Okinawa is a place that everyone is familiar with, and some people may say that this is not a place name in Japan, but in fact, it was also called Ryukyu a long time ago.
Ryukyu has been a Chinese territory since ancient times, but it was occupied by Japanese forces in the last years of the Qing Dynasty. Later, it was ruled by the U.S. military, and to this day, many people in the four islands of Japan think that Okinawans are just foreigners who speak Japanese.
There is also a large percentage of Okinawans who do not consider themselves Japanese. Even they want Okinawa to become independent and separate from Japan. And the root cause of all this is probably a series of actions taken by the Japanese government, which have completely disappointed the Okinawans.
According to historical records, before the Japanese occupied Okinawa, most of the citizens of the Ryukyu Kingdom came from Fujian, Zhejiang, and Taiwan. They wear Hanfu and speak Chinese, which is no different from their mainland compatriots.
When the Battle of Okinawa broke out in 1945, Japan was already in decline, but it still wanted to do its best to stop the American attack, so the Japanese government deployed all its remaining troops to Okinawa.
However, the difference in strength between the two sides was too great, the British and American allies first sent bombers to carry out carpet bombing, and then strategic ships approached Okinawa, first solved the Japanese navy, and then killed the Japanese air force that came to attack.
Although the Japanese army suffered heavy losses, it still did not give up resistance, but used its familiarity with the terrain on the island to engage in brutal positional warfare with the American and British forces.
The two sides suffered heavy losses, and the corpses of soldiers on both sides could be seen everywhere on the island, and everyone must know that once the US military suffered heavy casualties, the presidential throne would not be so secure.
Therefore, in order to reduce casualties, the US military slowed down the attack and arranged for the army to rotate and rest, and it is said that sometimes the US army only advanced a few meters after a day of fierce fighting.
In May 1945, Germany announced its surrender, which was too great a blow to Japan. In addition, the US military has transferred a large number of new weapons, and now the Japanese army can no longer bear it, and it is constantly shrinking the defensive line, and it is seen that Okinawa is about to be lost.
By the end of June, the three-month war had finally come to an end, with 75,000 casualties among the American and British allies, and almost all but 10,000 Japanese prisoners were killed.
And the most hurt by this war were not the US-British forces or the Japanese army, but the local residents of the small island of Okinawa.
As the aggressor, the Anglo-American coalition will naturally not be polite to kill the Okinawans. The Japanese army, as its own people, should do its best to protect the people of Okinawa. If you think so, you can only say that you are too kind.
In fact, however, far more Okinawans died at the hands of the Japanese than at the hands of the British and American forces.
Although the Japanese government has ruled Okinawa for more than half a century, it has never treated the people of Okinawa as its own. The first thing the Japanese did when they arrived on Okinawa was to deal with the unrest, that is, to purge the Okinawans of discontent with the Japanese government.
After the battle began, the Okinawans became cannon fodder for the Japanese army, and the dangerous tasks were carried out by the Okinawans, and even if the Okinawans did exactly that, they could not escape a massacre when the Japanese retreated.
When Okinawa was about to fall to the entire island, the Japanese army went so far as to frantically demand that all Okinawans be martyred, and preached everywhere that if they fell into the hands of the US military, they would be subjected to inhuman torture, and that life would be worse than death at that time.
For those Okinawans who were determined to never commit suicide, the Japanese army never hesitated to give them a ride. In addition, the Japanese army would also rob the Okinawans of food and medicine, and force civilians to stop the bullets in front of the position. Even after the complete loss of Okinawa, some Japanese soldiers who slipped through the net continued to massacre innocent civilians.
After the war, Japanese officials said that a total of 100,000 Okinawans died in this battle, but what was the actual situation? The Okinawan people also have a set of figures, let's find out.
There were more than 400,000 indigenous people in Okinawa before the battle, and less than 200,000 survived the war. It is true that some of them must have died in the artillery fire of the American army, but the number of people killed in the massacre by the Japanese army is probably far more than 100,000.
The crimes committed by these Japanese militarists in Okinawa are too numerous to mention, and this is the fundamental reason why some Okinawans still hate the Japanese government.
Some people may not believe that any army can slaughter the people in their own territory. If you think so, I recommend that you visit the Okinawa Prefectural Museum, where there is still a sculpture of Japanese soldiers forcing the people of Okinawa to commit suicide, with the words "Japanese soldiers massacred civilians, forced them to kill each other, and then committed suicide".
After the end of the Pacific War, Okinawa was occupied by the U.S. military, so how did these Americans, who claimed to be gentlemen and opened their mouths to advocate human rights, treat the Okinawans?
First of all, it is undeniable that in order to consolidate the dominant position of the United States in Okinawa, the U.S. government has indeed formulated many policies to promote the local economic development, and in order to quickly restore the Okinawa economy to the pre-war level, the U.S. government has given Okinawa a lot of economic assistance.
