Okinawa bases keep Japan locked in as a U.S. client state

Evidence

More broadly, U.S. officials see removing bases and troops from Okinawa as weakening the U.S.-Japanese military alliance, whereas successive presidential administrations have been trying to deepen bilateral military cooperation. Some suggest that U.S. officials have been trying to turn Japan into something of the “Great Britain of Asia”—and that many Japanese officials are more than happy to assume that role, given the power and financial benefits it has brought Britain. U.S. officials would like to use Japan’s military as a subordinate force within a global military architecture that’s increasingly relying on the incorporation of allied armies into a U.S.-controlled system. In the process, U.S. leaders hope to keep Japan locked into its position as a Cold War–era client state during a new era when the rationale for maintaining Cold War alliances has disappeared, when Japan could potentially assert more independence, and when U.S. political, economic, and military control in East Asia is being challenged by China and other rising powers. Holding on to bases in Okinawa becomes a way to try to hold on to a Japanese puppet and, with it, U.S. political-economic dominance. — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 887

Categorization

• SEED: The ‘Great Britain of Asia’ framing is a strong hook for an article on post-Cold War alliance architecture
• XREF: Directly serves the reader’s stated goal: how bases harm America and the world, here by perpetuating client-state subordination