Guam: The America that Americans forget
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
Or pack like Rick Steves and just bring a backpack with the essentials.
If there's any delay, you miss your next flight, and the airline will not rebook you because your layover's a self-connection, not an actually ticketed thing. So your Guam trip just became a Japan trip.
3 hours would actually have some safety margin in it for short delays. Personally I don't get how people manage really short connections, and I hear plenty of people getting screwed over because of them.
Also, I'm not entirely sure how this works with immigration. The visitor form for Japan asks you about your hotel you plan to stay at - which you won't have since you aren't intending this to become a Japan trip. I have no clue if the immigration officer actually checks that field or if it's purely just for keeping records on tourists.
[0] I heard an hour at LAX. This is the same airport that universally refuses to store luggage overnight - a fact that even people in the airport industry don't seem to understand - so perhaps this is just a rule specific to that tire fire of an airport.
I think at least half of travel should be an adventure. Adventures are uncomfortable - but they make the best stories. Nobody has ever said, "Man, remember that time we went on that perfectly planned trip where nothing out of the ordinary happened? How exciting!"
If you just want to travel randomly, then no plan is fine. However we laid out plans can ensure you get to the must sees that are farther from home. Also many close to home things have wierd hours They are open so if you don't plan you won't see them that trip.
I would definitely encourage visiting if you have the means! I find there are two types of people here: those who feel limited by the island and its infrastructure (no Target, no Starbucks, etc.) and those who enjoy its incredible outdoor environment. Some of the best snorkeling and scuba diving in the world is right here, and as for hiking: we've been hiking very frequently for the two years since we arrived and haven't gotten bored yet. Depending on where you go on the island, the terrain and plant life looks very different.
We almost retired there, but my son's health condition(s) precludes that.
Space-A is how we flew back during our tour there, and if you know the tricks it work great. If you don't it's a nightmare.
I hate those people. I live in a city of 1.5 million (there's everything here), and it's a constant background radiation talking point for a significant number of my highschool friends: how unfortunate they are that they don't live in the nearby city of 15 million. IME this constant moping has everything to do with the amount of social media one consumes daily.
My biggest pain point of remote island life is not having access to a variety of affordable dairy foods.
Well, you've managed to one-up them in how tiresome and cliched your talking point is.
That is a very important realization and self awareness, alaways :)
Fwiw I lived in 600k-2m cities most of my life. I now moved to a 50k city (for love :) ,but problem is it's a satellite city - a 50k city in rural Minnesota or Manitoba will be a local centre with many amenities and a certain vibe. A 50k city on the greater Toronto area is just a commute residential park.
Anyhoo, I always enjoy people complaining about city becoming bigger because... They themselves moved here! If you moved to that 100ppl place you would be the problem, the 101st person- while likely complaining about other people moving in and ruining it for everyone :). It's like when I'm stuck in traffic and people in the car with me get annoyed "where do all these people think they have to be on a Sunday morning???" - erm, just like us you mean? :)
But it's been many years (25? If you count Timor crisis?) since any significant political disturbance in Bali/Indonesia and only 3 years since a coup attempt in Guam/USA.
Bali did have that bombing just after 9/11 a while back. Sort of ancient history anyways, but I've loved my trips there.
I'm sure it's based on preference and tolerance, but very hot humid heat just saps all the enjoyment of life out of me when I'm outside, unless I'm on a sailboat or in a pool with a cold drink in my hand.
But maybe it's better this way.
Most of the domestic tourists I saw around Guam (I was stationed there for a stretch) were divers. I don't know that I'd recommend it for the average non-diving traveler over cheaper-to-get-to alternatives unless it's someone who's specifically looking for the remote character of Guam (and in that case, there are less developed islands that can be gotten to more cheaply).
If a non-US carrier abides by local regulations, I don't see an issue with letting them run domestic flights.
IATAs cartel like behavior was due to them regulating airline prices and services. This started at a time when governments where still regulating domestic prices thinking that competition on price or service would lead to cutting corners on safety.
As we've seen, anytime an airline raises prices it is pretty easy for another carrier (or even a brand new carrier) to come in and replace them. So it isn't like a hypothetical foreign government owned carrier could somehow make long term sustained profits.
