{"id":341,"date":"2010-03-23T21:15:00","date_gmt":"2010-03-23T21:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theinsularempire.com\/?p=341"},"modified":"2014-07-17T21:34:56","modified_gmt":"2014-07-17T21:34:56","slug":"obama-the-velvet-imperialist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theinsularempire.com\/?p=341","title":{"rendered":"Obama: The Velvet Imperialist"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/3.bp.blogspot.com\/_mg7D3kYysfw\/SQZyRknIEVI\/AAAAAAAAIMM\/RjDjQSzTg1M\/s1600\/2668582.41.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft\" style=\"border: 0pt none;margin: 10px\" src=\"http:\/\/3.bp.blogspot.com\/_mg7D3kYysfw\/SQZyRknIEVI\/AAAAAAAAIMM\/RjDjQSzTg1M\/s320\/2668582.41.jpg\" border=\"0\" alt=\"\" width=\"208\" height=\"320\" \/><\/a>The ever-helpful Jean Downey just forwarded me <a href=\"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/john-feffer\/velvet-imperialists_b_510182.html\">this article in the Huffington Post<\/a> by <a href=\"http:\/\/www.johnfeffer.com\/\">John Feffer<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>In it, Feffer describes a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.internationalrelations.house.gov\/hearing_notice.asp?id=1165\">recent Congressional hearing<\/a> on currently-strained <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fpif.org\/articles\/can_japan_say_no_to_washington\">US-Japan relations<\/a> &#8211; in which a Pentagon official was unable to come up with the number of US troops stationed in Japan (47,000), or to explain why the US needs more than 700 overseas bases worldwide. (I thought the number was just under 900, but who&#8217;s counting?) Feffer writes:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The Pentagon official couldn&#8217;t satisfy either Rohrabacher&#8217;s anti-China  tirade or Faleomavaega&#8217;s probing questions about the U.S. empire of  bases. And that&#8217;s precisely the problem with the Obama administration&#8217;s  Pacific policy. We are trying to maintain the exact same force posture  as previous administrations but at the same time emphasizing our new  commitment to multilateralism and our new status as a &#8220;global partner.&#8221;  It&#8217;s like Arnold Schwarzenegger going from Terminator to Kindergarten  Cop in the space of a year: Audiences above the age of seven are just  not convinced.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/4\/48\/Kokkaigijido.jpg\/220px-Kokkaigijido.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright\" style=\"border: 0pt none;margin: 10px\" src=\"http:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/4\/48\/Kokkaigijido.jpg\/220px-Kokkaigijido.jpg\" border=\"0\" alt=\"\" width=\"220\" height=\"163\" \/><\/a>Obama, Feffer argues, is trying to run an empire with velvet gloves &#8211; an approach that will be fruitless for either building or dismantling it. We shall have to wait, he says, for &#8220;an insider who knows the system,&#8221; such as <a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=TZ1h6Ki2-8U\">Andrew  Bacevich<\/a>, to &#8220;pull the plug&#8221; and offer real Pentagon reform.<\/p>\n<p>I also really like the Swiftian &#8216;modest proposal&#8217; that Feffer concludes with. What shall we do with all those US Marines in Futenma? Why, move them to Washington, DC!<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If the prospect of having U.S. Marines involved in promoting democracy,  maintaining stability, and responding to humanitarian crises at home  makes you squeamish,&#8221; he concludes, &#8220;you can begin to understand how the Okinawans might  feel.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The ever-helpful Jean Downey just forwarded me this article in the Huffington Post by John Feffer. In it, Feffer describes a recent Congressional hearing on currently-strained US-Japan relations &#8211; in which a Pentagon official was unable to come up with the number of US troops stationed in Japan (47,000), or to explain why the US [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,86],"tags":[95,96,167,92,94,93],"class_list":["post-341","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","category-guam-military-buildup","tag-camp-schwab","tag-futenma","tag-guam-military-buildup","tag-john-feffer","tag-okinawa","tag-us-japan-relations"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theinsularempire.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theinsularempire.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theinsularempire.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theinsularempire.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theinsularempire.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=341"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/theinsularempire.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2323,"href":"https:\/\/theinsularempire.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341\/revisions\/2323"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theinsularempire.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theinsularempire.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theinsularempire.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}