Dispute resolution finally allows runway construction at U.S. base to begin
BY JULIAN RYALL Japan Correspondent
TOKYO, Japan — The Japanese government has taken over decision-making linked to the development of the U.S. Marine Corps base at Henoko, in north-east Okinawa, after the prefectural governor defied a series of court orders to approve new construction work at the site. The decision is the first time the Japanese government has applied an execution by proxy legal mechanism.
SaitoLand minister Tetsuo Saito on Dec. 28 formally approved alterations to the design of the site at Camp Schwab after four years of additional delays to a project that was originally agreed in a pact between Washington and Tokyo in 2006 — with a provisional completion date of 2014.
With the central government removing the Okinawa government from the decision-making process, there are hopes that the reorganization of some of the 47,000 U.S. military personnel in Japan can finally go ahead, including the delayed transfer of U.S. Marines to Guam.
The original plan for the development of Camp Schwab called for the reclamation of land off the existing base and the construction of two runways in a V configuration. The site was intended to take on the functions of the existing U.S. Marine Corps facility at Futenma Air Station, which is in central Okinawa and has been described as the most dangerous airfield in the world due to the urban sprawl that has seen the Japanese community build right up to the perimeter fence.
That work was delayed by repeated appeals by the local government and environmental groups, which claimed the waters off the base were grazing grounds for critically endangered dugongs.
Nevertheless, landfill work began in 2018 on the southern portion of the offshore site.
Prefectural elections in September 2018 returned Denny Tamaki as governor, the half-US-half-Japanese politician running on a platform of resisting the Camp Schwab project. That message seemed to resonate with local people, who gave Tamaki an 80,000 majority.
Reclamation work hit a significant snag in 2019 when the government admitted that an initial survey that indicated the seabed at the northern end of the planned runways was far less firm that originally believed — one study said it was “as soft as mayonnaise” — and that construction work would be far more complicated, time-consuming, and expensive.
New plans drawn up by engineers require 71,000 pilings being driven into the seabed to serve as firm foundations for the area of Oura Bay that is due to be reclaimed. One estimate suggests the work will take another 12 years to complete.
The Japanese government has expressed its satisfaction at the latest maneuvering, which has stripped Tamaki of the ability to further delay the project, with Defense Minister Minoru Kihara telling reporters at the ministry in Tokyo on Dec. 28, “This is a milestone toward the full-scale return of Futenma Air Station.”
Three years and eight months after the central government filed a request with the prefectural authorities for the additional work to be carried out, work can now start.
Camp Schwab will be the site of two runways for U.S. Marine use. Photo courtesy of WikipediaWork started Jan. 10 on the construction of a sea wall that will act as the perimeter of the area to be reclaimed, after steel pipes are driven into the seabed to a depth of around 70 meters, work can begin with dumping rocks and soil into the enclosed area. Experts said the approach has been used successfully in Japan in the past, including in the construction of an island off Osaka for Kansai International Airport.
The Camp Schwab project is considered more challenging than others, however, due to the depth of the water and the thick layers of sand and sediment. Building the sea wall and driving the pilings into the seabed alone is expected to take more than four years. Anticipating that the work may again require an alteration to the existing plans, the government has acted to take away the prefecture’s ability to further delay the project.
Costs have also risen, the government has admitted, with the initial estimate of Y350 billion ($2.48 billion) eclipsed by the new figure of Y930 billion ($6.59 billion) due to the delays and increasing costs of materials.
Still, Tamaki appears not to have completely given up all hope of halting the project.
The prefecture’s final legal tactic was defeated in the Supreme Court in September, with Tamaki ordered to grant approval for the work to go ahead. The governor still resisted and on Dec. 20 the Naha branch of the Fukuoka High Court again ordered him to approve the application or the execution by proxy mechanism would be applied and the issue would be passed to the national government to act upon.
On Dec. 25, Tamaki filed a new appeal against the high court’s order, once again returning the issue to the Supreme Court. Given that the highest court in the land has already sided with the national government in an earlier hearing, the prefecture’s maneuver appears to be futile.
With local resistance ended, it is just a matter of time before the construction work is resumed, the facility is completed and the full-scale reallocation of troops from Okinawa to Guam and other parts of the Indo-Pacific region can go full-steam ahead. mbj
