Tag: Japan

After North Korea fired a missile last week that landed in their EEZ I wondered if they were going to take measures to prevent this in the future.  It looks like they will:

Japan has ordered its Self-Defense Forces to intercept and destroy incoming flying objects after North Korea fired a ballistic missile last week that landed in Tokyo’s exclusive economic zone. The command issued on Monday is to apply to all incoming projectiles, South Korean news service Newsis reported. The directive is to be in effect for the next three months. But according to Japanese press reports the command is to be updated every three months, signifying the policy is more than a temporary measure designed to respond to North Korea provocations.  [UPI]

You can read more at the link, but to defend water the Japanese would have to rely on their Aegis ships equipped with SM-3 missiles which would mean ensuring always having one out at sea to support a missile defense mission.  That is likely why after three months this decision will be reviewed because there is probably better things these sailors could be doing than sailing in circles for three months if the North Koreans are no longer firing into their EEZ.

Considering where North Korea fired from and where the missiles landed it appears the North Koreans were trying to test as much of the range as possible.  They are additionally continuing their signaling to the ROK and Japan that their missiles work and have the range to hit anywhere in their two countries:

Pyongyang fired a ballistic missile that flew around 1,000 kilometers (621 miles) and landed in waters in Japan’s exclusive economic zone Wednesday morning, according to military officials.

At around 7:50 a.m., Pyongyang launched the missile from Unryul County in southwestern South Hwanghae Province toward its eastern coast, said the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS).

It was presumed to be an intermediate-range Rodong missile, which has a range of up to 1,300 kilometers.

The North American Aerospace Defense Command (Norad) determined that Pyongyang actually fired two intermediate-range missiles, but one exploded in midair immediately after launch.

The U.S. Strategic Command said in a statement that it detected “the simultaneous launch of two presumed intermediate-range ballistic missiles,” adding that one “exploded immediately after launch, while the second was tracked over North Korea and into the Sea of Japan,” which South Korea calls the East Sea.

“The missile that North Korea launched toward its east coast today flew over 1,000 kilometers and landed in Japan’s air defense identification zone (ADIZ),” a JCS official said. Japan’s exclusive economic zone covers most of its ADIZ.   [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read more at the link.

We haven’t had any Dokdo nonsense in a while here on the ROK Drop so here is the latest issue on this front:

Lizzy from K-pop girl group After School has been facing criticism from Japanese netizens after posting several photos of Dokdo Island on Instagram.

The photos showed Lizzy holding the Korean flag and cheering for the Korean guards on the island off Korea’s east coast. In some photos she said: “Dokdo is a Korean territory.”

Japanese netizens responded with fury, with some attacking her personally. They said “Lizzy should not come to Japan, ever,” “Dokdo is Japanese territory,” “You are not very considerate of your Japanese fans” and “Your caption is very offensive to Japanese fans.”

But Korean fans embraced the singer, whose real name is Park Soo-young. They said “We are proud of you,” “Dokdo definitely belongs to Korea” and “You are a patriot! Don’t mind the malicious comments.” [Korea Times]

She must have sagging sales because it seems like these Dokdo promotional events by politicians and celebrities always seem to get them the spotlight they are looking for. I would have been more impressed if she would have ate a Japanese flag, chopped her finger off, stuck a knife her gut, drank weed killer, or covered herself in bees. That is how real defenders of Dokdo show their patriotism.

Via a reader tip comes this horrible story out of Japan where once again the mass killer had a history of mental trouble:

Nineteen residents have been killed in a knife attack at a care centre for people with mental disabilities in the Japanese city of Sagamihara.

Such attacks are extremely rare in Japan – the incident is the worst mass killing in decades.

Police have arrested a man who worked at the centre until February, and who turned himself into police after the attack.

He reportedly said he wanted people with disabilities to “disappear”.

The brutal killings have shocked Japan, one of the safest countries in the world.

The suspect has been named as 26-year-old Satoshi Uematsu.

He sent letters to politicians in February in which he threatened to kill hundreds of disabled people during a night shift, Kyodo news agency reports.

“My goal is a world in which the severely disabled can be euthanised, with their guardians’ consent, if they are unable to live at home and be active in society,” Uematsu wrote in a letter to the speaker of the lower house of parliament, obtained by Kyodo.