Let them spend their money on that if they are that dumb!
If the Chinese state intervenes in US domestic travel affairs then the US has the option to nationalize their fleet. All their assets and operational staff are in the US and the staff aren't going to oppose keeping their jobs...
1) China comes in and undercuts US prices.
2) US carriers are unable to compete with a business subsidized by one of the largest economies in the world, and China Air forms a monopoly as it drives competitors out of business.
3) China Air folds, leaving the US with no means of air travel at all.
I’m pretty sure China could outlast any airline in the US in a price war, given how thin the margins that US carriers already operate on are. They don’t have to care about making profits—their only goal is to damage the US economy, as on the world stage it’s a zero-sum game. Any damage to the US is a benefit to China.
So yeah, let them. And what effect do you think it will have on the economy when there are literally zero air carriers left in the United States?
And if China Air suddenly folds then the US nationalizes their fleet or some similar intervention. Similar has been done during crises in the banking sector, and similar has been done in other countries when an airline went bust.
That seems to be impossible these days.
Recent examples include:
* A case involving wage suppression by a secret agreement of poultry procesors in Georgia (May 2023)
* A divestment agreement for ASSA ABLOY AB to take over Spectrum Brand Holding Inc.’s Hardware and Home Improvement division
* An antitrust lawsuit against Activision for esport wage surpression.
See https://www.justice.gov/news/press-releases?f%5B0%5D=facet_t... if you want more
I suspect antitrust action against a Chinese-owned entity that had shutdown travel in the US would be fairly broadly supported.
Realistically I just don't think that's gonna happen, if they have to abide by local labor laws.
The even more difficult question is how to tell whether a foreign company is truly private or is secretly receiving government funding. With no way to collect tax information or audit the books of foreign companies operating in the US, there’s no way to tell.
I don’t think it’s inconceivable that China could set up a shell company to operate super cheap flights on, say, the west coast, with the express purpose of causing that market to collapse, leading to a domino effect as US carriers start to fold. Maybe it would work, and maybe it wouldn’t, but consider that the annual revenue for domestic carriers in 2022 was about $160 billion, and profit was about 1% of that. Given that China’s military budget is estimated at $230 billion, it doesn’t seem at all out of the realm of possibility to me that they might well try, entirely legally, undermine the US economy.
I’m not saying cabotage laws are the only thing preventing this scenario, or that it couldn’t be dealt with should it become apparent that it’s happening, but I think it’s definitely something to be consider when discussing the possibility of opening up any domestic market to foreign competition.
Why not? Ironically, that is the ultimate solution to the problem you're describing - if we consider this market so critical and so easily disrupted, then having a government-owned service provider that focuses on long-term availability of basic services over profits is a sensible precaution. Private airlines can still compete by offering more/better service for more money, or cheaper service due to less overhead.
Given just how horrifically awful the American carriers are, I don't see how this would be a bad thing: Air China couldn't possibly be any worse.
But today, FAA knows exactly which jurisdictions regulate airlines to a comparable standard and which don’t. Denying cabotage and other higher rights to those airlines is 100%, as you say, naked protectionism.
That's not exactly true. It just requires the USA and the other country to have negotiated a Fifth Freedom agreement.
There are lots of foreign-owned airlines flying from the US with layovers and stopovers in other countries. For instance, I recently flew JFK->FRA->SIN on Singapore Airlines. And United even operates their Island Hopper route, Honolulu-Majuro-Kwajalein Atoll-Kosrae-Pohnpei-Truk-Guam, among many others.
It’s the same rule.
I’m in Chicago, and I can book a Korean Air, non-codeshare ORD-ICN-GUM right now. You can find it on Kayak.
"This is based on the regulations of the U.S. Department of Transportation and you cannot make a reservation for an itinerary from the mainland U.S. to Guam (GUM) via a third country"
The rule is not that foreign-owned airlines can't fly point-to-point routes between US destinations - Air Canada can't sell SFO→JFK via Toronto, for instance. You may somehow be able to cause something to be ticketed, but that doesn't mean that you'd be able to check in.
As the other poster mentioned, try grabbing a componetized ticket from the airline and they will not book it.
