorities and in so far as such employment is necessary to maintain discipline and order among the members of the United States armed forces.
Off the bases, the MPs can exercise police power over troublemaking GIs, and that's it.
I can accept that the Marines might have had the primary right/responsibility to dismantle the helicopter and clean up the mess. But why the guns? A wrecking company might have primary responsibility for wrecking a building, but that doesn't give them the right to keep out building, fire, and other safety inspectors, using guns. It was the job of the Okinawan police department to investigate the cause of the accident and make sure there was not criminal negligence involved. It was the job of the Ginowan City Fire Department to investigate the cause of the fire. These two perfectly natural investigations were prevented with the use of armed force. By what right? The US Embassy, Tokyo says, SOFA. But SOFA contains no such provision. Major Hurt says, the diplomatic immunity guaranteed under customary law. But I find this dubious. The Embassy spokesperson didn't offer this as a reason, and anyway, a military helicopter is not a diplomat.
The other question is, Why? Major Hurt wants us to believe that it was to keep out the Chinese spies who, he fears, have infiltrated the Ginowan police and fire departments (waiting all those years for a helicopter to crash, and praying that, when it does, it will be on a day they are on duty, and that it is their unit that will be sent?). I doubt it.
In my article I mentioned that many Okinawans believe it was because the helicopters contained depleted uranium. Major Hurt makes a thoughtful case as to why that would be "unlikely." Actually, given that helicopters often use superheavy depleted uranium as ballast, and that a training flight like this one where the helicopter is carrying just the crew would be just the occasion when such ballast would be needed, it doesn't seem unlikely at all.
But forget about unlikely. And forget about depleted uranium; I was wrong to suggest it. It was strontium 90. On September 2, 2004 the US Embassy, Tokyo, admitted that the CH-53D has in its propeller blades a safety device that contains strontium 90.
I think we can assume that this is what the Marines didn't want the local police and fire department to discover, and also why after they got the helicopter carried away they dug up the dirt under the crash site and carried that away too.
Douglas Lummis
[Editor's Note: This was posted on behalf of Doug Lummis, who is laid up in the hospital following an accident.]
I want to thank Major Hurt once again for his thoughtful and detailed response, and for his help in thickening the plot, as it were. And I apologize for my delay in preparing an answer.
Major Hurt's note contains an important correction. The right of the US Marines to occupy a university outside their base, set up an armed cordon around the accident site, keep out police and fire inspectors, and dismantle and haul away their wrecked helicopter isn't derived from the right inherent in an "instrument of sovereignty" after all. I was glad to hear that, as I had never heard of such a thing. Now he tells us that it is an extension of the right of diplomatic immunity held by embassies, consulates and other diplomatic missions. Of course, we all know that embassies and consulates are guarded by military units from their home countries. Major Hurt wants to persuade us that this diplomatic immunity applies to military equipment wrecked in foreign countries ? so long as the equipment is not there illegally. This is an interpretation that stretches the customary meaning of diplomatic immunity pretty thin. I'm beginning to understand why Major Hurt is careful to say that these are his personal opinions and not those of his employer, the US Army. I will return to this point.
Major Hurt says that we should look at the record of the press conference that was held at the US Embassy, Tokyo two weeks after the accident to get more accurate information. I have done so, and he is right, it is quite interesting.
For example, the anonymous military spokesperson said that on the day of the crash, the Futenma Airbase air traffic control tower received a distress call from the helicopter at 2:17 PM, that the helicopter crashed at 2:18 PM, and that at 2:19 PM the control tower received a call from another aircraft reporting seeing the helicopter crash and catch fire. Then the spokesperson said that the Marines on the base "scaled two fences to get to the crash site, and pulled the three crew members away from the wreckage before the aircraft burst into flames."
As it happens, I teach at that university, and so last week I climbed up to the top of the building where my class is and took at another look at Futenma Airbase outside the back window. Seen from the university, the airstrip runs left and right, the barracks and administration buildings are on the far side; on the near side are hangers, warehouses, machine shops, etc. Between that work area and the fence there's a thickly wooded area some 20 or 30 yards wide, then there's the high cyclone fence topped with barbed wire. Between the fence and the campus there's a narrow residential strip. After you enter the campus, there's maybe another 200 yards, going through or around buildings, to get to the crash site.
No Olympic runner is going to get through that obstacle course in the time the Embassy spokesperson allowed him.
The Okinawan conspiracy theorists, few but vociferous, believe that the helicopter crash was staged to show the Okinawan people how dangerous Futenma base is, and frighten them into giving up their opposition to the replacement base now being planned in Northern Okinawa. They would have it that there was a detachment of Marines poised in the woods just behind the fence, waiting for the helicopter to crash. And they use the Embassy spokesperson's timeline to support that speculation. I don't believe the conspiracy theory. What I do believe is that the spokesperson's impossibly contradictory claims only show that he or she didn't care much about facticity, and was willing to whatever was convenient.