He was kept in hospital for almost two weeks before being released.  [BBC]

You can read more at the link, but along with mental health the other thing that causes these mass killings that few talk about to include the BBC is the glorification in the media that allows these killers to act out their fantasies.  I do like how the BBC did find space to throw this line into the article though:

Mass killings are extremely rare in Japan, in part because strict gun control laws means almost no-one has access to a firearm.

The left wing Hankyoreh newspaper went to the Kyoga-Misaki radar site in Japan to try and dig up dirt to use against the deployment of THAAD to South Korea and found much to do about nothing:

In June of last year, when South Koreans first started talking about THAAD, I came here to report on residents who were concerned about the noise and the health effects of the electromagnetic waves.At the time, there was considerable opposition from residents who were afraid that their health would be damaged by the radar, but over the past year, the residents appear to have come to terms with the radar, like it or not.  [Hankyoreh]

The generators for the radar used to create noise for nearby residents, but they were muffled last year which eliminated the vast majority of the noise and next year the radar is going to be hooked up to the commercial power grid thus turning off the generators.  This will eliminate all the noise.  Also the radar looks out over the ocean thus there are no concerns about electromagnetic waves.

Despite all these facts the Hankyoreh reporter did everything he could to end the article in an ominous tone:

“The negative effect of the radar is invisible,” said Munenori Owan, 75, co-chairman of the Kyoto Group Against the X-Band Radar Base. “Electromagnetic waves are invisible, and the effect of the noise varies with the individual.  If I’m having problems and the person next to me is fine, that makes me the weird one.”“If South Korea teams up with the US against China, South Korea won‘t be able to prosper. Security problems must be resolved through dialogue and not through military conflicts that antagonize the other side. Focusing solely on electromagnetic waves and noise will make you miss the heart of the problem,” Owan said.  Sodeshi Village is weighed down by a sense of despair and discontent that is drowned out by the ominous rumble of the generator. Is this the future that the South Korean government wants for Seongju?

What is really ridiculous about this report is that no mention about the radar at Kyoga-Misaki that is part of the JADGE system that detects and protects Japan from missile attack is made.  Below is a map that shows the various JADGE radars in Japan; the Kyoga-Misaki radar can be seen towards the center of the map:

This radar has been there for years and no one is complaining about electromagnetic waves from that radar.  This is similar to the fact that South Korea operates various radars across the ROK as well and no one is protesting those radars.  This is just another example of how the opposition to the THAAD radar is purely political and has nothing to do with environmental concerns.

Over at Reddit they have a translation to this Kyunghyang Shimun article that claims that the THAAD radar is making people sick and even crazy in Japan:

A reporter from the paper went to Kyoto Japan where a Thaad radar facility is located. There, he found that Japanese residents were suffering from serious health problems including lack of breast milk from mothers, severe headaches, insomnia, and other side effects. The most severe side effect was the constant droning sound of power being fed into the facility which is driving the people living near it, crazy. The paper interviewed one Japanese resident who said even standing near the Thaad facility for 30 minutes makes him throw up. The concern in the Japanese village is that there is no study done on the effects of constant electronic magnetic signals. The paper also says that a few residents welcome the Thaad station because they profit from the central government rewarding the town with subsidies for hosting Thaad. But the reporter says the more reasonable Japanese residents who don’t care about money, are warning the Seongju residents to not ignore the harmful effects of the radar system which can’t been seen with human eyes.  [Reddit]

First of all the radar in Japan is not a THAAD battery, it is a forward based AN/TPY-2 radar site in Kyoga-Misaki that uses the same radar antenna as a THAAD battery.  Secondly this is just another example of how the leftists in the Korean media are going to distort and lie to push their political agenda just like what happened in 2008 with the phony US beef crisis.

Why doesn’t this reporter request to interview the soldiers that are around this radar every single day and see if they are getting sick and going crazy?

This guy is quite the scumbag to have found a passed out Japanese woman in front of his hotel room and instead of notifying the hotel manager he decided to carry her into his room and rape her:

A U.S. sailor must serve 2½ years of hard labor for raping an intoxicated Japanese woman at a Naha hotel, an incident that sparked anti-base protests and contributed to tightened liberty restrictions on Okinawa.