Philippine Airlines flights from west-coast US (SF, LA) refuel in Guam, since a 2006 "technical stop" agreement [0] (not allowed to pick up passengers on Guam, but can refuel and pick up supplies); at least during the winter headwinds, Nov-Mar [1]. Passengers can't even get out of the plane, you get to sit on the tarmac and watch the fuel tankers out the window for 45min in the predawn. I wanted to at least get out and see the inside of the terminal but absolutely not. ("Guam: the ultimate skiplagged challenge")
So you won't see this arrangement show up on any ticket engines, and they're not allowed say "Philippine Airlines flies to Guam". Are there any good articles on how current airline treaties affect routes and pricing in the Pacific?
[0]: "Guam replaces Honolulu as stop for PAL flights" https://www.philstar.com/headlines/2006/01/06/315333/guam-re...
[1]: "The one-hour technical stops are required during certain times of the year, particularly during the winter months of November to March, when headwinds are strong enough to affect aircraft flying westward across the Pacific." (to avoid exceeding MTOW)
[2]: discussed on https://www.pprune.org/south-asia-far-east/374507-pal-techni...
I'm sure Gordon Lightfoot (RIP) could have sung about treaties...
If not, a creative itinerary with multiple stopovers like Manila-Guam-Honolulu-Anchorage-Seattle could be interesting.
- Majuro in the Marshall Islands (MAJ)
- Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands (KWA)
- Kosrae in the Federated States of Micronesia (KSA)
- Pohnpei in the Federated States of Micronesia (PNI)
- Chuuk in the Federated States of Micronesia (TKK)
I believe passengers aren't allowed off in at least one, if not two, of the stops because they're basically just a US military base on a rock. [1, 2]
> The limitation is purely legal. The airline treaties distort pricing and competition, otherwise it should be possible to do a 24/48h stopover in Guam, Taipei etc., and even lower your overall ticket price if you're flexible about dates.
Note that you can do this, it just has to be on separate tickets if connections are under 24h. For a connection over 24h, the world is your oyster, so to speak, from a ticketing perspective. Unless you plan to stay at the airport (and only an option in some places with sterile transit) you may need a visa for the intermediate point.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island_Hopper
[2] http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=HNL-MAJ-KWA-KSA-PNI-TKK-GUM
Cabotage is also referred to as the 9th air freedom, for the curious. [1]
The prohibition on cabotage also applies to passenger and cargo ships. [2]
Qantas has historically had a similar stop in LAX en route to JFK, although new aircraft will allow them to start making the trip non-stop, in an initiative called 'project sunrise.' [1] I believe they are currently routing that flight with a stop in Auckland as QF3, although they are running AKL-JFK as a 5th freedom with pick-up rights in AKL.
I don't think it's true that it's faster to get to Philippines than Guam from the mainland - you just have to transit in Honolulu. SFO-HNL-GUM on United is 14h15, whereas the non-stop SFO-MNL is 14h35. Philippines only offers limited non-stop options to Manila - just LAX, SFO and JFK - so much of the time you'd be connecting either way, and that eliminates any advantages. After all, Honolulu is pretty much on the way to Guam based on the great circle arc. [2]
[1] https://www.qantas.com/au/en/about-us/our-company/fleet/new-...
Guam is a U.S. colony that has benefitted from the U.S., but has also been overrun by Americans and people from Asia, so that Chamorus are now a minority on the island. We've long wanted to have a vote to decolonize, but this has been blocked by Americans on the island who demand to have a vote in a matter that should be up to the Chamorus.
As a result of blocking decolonization, we have been impacted greatly:
* Big military bases have brought a militarized mindset to the residents.
* Those bases were taken without asking or recompense, and drive up land prices, which drives up the price of everything else.
* The U.S. has protected U.S. corporations from competition (Jones Act, etc) which drives up the prices as well.
* The U.S. has set immigration policies to benefit itself, leading to a flood of immigrants who the U.S. doesn't pay for (healthcare, education).
* U.S. corporations have taken over commerce (think big box stores and chain restaurants), leading to a loss of the local culture.
* Guam residents are mostly in poverty, undereducated, with terrible health. You could argue that it's our own fault, but the U.S.'s unthinking impact has created a system that leads to these results.