There's another example. Reporters at the press conference asked the spokesperson why the other CH-53D helicopters, which had been grounded after the accident, were again allowed to fly so soon after. The spokesperson answered that the helicopters were allowed to fly only after that cause of the accident had been found, and it was determined that the trouble was "solely unique" to that one helicopter. It seems that a pin was missing from the tail apparatus, which made it impossible to steer. The reporters pressed the point. Was this some mechanic's error, or what? And how is it that the helicopter, which was on its way back from a training flight, got that far without the pin, and then suddenly went out of control? The answer: "[U]ntil that investigation is incomplete, I think it's premature to speculate what happened." "?I would defer to the investigators to come up with the reason, the cause, and the timeline for that missing piece."
So they didn't know yet what happened, which means that they couldn't possibly have known that the trouble was "solely unique" to that one helicopter, and therefore that it was irresponsible for them to end their grounding before that was known. (The conspiracy theorists believe that the helicopter was sabotaged in such a way that it could get off the ground, fly for a while, and only then malfunction. Again, I think this is nonsense, but you can see how the Embassy spokesperson's waffling responses would give them ammunition.)
But more important in the context of this discussion, the spokesperson did not agree with Major Hurt on diplomatic immunity. The spokesperson says that shortly after the accident Okinawa Police met with Marine Corps officials "to request access to the site to conduct a criminal investigation into the cause of the accident." Now, listen close here. The spokesperson continues: "In response, the Marine officials informed the OPP [Okinawan Prefectural Police] that the Marines would remain in charge of the site, in accordance with a long-standing agreement between the U.S government and the government of Japan, under SOFA" Got that? The Okinawan police "request", the Marines "inform". This means that the Marines have already taken exclusive control of the area, and consider themselves the supreme authority as to who can enter and for what reason.
And the legal basis for that authority? It's SOFA after all. But as I wrote in my original piece, and as I believe Major Hurt agrees, it can't be SOFA. The SOFA agreement contains no clause allowing such action.
Of course, no one is criticizing the Marines for piling over the fence, pulling their buddies out of the helicopter, pouring water on the fire, or even waving people away from the danger area. In a case like that, to Hell with the law, that's what you do. What is at issue is the cordoning off of the area by armed MPs, putting hands over the lenses of TV cameras (that captured on film) and keeping out the local police and fire departments?and the town mayor.
Major Hurt makes a thoughtful case as to why it is "unlikely" that the Marines there would have had guns. But, I'm sorry, I was there, and saw the guns. They were on the belts of MPs, who were in effect exercising police power over Japanese nationals outside the base?including, exercising police power over the Japanese police. This is a right that SOFA specifically does not give to the US military:
Article XVII, 16. Outside these facilities and areas [the bases], such military police shall be employed only subject to arrangements with the authorities of Japan and in liaison with those authorities and in so far as such employment is necessary to maintain discipline and order among the members of the United States armed forces.
Off the bases, the MPs can exercise police power over troublemaking GIs, and that's it.
I can accept that the Marines might have had the primary right/responsibility to dismantle the helicopter and clean up the mess. But why the guns? A wrecking company might have primary responsibility for wrecking a building, but that doesn't give them the right to keep out building, fire, and other safety inspectors, using guns. It was the job of the Okinawan police department to investigate the cause of the accident and make sure there was not criminal negligence involved. It was the job of the Ginowan City Fire Department to investigate the cause of the fire. These two perfectly natural investigations were prevented with the use of armed force. By what right? The US Embassy, Tokyo says, SOFA. But SOFA contains no such provision. Major Hurt says, the diplomatic immunity guaranteed under customary law. But I find this dubious. The Embassy spokesperson didn't offer this as a reason, and anyway, a military helicopter is not a diplomat.
The other question is, Why? Major Hurt wants us to believe that it was to keep out the Chinese spies who, he fears, have infiltrated the Ginowan police and fire departments (waiting all those years for a helicopter to crash, and praying that, when it does, it will be on a day they are on duty, and that it is their unit that will be sent?). I doubt it.
In my article I mentioned that many Okinawans believe it was because the helicopters contained depleted uranium. Major Hurt makes a thoughtful case as to why that would be "unlikely." Actually, given that helicopters often use superheavy depleted uranium as ballast, and that a training flight like this one where the helicopter is carrying just the crew would be just the occasion when such ballast would be needed, it doesn't seem unlikely at all.