In addition, it has helped the local government to build schools and increase public facilities, and these actions of the United States have indeed played a certain positive role in Okinawa's economic development, but these are not enough to cover up the heavy blood debts committed by the US garrison to the local residents.
During the Pacific War, many American troops died at the hands of the Japanese army, and when did the United States suffer such a big loss? However, Japan had already announced its surrender and could no longer attack the Japanese mainland, so the American GIs vented all their hatred for the Japanese on the Okinawans, who were Japanese in their eyes anyway.
As a result, the Okinawans tragedy, they fell from the 10th floor of hell to the 11th floor of hell. In fact, before the start of the Pacific War, although the Japanese looked down on the Okinawans, they still had at least respect. The Americans, on the other hand, regard Okinawa as their own carnival paradise, and the Okinawans, especially the Okinawan women, are slaves in their eyes.
When U.S. troops stationed in Okinawa see a lone woman, they will come up to them and talk to them, and sometimes they will even force them to have sex with them. Even at home, women in Okinawa are not safe, and American GIs are not a barrier to their bestiality when they want to vent their bestial desires.
There was once a high school girl who was sexually assaulted by several American soldiers while washing clothes at home, and gave birth to two children, who should have been as beautiful as flowers at an age that suffered such atrocities, and sadly, the American GIs who committed crimes were not punished at all.
According to statistics, American GIs committed no less than 300 sexual assaults in Okinawa, and the youngest victim was a 9-month-old baby girl, who died shortly after the incident.
Even if these American soldiers are arrested by the local police, they do not have the power to try American citizens, and they must be extradited back to the United States to face trial.
However, the U.S. devastation of Okinawa was far more than that, for example, Okinawans at that time had to obtain a passport issued by the U.S. if they wanted to go to Japan, and in addition to strictly controlling Okinawa's foreign trade and restricting Okinawa's industrial development.
Okinawans have long hated American soldiers, and the frequent expropriation of land by the U.S. military has seriously affected the interests of the largest group in the region, the peasants, and has led to a large-scale anti-al-Qaeda movement.
The Okinawans had always wanted to move the U.S. military bases out of Okinawa until June 1971, when Japan and the United States signed the Okinawa Return Agreement, which officially returned the U.S. government to Japan.
Some people may ask: Did the US military give Okinawa away in this way after all great painstaking efforts? Of course, the matter is not so simple, and the United States' willingness to return Okinawa to Japan has also been repeatedly considered.
First, the United States was deeply involved in the Vietnam War at that time, and its control over Okinawa became more and more inadequate. In addition, since Okinawa is an important US air base in Southeast Asia, from which all planes involved in the Vietnam War took off, its military operations have caused trouble to the local population, and the sentiment of Okinawans towards the United States is growing day by day.
Second, aid to Okinawa consumes a lot of money from the United States, and the cost of completely controlling Okinawa is too high, and some of the gains outweigh the losses.
Third, Japan has become an ally of the United States, and many US military bases have been built on the Japanese mainland, so there is no need to offend Japan on the Okinawa issue, and if it is returned, it can still betray the Japanese government.
When they first heard that Okinawa was about to return to Japan, the Okinawans were hopeful, and they felt that their hard days were finally over, and that these hateful Americans were finally going to get out of their turf.
However, the cold reality shattered the dreams of the Okinawans, and although Japan took back power in Okinawa, it made huge concessions, including the inability to dismantle the US military bases.
Not only that, but what the Okinawans did not expect was that instead of abolishing the US military bases in Okinawa, the Japanese Government had also transferred US military bases to Okinawa in large quantities.
In the words of the Japanese foreign minister at the time, it was better to move all of them to Okinawa because there were too many US military bases on the Japanese mainland, so that the number of US military bases on Okinawa Island increased instead of decreasing.
It can be seen that the Japanese government does not want the United States to have too many military bases on the mainland, but it does not dare to resist openly, so it can only retreat to the next best thing and abandon Okinawa.
The end result is that Okinawa Prefecture, a small island covering an area of less than 1 percent of Japan's territory, is dotted with dozens of US military bases of various sizes, accounting for 70 percent of the total number of US military bases in Japan, and the density is nearly 500 times that of the Japanese mainland.
In order to alleviate the anti-American sentiment of the Okinawans, the Japanese Government came up with a less clever but very realistic solution, that is, to raise the land use fee of the US military base.
To put it bluntly, it is to let the locals get benefits, and use money to gag them, during this period, the income from military land was far greater than the income from planting, but it also played a certain role.
At this time, Japan's economy was developing rapidly, and after the Japanese government took over, it formulated corresponding plans for Okinawa's economic development, mainly to improve Okinawa's economic structure.
In 1965, U.S. military bases-related revenues accounted for 30.4% of the Ryukyus' total revenue, which fell to 15.5% in 1972 and 5.7% in 2014.
