Officials call U.S.-funded and U.S.-operated installations host-country bases

Evidence

Military planners generally design medium-sized bases like Soto Cano and others like it in Singapore, Djibouti, and Romania to be readily expandable. This allows short-term deployments of U.S. forces to visit for training purposes and operations of various kinds and also permits for more permanent construction of the kind that Soto Cano saw during the 1980s and is seeing today. All the while, officials at “forward operating sites” often repeat the mantra that their U.S.-funded, U.S.-operated facilities are not U.S. military bases at all. “This is their base,” Sergeant Edwards emphasized to me before the end of my visit to Soto Cano. “Sometimes we forget that. But we’re here to help them.” — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 145

Categorization

• XREF: The ‘this is their base’ cover for effectively U.S. facilities parallels other cases where nominal ownership masks real control.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 145