But forget about unlikely. And forget about depleted uranium; I was wrong to suggest it. It was strontium 90. On September 2, 2004 the US Embassy, Tokyo, admitted that the CH-53D has in its propeller blades a safety device that contains strontium 90.
I think we can assume that this is what the Marines didn't want the local police and fire department to discover, and also why after they got the helicopter carried away they dug up the dirt under the crash site and carried that away too.
Douglas Lummis
AMERICA'S MALIGNANT NEO-MARXIST CANCERS
America suffers from Podhoretz Neo-Con and Leiberman Neo-Lib political cancers, in her executive, legislative, and judicial organs; and in Hollywood and the news media. Their subversion of foreign policy, Christian morality, nationalism, and traditional labor relations are notorious.
The 9/11 Terrorist Spectacle is one of the lesser symptoms caused by their hate provoking foreign military interventions. The un-patriotic and illegal Neo-Con Iraq War in support of Judeofascist Israel is costing over a trillion dollars and killing more than 4,000 young patriots; and doing worse damage to Iraq. The military intervention in Afghanistan is needlessly creating more suffering and hatred there.
Roe vs. Wade is sacrificially killing more than 45 million children by their mothers. Naturally, Neo-Marxists and their following of Christian heretics, not wanting to be stigmatized as morally depraved child killers, want every woman to sacrificially kill her children.
Money scammed and extorted from blue-collar rednecks and school teachers by the Neo- Marxist union lobbies, SEIU and NEA, is electing Congressional political prostitutes who enact legislation that subverts Christian culture, nationalistic unity, freedom from excessive governmental regulation, and capitalistic free enterprise.
These malignant cancers got started in America 60 years ago, when millions of pitiful defeated Marxist refugees from Nazi Germany and Marxist Soviet Union were trustingly accepted as immigrants by inexperienced America, after their rejection by experienced Europe. History suggests that their destruction will inevitably occur, with surprising speed. Russia was utterly devastated by Marxist cancers for two generations, and is very slowly recovering with the gradual introduction of democracy, freedom of speech, nationalism, and Christianity. But Germany under Hitler, and Spain under Franco, quickly destroyed their Marxist cancers, before they could seize control over vital governmental organs. Each healthy nation naturally has a unique defensive immune system for destroying malignant political cancers. England's immune system is so effective that Marxist cancers are unable to grow.
America's Constitution is quite extraordinary in that the supreme defensive governmental organ of the People is the grass-roots town militia. When executive, legislative, and judicial organs become tyrannical, militias spring-up over-night in every town to restore freedom and democracy, by guns and gallows revolutionary justice. America promises to put on the greatest revolutionary show on Earth, to the tune of "God Bless America". The militia man with Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Assembly, and the Right to Bear Arms go into action in a minute, clutching his Crucifix and gun. With Separation of Church and State, his pastor never tells him how to fight for his Country, and his general never tells him how to pray to his Christian God.
Staunch Protestant, Catholic, Mormon, Evangelical, and Fundamental crusaders in the Cultural War indirectly support the revolutionary militias, when they forcefully condemn the heresies and inter-denominational strife that is destroying America's Christian culture.
I have no bloody idea what that troll's diatribe above has to do with the topic, but he makes one of the best cases for gun control I've ever heard. Anyway, back to topic, I was stationed on Okinawa for a bit back in the early seventies, and it was pretty clear that we owned that island. A Buddhist priest summed up the whole situation for me one night when he told me that back in the time before the Americans, people wanted sons to work in the fields and take care of them in their old age. Then the Americans came, and now everyone wants daughters who can work in the bars and brothels. It's not just our disregard for other people's rights that's a problem; our very presence is poisonous.
Mr. Lummis makes some points here that I would like to address.
First and foremost, I agree that we have often poorly handled the legal proceedings against Marines and Soldiers on Okinawa that have committed crimes against Okinawans. Those Article 15 investigations (like a grand jury) and general courts-martial should have taken place on Okinawa and been very open and public to give Okinawans a view of how the wheels of military justice work. Let me assure you, they work well. The military does not want criminals in its ranks. It is bad for the good order and discipline of the force.
In fact, the SOFA provision excluding US troops from prosecution in Japan for crimes punishable in the USA (either under federal law or the Uniform Code of Military Justice, UCMJ for short), is not only common (found in Germany, Belgium, and any other nation where we have a SOFA), but is a common practice when there is a dispute of jurisdiction over troops based in the United States. I'll give you an example. When I was a Cavalry Troop Commander at Ft. Knox, KY, one of my Soldiers was confronted with evidence and confessed to molesting his daughter in Brownsville, TX. After talking with the Brownsville District Attorney's office, the decision was made to prosecute the Soldier at Ft. Knox under the provisions of UCMJ. He is now serving a 15-year sentence at Ft. Leavenworth's US Disciplinary Barracks and is a registered sex offender. He could have been tried in Texas, but the UCMJ was just as, if not more, effective.