Although there is still a gap between per capita income, infrastructure, and public services, the overall level of the economy has improved significantly compared with the period when the United States occupied the country.
However, with the arrival of the Japanese Self-Defense Forces on the island, some not-so-good memories of the Japanese army during the Pacific War were evoked among the Okinawan people, and anti-Japanese sentiment quietly brewed.
In 1975, Crown Prince Akihito came to Okinawa, and Akihito came to Okinawa to visit Himeyuri Tower to mourn the Okinawan schoolgirls who died in World War II.
Sure enough, his behavior aroused the anger of the Okinawan students, two of whom were more radical, infiltrated the Himeyuri Tower and threw Molotov cocktails at the Akihito couple, although they did not hurt them, but also scared the two of them very much. From this incident, it can be seen that some people in Okinawa are still resentful of what the Japanese army did in the Pacific Campaign, which is also one of the reasons why the Okinawans demand independence.
Over time, Okinawans occasionally launched rallies against US military bases, but this did not have a serious impact. Until September 4, 1995, a 12-year-old elementary school student in Okinawa was hijacked by three U.S. soldiers while shopping at a mall, and taken to a nearby beach to be gang-raped.
As soon as the news broke, it immediately caused an uproar in Okinawa. New and old hatreds erupted together, and various protests and marches continued one after another, with people shouting, "Okinawa wants independence, and the US troops get out." slogans took to the streets.
This time, the Japanese mainland also began to show solidarity with Okinawa, and even some government officials joined the march, and under pressure from all sides, the US military made concessions and promised to clean up the US military bases.
In 1996, the United States and Japan reached an agreement on the reorganization of the U.S. forces stationed in Okinawa in Japan, the core of which was to move the Futenma base, which was the most disturbing to the people, to the northeast and fall to the city of Nago on the island of Okinawa.
In this regard, the residents of Okinawa Island said that they were not satisfied, and as long as the US military base was still in Okinawa, it would not be safe here. In the years that followed, rapes continued to occur, and in 2000, U.S. Marine Corps Lieutenant General Earl Hairston bowed and apologized to the governor of Okinawa Prefecture at the time.
However, in the face of the frequent occurrence of such vicious cases, the Japanese government pretended to be deaf and dumb, and sometimes even helped the US military to cover up, which made the residents of Okinawa very unhappy, and they felt as if they had been completely abandoned by the Japanese government.
Then why would the Americans rather bow their heads and apologize than withdraw the US military base from Okinawa? The reason is that the special geographical location of Okinawa Island is too important to the United States.
I don't know if you've heard of the "three-line island chain". The so-called "three-line island chain" is actually the three lines of defense of the United States. The first line is based on Diego Garcia Island in Japan and South Korea to the Indian Ocean, the second line is from Guam to Australia and New Zealand, and the third line is centered on Hawaii and extends to Midway, Alaska and the Aleutian Islands.
Okinawa is located at the forefront of the "three-line island chain", and if there is no base on Okinawa, it will be very difficult for the US military to supply materials and support troops in the event of a war in East Asia. With Okinawa as a springboard, everything is different.
Whether it is delivering supplies to the front line, providing fire support, or landing operations, the US military will become more and more adept, attacking and retreating.
More importantly, China has always been an imaginary enemy of the United States and Japan, and everything they do revolves around the central task of containing China's development.
In other words, there are U.S. military bases in Okinawa, whether in East Asia, Eastern Europe, or Africa, and in the event of a war, the U.S. military can take the lead, which is probably the main reason why the Okinawa base cannot be abandoned.
Then why did the Japanese Government turn a blind eye to the surging tide of aggression against Okinawa? In fact, this is not necessarily the case, and which country is willing to build military bases of other countries on its own soil? Once the United States makes any attempt against Japan, Japan is basically unable to resist it.
In fact, it is not that the Japanese government does not want to manage it, but it cannot manage it at all. As a defeated country in World War II, Japan did not collapse suddenly, but developed rapidly economically.
It was because the United States risked the world's condemnation to protect Japan, and the United States naturally would not do a loss-making business, and the condition they put forward was to exchange Okinawa for it.
According to the "Potsdam Proclamation," the United States already enjoyed the right to administer Okinawa, and even though Japan and the United States later signed the agreement "the U.S.-Japan San Francisco Peace Treaty," the treaty still clearly stipulates that the United States can establish bases and garrison troops on Okinawa, and Japan has no right to interfere.
Even if the Japanese government's inaction was motivated by fear of the power of the United States and the constraints of the treaty, such a government was still disappointing to the people of Okinawa.
In recent years, the anti-US voices on Okinawa have become louder and louder, and Japan has not broken the situation at all, and in the long run, the residents of Okinawa will inevitably become even more disappointed with the Japanese government, and it is very likely that Okinawa's independence will no longer be just a slogan.