Seaman Apprentice Justin Castellanos, 24, was sentenced Friday by a three-judge Naha District Court panel. His family was required to pay $21,789 in restitution to the victim, in addition to $2,842 from the U.S. military. Both amounts have been paid, officials said.

Prosecutors had sought a four-year prison term, but the chief judge said a lower sentence was accepted for the corpsman, who is assigned to Camp Schwab, because he had pleaded guilty and shown remorse for his actions.  [Stars & Stripes]

Here is the part of the article I am surprised about and makes me wonder if this is part of the Japanese legal system where actions by the victim are taken into account to mitigate the sentence of the perpetrator?:

Judges also said the woman was partly to blame for becoming incapacitated and passing out in the hallway by the sailor’s room.

If this happened in the US we would be treated by a week long news cycle on victim blaming.

If you are an E-5 or below in Japan life is still going to sort of suck for you if you like to stay out late:

Junior enlisted servicemembers stationed in Japan must now be accompanied after 10 p.m. when drinking alcoholic beverages off base, according to a new U.S. Forces Japan liberty policy.

The policy, which replaces a 2014 version, also creates three new operational levels that allow commanders to place varying restrictions on movement and alcohol consumption.

The changes follow a series of arrests in Japan that last month sparked one of the largest protests against the U.S. military in decades on Okinawa, where half of all U.S. servicemembers are stationed.

“Acts of indiscipline or criminal behavior by U.S. military personnel adversely impact international relations, tarnish the image of the United States military and affect our military readiness,” said an order signed by Lt. Gen. John Dolan, USFJ commander.

Servicemembers in pay grades E-5 and below who drink off base after 10 p.m. must go out with another servicemember, Defense Department civilian worker or DOD family member; if they drink with someone else, that person should be command approved, according to the policy.

Servicemembers in all ranks are banned from drinking alcoholic beverages off base between midnight and 5 a.m., a rule instituted as part of the 2014 policy. In pay grades E-5 and below, a 1 a.m. to 5 a.m. curfew remains in effect.

For junior enlisted servicemembers on temporary duty in Japan, the restrictions are tighter; the new policy requires them to have a “liberty buddy” even if they aren’t drinking, if they go off base after 10 p.m.  [Stars & Stripes]

You can read more at the link.

Just another example of how Okinawa has turned into South Korea during the Roh Moo-hyun administration years of the early 2000’s:

The United States and Japan announced new procedures Tuesday aimed at ending status of forces agreement protection for some civilian base workers, two months after an alleged homicide by a contractor touched off massive protests targeted at the American military on Okinawa.

The new procedures would place civilians into four categories and exclude workers from SOFA who already have Japanese residency visas, according to a joint statement issued Tuesday evening.

It remained unclear after a news conference Tuesday whether the new procedures under negotiation would mean fewer SOFA-sponsored jobs; however, the statement calls on the U.S. and Japanese governments to clarify SOFA’s scope by “evaluating categories of positions eligible for status as members of the civilian component.”  [Stars & Stripes]

It looks like contractors are going to have to sit in on mandatory Powerpoint briefs now as well just like servicemembers.

Defense Department civilians and contractors in Japan are now expected to attend the same training events as their active-duty counterparts, Dolan said.

“For contractors and civilians under SOFA, I have added contract specifications that all workers will sign an acknowledgement of SOFA responsibilities, which can later be used, if needed, in any adjudication or incident review,” Dolan said in a prepared statement Tuesday.

Here is another example of the Japanese government putting unreasonable expectations on the US military in Japan:

Defense Minister Gen. Nakatani praised the U.S.-Japan security alliance but also called on the U.S. military Tuesday to “eradicate driving under the influence” of alcohol. Nakatani noted that an Air Force staff sergeant was arrested by Japanese police on DUI suspicion during curfew hours on Monday, despite recent restrictions on Okinawa.

Has Japan ended DUIs in their military?  Of course not because when it comes to large populations there is always going to be crime committed.  What is important is what is the trends of the number of crimes committed?  For US Forces on Okinawa statistics have shown that per capita they commit crime at a much lower rate than the surrounding population.

Working together to strengthen the U.S.-JPN Alliance through improved #SOFA implementation, monitoring and training pic.twitter.com/YcPXmAcUTz

— キャロライン・ケネディ大使 (@AmbCKennedy) July 5, 2016