Bottom line: The process is thorough and there are many safeguards against commanders influencing the process. While the US military has not done a good job making this process transparent to the Okinawans and Japanese, Americans can rest assured that guilty troops get convicted and serve sentences.
By the way, I can guarantee you there are similar provisions in SOFAs covering foreign Soldiers and Officers stationed full-time on US soil (like the German Air force Base outside Alomogordo, NM).
Now as for the helicopter crash, that is a different story and no SOFA is going to cover it. I agree that the Marines could have done a better job being more open and working with the local authorities. That would have gone a long way to smoothing this over. However, there are bigger factors at play here which prevented the Japanese government from lodging a formal protest and of which Mr. Lummis is most likely ignorant.
Military equipment, along with diplomatic equipment, is considered under international law as an "instrument of the sovereign." That means that it has, for lack of a better term, diplomatic immunity and falls solely under the authority of the owning government. This is why US forces protect US aircraft while on the ground in foreign lands and why US Marine Guards and Diplomatic Security officers can use deadly force to protect US Diplomatic Missions and their personnel abroad. Sending an armed Marine security detachment to guard the crash site was the US government protecting its interests. I can assure you that within minutes of the crash, the Deputy Chief of Mission at the US Embassy in Tokyo was notified of the situation and was already talking to the Japanese Government about it.
What you have to understand about instruments of the sovereign is that they can contain very sensitive information and technology that the owning governments want to keep out of foreign hands, allied or not. Given Okinawa's proximity to China and the high likelihood that Chinese intelligence services are very keen to find out what happens on the Okinawa base and what our military equipment can do (based on the amount of confirmed Chinese espionage directed against the US), there was a pressing national security need to secure the crash site to prevent US military technology from disappearing from the crash site, quite possibly into Chinese intelligence service hands. So, while the method was less than pleasant, the need was urgent.
Let me make this clear, though: I feel that American troops abroad need to be MUCH more culturally sensitive than they are. We have a long way to go. It is somewhat easier for troops stationed abroad in European nations, where there is much more cultural commonality. However, being stationed in the far east in the midst of a ancient and proud culture very different from ours makes it much easier to offend one's hosts. The military needs to work hard to educate troops on how to deal with the host culture.
Bottom line: It was meet and right of the US forces to secure the crash site, excluding all non-military from the site. It was not arrogance or a military incursion. It was a matter of national security. However, they should have done a better job of working with the local authorities.
I am a US Army Officer and the views I expressed here are my own. They do not reflect official policy or position of the US Army.
More than 100,000 marched in the Swedish city of Malmoe on Saturday in a demonstration against the excesses of globalisation, organised as part of the European Social Forum being held there.
The marchers, many carrying banners, set off from the suburb of Rosengaard at 2:00 pm (1300 GMT) accompanied by several marching bands, in what was one of the biggest organised in Sweden.
"We are all here because we have a common message," Thor Rutgersson, a 25-year-old teacher told AFP.
"We want better conditions for workers, for students and more cooperation to fight poverty in Europe," he added.
The march included delegations from all over Europe, including trade unionists and students.
"It is important that the countries from eastern Europe are here today," said Piotr Ostrowsky of the Polish confederation of trade unions, the OPZZ.
IF OBAMA WAS SMART HE WOULD PICK HILLARY FOR VP.
HE WAS STUPID TO DO WHAT HE DID.
I WOULD NEVER VOTE FOR A STUPID MAN
I want to thank Maj. Nathan C. Hurt for his thoughtful and informative response to my article "Pentagon Promise-breakers." In it he makes two main points. 1) Don't worry, the military is by no means lax in punishing lawbreakers in its midst, though it is not always good at making this process transparent to people in the countries hosting its bases. 2) Military equipment is considered an "instrument of the sovereign" under international law, so the Marines from Futenma Airbase were legally justified in using (threat of) deadly force to keep people away from their helicopter that crashed inside Okinawa International University.
As to the first, I do know that the military is tough on lawbreakers in certain cases - much tougher sometimes than most civilian authorities. When I was in the Marines I (unsuccessfully) defended a kid who got six months in the brig for falling asleep on watch - something that wouldn't happen, say, to a night watchman who fell asleep on duty. I remember also reading in the casebooks about a Captain who was convicted of sodomy and imprisoned for having (consentual) oral sex with his wife (somebody peeked). But cases like this, and the Texas case mentioned by Maj. Hurt, do nothing to assuage the doubts that military justice may be a whole lot more lenient when the victim is a foreigner - say, an Okinawan woman. The "double standard" is hardly a novel idea in US justice.
Concerning the concept "instrument of the sovereign", Maj. Hurt is quite correct in his guess that this is something I did not know about. I am not alone in this: the Okinawan people do not know about it, Mayor Yoichi Iha of Ginowan City (where the crash occured) doesn't know about it (he has a different interpretation) and apparently the then US Consul General didn't know about it - or if he did, I am not aware that he mentioned it. (Maybe that's why he got replaced.) And I have to say that it is still something I do not "know" about, but I am eager to learn, and I hope Maj. Hurt will be kind enough to answer a few questions.
At the end of his comment, Maj. Hurt says that the views expressed in it are his own, and not necessarily those of the US Army. Fine, but does that mean that the concept of "instrument of the Sovereign" his his own opinion or interpretation, or is it really an accepted principle in international law? If the latter, is this customary law, or is it established in an international treaty? If there is such a treaty, what is its name? Does it guarantee this right - the right to use deadly force to protect military equipment in foreign countries - to all states, or only to some? If a Mexican warplane crashed across the border in Texas, would the Mexican army have the legal right to surround it with armed troops and kick out the Texas police and fire department? A week or so ago a Japanese Self Defense Force fighter plane crash landed inside Kadena Airbase; would the SDF have had the right to enter the base and surround it with an armed cordon if necessary? US military trucks are routinely seen barreling up and down Okinawa's civilian highways; is each of these a carrier of state sovereignty, immune to the authority of the Okinawan highway patrol? If so, these are all things the Okinawan (and other people hosting US bases) ought to know about; as Maj. Hurt says, these matters should be made as transparent as possible. So I would appreciate any information that Maj. Hurt, or any other readers who are informed on these matters, could give me.
Incidentally, Maj. Hurt suggests that probably the reason the Marines kept everyone away from the wrecked helicopter was to keep away Chinese spies. But it is a litte hard to imagine Chinese spies infiltrating the Ginowan City police and fire department. The explanation believed by most Okinawans is more plausible: that the helicopter in question contained parts made of depleted uranium, and the Marines wanted to conceal that fact from the Okinawan authorities and public.
C. Douglas Lummis
Doug, the helicopter had Chinese parts that failed. You know that they produce junk, but they are cheap, and the manufacturers use cheap parts to make a big profit. This attitude provides American business. Good luck.
Thank you, Mr. Lummis, for your thought-provoking response to my post. Sorry it took me a couple of days to respond.
I cannot truthfully claim that either the UCMJ or the administration of it are perfect. The same can be said for any legal system in the world. There are various and myriad factors at play. When you add international incidents into the mix, it is very understandable that the wrong perceptions will be created on one side or the other. People from different cultures and legal traditions will naturally have different expectations of legal proceedings. Additionally, in a case where a major crime is committed, such as a rape or murder, people have emotional investment in the verdict and someone will always be disappointed and possibly bitter at the outcome of the proceedings.
I have done a little research, though (asked a retired Army JAG officer), and have learned that in most cases, American service members are generally tried on the post/base nearest site of the crime. Generally, this facilitates access to evidence, witnesses, and makes giving testimony easier. Since I do not know the details of the case(s) which Mr. Lummis cited, so I cannot comment specifically on them. However, it does seem counter-intuitive to move the troops to another post or base in the lead-up to the trial, unless there is no way to keep them in pre-trial confinement at their present duty station. However, that is just a guess. There might be a few isolated cases where unscrupulous commanders sent service members back stateside to avoid local prosecution. However, military lawyers will generally stop this if they catch wind of it.
In fact, though, it is pretty hard to quickly "spirit" a service member back to the states, as ending an overseas tour prior to the prescribed tour length (generally 12, 24, or 36 months and governed by joint regulation and tied to where the service member is stationed) requires some waivers with good reasons. At any step along the way, a commander, assignments officer/NCO, or someone else in the process can bring the move to a screeching halt. Additionally, there are issues like shipment of household goods and clearing the base to consider. Getting this done takes a considerable amount of time, which allows the situation to develop on the host nation side.
I would also like to correct a misstatement I made earlier. The military equivalent of a grand jury investigation is an Article 31 investigation. An Article 15 proceeding is how the military administers non-judicial punishment.
I have also done some more research into the crash. I invite Mr. Lummis and anyone else interested to read the account of it on the US Embassy Tokyo website (http://tokyo.usembassy.gov/e/p/tp-20040827-61.html). This background briefing provided a somewhat different picture of the incident than the one Mr. Lummis presented. As we all know, history is often a matter of perspective. I encourage you to look at this from the perspective provided by the link I placed above. It does recount by timeline what happened when and also talks about what kind of presence the Okinawan Prefecture Police played in securing the crash site, as well as mentioning that there are mechanisms in place to ensure cooperation between the Marines and local law enforcement. It also describes why the Marines scaled the fence: to save the crew and evacuate people from the building that it hit.
This version is, in all probability, closest to the truth, and two things indicate this to me. The first indicator is that the Marines who scaled the fence were credited with pulling the three crew members from the wreck before it caught fire, thereby saving their lives. (It also credits them with helping to evacuate- not occupy- the building the helicopter struck.) The other indicator that makes me think that this version of the Marines scaling the fence is the truth is that Marines would not have weapons or ammunition unless they were either on a rifle range, on a military operation in a war zone, or serving on duty as a military policeman (or in some other base security function where they would be authorized to carry a weapon and ammo). During normal duty days, the weapons are locked in the arms rooms and the ammunition is secured in the ammunition storage point. There are formal procedures required to get either from these storage areas and both are tightly controlled when they are issued. These Marines were most likely doing their normal daily duties, were unarmed, saw the helicopter go down, and did what any Marine would do for another Marine in danger: they went to help as quickly as they could. The armed forces to secure the crash site most likely arrived later.
I cannot comment on the Mayor of Ginowan City or the US Consul General's ignorance of responsibilities/actions/etc. However, I can tell you that the account provided by the embassy states that the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs was notified within 42 minutes of the crash. Having a little background in embassy work, I speculate that the notification probably went up Marine Corps chain of command reporting channels and then to the Defense Attaché Office in Tokyo, which, in turn, took it to the Deputy Chief of Mission. The DCM probably directed someone to notify Washington and then went to talk to the Japanese government. Notice that the US Consul General was not in that chain of reporting. The Consulate, while a satellite of the embassy, does not have any military staff and does not perform the strategic engagement that the Embassy does.
Thanks to my acquaintance (the retired JAG Officer), I have been slightly corrected in the concept of the "instrument of the sovereign." The concept is more accurately termed "law of the flag." It is a long-standing part of customary international law and its origins are primarily naval and precede the long-term basing of US Soldiers overseas, but may have some application on land as well.
The hypothetical situation of a Mexican aircraft crashing in the US, as Mr. Lummis framed it, would not fall under this case. It would be considered an incursion, whether it was intentional or not. Aircraft must have a clearance to enter the airspace of another country. For civilian aircraft, this is generally governed by treaties, bilateral agreements, and civilian agencies. For military aircraft, the Defense Attaché Office obtains a diplomatic flight clearance for the aircraft to enter the foreign country's airspace. So, unless the aircraft had a fight clearance, it would be considered an incursion and the US Government would have a right to secure and search the site. Were the aircraft to have a diplomatic flight clearance, under law of the flag, the Mexican government would retain jurisdiction. There might be a need for the US government to secure the site, as well as put out the fire, until the Mexicans could get there, but, since the aircraft was afforded a diplomatic clearance, it would remain Mexican jurisdiction. Most likely, the security of the site would be a joint US-Mexican operation, with us assisting the Mexicans while they do what they need to do at the crash site. This would be similar to how the US Embassy Tokyo website described the security of the Okinawa crash site. This is my understanding of law of the flag based on my own limited experience working in a US Embassy. Please keep in mind that I am not a lawyer and this is just how I understand it works.
I do not know about the Japanese SDF fighter that crash landed at Kadena Air Base. Again, I am not a lawyer and am not qualified to give an opinion here.
[Lummis] "US military trucks are routinely seen barreling up and down Okinawa's civilian highways; is each of these a carrier of state sovereignty, immune to the authority of the Okinawan highway patrol?"
Article XVI of the SOFA states that US service members, their dependents, etc. are bound to observe the laws of Japan. Generally, there is a liaison relationship between host nation police and US forces' military police to ensure US troops obey the laws. I do not know how how it works on the ground there, so I cannot comment. However, I do know that there are cooperation structures are in place and the troops are obligated to follow local laws.
[Lummis] "Incidentally, Maj. Hurt suggests that probably the reason the Marines kept everyone away from the wrecked helicopter was to keep away Chinese spies. But it is a little hard to imagine Chinese spies infiltrating the Ginowan City police and fire department."
Perhaps not so much the police and fire departments, but it is possible that some police are paid informants. I am not claiming that as a fact. I am just thinking in possibilities here. Intelligence services look for biases, frustrations, and other attributes to exploit in people. A police officer who wants the Americans gone would be a potential target for an intelligence service. A more plausible espionage threat would be the Chinese students attending Okinawa International University (OIU website lists Chinese among nationalities of international students). Whether they are active intelligence collective agents or not, chances are they are at the very least being debriefed by Chinese intelligence when they get back to China. Besides, what better cover for a Chinese intelligence agent who wants to spy on US military activities close to China than to be a student next door to a Marine Corps Air Station?
[Lummis] "The explanation believed by most Okinawans is more plausible: that the helicopter in question contained parts made of depleted uranium, and the Marines wanted to conceal that fact from the Okinawan authorities and public."
I find this highly implausible. The helicopter that crashed was a CH-53. "CH" means "Cargo Helicopter." It is a utility transport. It is not an attack helicopter. It is only lightly armed for self defense. Aircraft need to be as light as possible and still meet the demands of the missions for which they were designed. The heavier an aircraft is, the harder it is to get airborne, control while airborne, and keep airborne. Because helicopters have a relatively limited amount of lift available to them through their rotors, lightness is even more of an imperative than for fixed-wing jet-powered aircraft. For this reason, helicopters are built mainly out of aluminum and titanium alloys because they are light, flexible, and strong. Depleted uranium is heavy, dense, and hard. It is counter-intuitive to what one would use to build an aircraft. I even asked an acquaintance of mine who is an Army test pilot and he confirmed to me that there is no depleted uranium in a CH-53's airframe.
Thank you for listening to my point of view. I hope I answered most, if not all, of your questions. I find the dialog here to be interesting and civil. I appreciate that. Again, please remember that while I am an Army Officer, I am merely expressing my personal opinion. I do not speak for the Army.
From the editor of this Mission Creep package: Doug Lummis contacted me from the hospital to say he's been in a bad accident, but wanted readers to know that he plans to continue this discussion on SOFAs and Okinawa, and respond to Major Hurt's latest posting as soon as he's able.
[Editor's Note: This was posted on behalf of Doug Lummis, who is laid up in the hospital following an accident.]
I want to thank Major Hurt once again for his thoughtful and detailed response, and for his help in thickening the plot, as it were. And I apologize for my delay in preparing an answer.
Major Hurt's note contains an important correction. The right of the US Marines to occupy a university outside their base, set up an armed cordon around the accident site, keep out police and fire inspectors, and dismantle and haul away their wrecked helicopter isn't derived from the right inherent in an "instrument of sovereignty" after all. I was glad to hear that, as I had never heard of such a thing. Now he tells us that it is an extension of the right of diplomatic immunity held by embassies, consulates and other diplomatic missions. Of course, we all know that embassies and consulates are guarded by military units from their home countries. Major Hurt wants to persuade us that this diplomatic immunity applies to military equipment wrecked in foreign countries so long as the equipment is not there illegally. This is an interpretation that stretches the customary meaning of diplomatic immunity pretty thin. I'm beginning to understand why Major Hurt is careful to say that these are his personal opinions and not those of his employer, the US Army. I will return to this point.
Major Hurt says that we should look at the record of the press conference that was held at the US Embassy, Tokyo two weeks after the accident to get more accurate information. I have done so, and he is right, it is quite interesting.
For example, the anonymous military spokesperson said that on the day of the crash, the Futenma Airbase air traffic control tower received a distress call from the helicopter at 2:17 PM, that the helicopter crashed at 2:18 PM, and that at 2:19 PM the control tower received a call from another aircraft reporting seeing the helicopter crash and catch fire. Then the spokesperson said that the Marines on the base "scaled two fences to get to the crash site, and pulled the three crew members away from the wreckage before the aircraft burst into flames."
As it happens, I teach at that university, and so last week I climbed up to the top of the building where my class is and took at another look at Futenma Airbase outside the back window. Seen from the university, the airstrip runs left and right, the barracks and administration buildings are on the far side; on the near side are hangers, warehouses, machine shops, etc. Between that work area and the fence there's a thickly wooded area some 20 or 30 yards wide, then there's the high cyclone fence topped with barbed wire. Between the fence and the campus there's a narrow residential strip. After you enter the campus, there's maybe another 200 yards, going through or around buildings, to get to the crash site.
No Olympic runner is going to get through that obstacle course in the time the Embassy spokesperson allowed him.
The Okinawan conspiracy theorists, few but vociferous, believe that the helicopter crash was staged to show the Okinawan people how dangerous Futenma base is, and frighten them into giving up their opposition to the replacement base now being planned in Northern Okinawa. They would have it that there was a detachment of Marines poised in the woods just behind the fence, waiting for the helicopter to crash. And they use the Embassy spokesperson's timeline to support that speculation. I don't believe the conspiracy theory. What I do believe is that the spokesperson's impossibly contradictory claims only show that he or she didn't care much about facticity, and was willing to whatever was convenient.
There's another example. Reporters at the press conference asked the spokesperson why the other CH-53D helicopters, which had been grounded after the accident, were again allowed to fly so soon after. The spokesperson answered that the helicopters were allowed to fly only after that cause of the accident had been found, and it was determined that the trouble was "solely unique" to that one helicopter. It seems that a pin was missing from the tail apparatus, which made it impossible to steer. The reporters pressed the point. Was this some mechanic's error, or what? And how is it that the helicopter, which was on its way back from a training flight, got that far without the pin, and then suddenly went out of control? The answer: "[U]ntil that investigation is incomplete, I think it's premature to speculate what happened." " I would defer to the investigators to come up with the reason, the cause, and the timeline for that missing piece."
So they didn't know yet what happened, which means that they couldn't possibly have known that the trouble was "solely unique" to that one helicopter, and therefore that it was irresponsible for them to end their grounding before that was known. (The conspiracy theorists believe that the helicopter was sabotaged in such a way that it could get off the ground, fly for a while, and only then malfunction. Again, I think this is nonsense, but you can see how the Embassy spokesperson's waffling responses would give them ammunition.)
But more important in the context of this discussion, the spokesperson did not agree with Major Hurt on diplomatic immunity. The spokesperson says that shortly after the accident Okinawa Police met with Marine Corps officials "to request access to the site to conduct a criminal investigation into the cause of the accident." Now, listen close here. The spokesperson continues: "In response, the Marine officials informed the OPP [Okinawan Prefectural Police] that the Marines would remain in charge of the site, in accordance with a long-standing agreement between the U.S government and the government of Japan, under SOFA" Got that? The Okinawan police "request", the Marines "inform". This means that the Marines have already taken exclusive control of the area, and consider themselves the supreme authority as to who can enter and for what reason.
And the legal basis for that authority? It's SOFA after all. But as I wrote in my original piece, and as I believe Major Hurt agrees, it can't be SOFA. The SOFA agreement contains no clause allowing such action.
Of course, no one is criticizing the Marines for piling over the fence, pulling their buddies out of the helicopter, pouring water on the fire, or even waving people away from the danger area. In a case like that, to Hell with the law, that's what you do. What is at issue is the cordoning off of the area by armed MPs, putting hands over the lenses of TV cameras (that captured on film) and keeping out the local police and fire departmentsand the town mayor.
Major Hurt makes a thoughtful case as to why it is "unlikely" that the Marines there would have had guns. But, I'm sorry, I was there, and saw the guns. They were on the belts of MPs, who were in effect exercising police power over Japanese nationals outside the baseincluding, exercising police power over the Japanese police. This is a right that SOFA specifically does not give to the US military:
Article XVII, 16. Outside these facilities and areas [the bases], such military police shall be employed only subject to arrangements with the authorities of Japan and in liaison with those authorities and in so far as such employment is necessary to maintain discipline and order among the members of the United States armed forces.
Off the bases, the MPs can exercise police power over troublemaking GIs, and that's it.
I can accept that the Marines might have had the primary right/responsibility to dismantle the helicopter and clean up the mess. But why the guns? A wrecking company might have primary responsibility for wrecking a building, but that doesn't give them the right to keep out building, fire, and other safety inspectors, using guns. It was the job of the Okinawan police department to investigate the cause of the accident and make sure there was not criminal negligence involved. It was the job of the Ginowan City Fire Department to investigate the cause of the fire. These two perfectly natural investigations were prevented with the use of armed force. By what right? The US Embassy, Tokyo says, SOFA. But SOFA contains no such provision. Major Hurt says, the diplomatic immunity guaranteed under customary law. But I find this dubious. The Embassy spokesperson didn't offer this as a reason, and anyway, a military helicopter is not a diplomat.
The other question is, Why? Major Hurt wants us to believe that it was to keep out the Chinese spies who, he fears, have infiltrated the Ginowan police and fire departments (waiting all those years for a helicopter to crash, and praying that, when it does, it will be on a day they are on duty, and that it is their unit that will be sent?). I doubt it.
In my article I mentioned that many Okinawans believe it was because the helicopters contained depleted uranium. Major Hurt makes a thoughtful case as to why that would be "unlikely." Actually, given that helicopters often use superheavy depleted uranium as ballast, and that a training flight like this one where the helicopter is carrying just the crew would be just the occasion when such ballast would be needed, it doesn't seem unlikely at all.
But forget about unlikely. And forget about depleted uranium; I was wrong to suggest it. It was strontium 90. On September 2, 2004 the US Embassy, Tokyo, admitted that the CH-53D has in its propeller blades a safety device that contains strontium 90.
I think we can assume that this is what the Marines didn't want the local police and fire department to discover, and also why after they got the helicopter carried away they dug up the dirt under the crash site and carried that away too.
Douglas Lummis