There's a lot more to this — it's an incredibly deep topic — but I thought there should be a voice here from someone who understands the issues.
Ex. obviously what American settlers did to mainland Natives was heinous and should not have happened, but it's less clear that Natives of the current generation should be able to unilaterally vote to remove Americans that are born here now.
Is there a dissimilarity with Guam I'm missing?
I'm not arguing against you, necessarily. It's a hard situation and maybe Americans leaving is the better solution.
How far "back" do you think it's fair for decolonization advocates to go? Do you think the same argument you're using here, applied to other places (ex. the continental U.S.) is also correct?
-
Addendum via Wikipedia: "The United States Department of the Interior approved a $300,000 grant for decolonization education" in 2016[0]. No idea what to make of this.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guam#Government_and_politics
And yes, as you noted in the addendum, there has been money allocated for decolonization education. It happened, but all efforts to have an actual vote were blocked in court by (a handful of) Americans living in Guam.
Overwhelmingly most people were awesome and the little island has a great esprit de corps. I really liked it, but there’s not that much to do, besides hanging out with folks and going to various exercises, jet-skiing, beach. OK, there's quite a bit to do, but not as much as living in a larger place. Which is OK. You can make your own fun. There's a couple shooting ranges too if you enjoy that. The Korean tourists certainly enjoyed their fully-automatic weapons when I was there.
There’s a strange juxtaposition between poor “local” areas, the luxury brands on the high street catering to Asian tourists, and the regular suburban areas. Clime-wise it's kind of like Singapore. Shopping-wise it's like mainland America, or maybe more like Hawai'i. Complete with sprawling malls, Dairy Queen, iHop, Pizza Hut, in a “tropical pacific” climate. Also, IIRC quite a lot of stray dogs hanging about. This was all pre-pandemic so maybe everything is different nowadays.
I was living in Asia at time so flights were a no brainer.
Everyone seems to drive giant utility trucks as well. You have to rent some kind of vehicle.
Oh NYT never change. If the country never did, you would bet the NYT would have something like below:
> As tensions with China mount, the U.S. military continues to ignore Guam and other Pacific territories — endangering on the nation’s most ignored and underrepresented citizens.
It’s 95ms from Melbourne, AU, 110ms from Auckland, NZ and about 120ms from west coast US. Central US is probably about 150ms.
All of which are very close playable.
Living in Australia, as a teen FPS gamer it was always frustrating to know that no matter what tech comes next, the physical distance is the limiting factor.
So Guam is a cool workaround.
I used oneqode. Really easy, and affordable.
RA2 was my jam back in the day, migrating to RA3.
Hell, I got married in the States recently. My marriage license registration didn’t go through because my birthplace wasn’t a thing in the online application form. My wife had no issue, and she was born in a foreign country.
I've always wondered if anyone has been born on Palmyra Atoll, would make for fun trying to get documents saying as such
The problem is always the website and how they implement the address selection for US 50 states, territories, and overseas military addresses.
But yes, people will ask where I’m from. I used to explain where I’m from but nowadays I just say I’m from Hawaii to keep intros short.
But yeah, statehood would solve the representation issue.
Like yeah, the Senate's disproportionate representation is dumb and bad, but that's the system we're stuck with.
And Guam is farther from Hawaii than Hawaii is from the US mainland IIRC.
Although, oddly enough it seemed to be a small bulwark _against_ extremism in the last election since you can't gerrymander a Senate race. So that was a pleasant surprise.
As a NYer the fact others get 40 times my representation is irksome though.
"Every idea of proportion and every rule of fair representation conspire to condemn a principle, which gives to Rhode Island an equal weight in the scale of power with Massachusetts, or Connecticut, or New York; and to Deleware an equal voice in the national deliberations with Pennsylvania, or Virginia, or North Carolina. Its operation contradicts the fundamental maxim of republican government, which requires that the sense of the majority should prevail. Sophistry may reply, that sovereigns are equal, and that a majority of the votes of the States will be a majority of confederated America. But this kind of logical legerdemain will never counteract the plain suggestions of justice and common-sense. It may happen that this majority of States is a small minority of the people of America; and two thirds of the people of America could not long be persuaded, upon the credit of artificial distinctions and syllogistic subtleties, to submit their interests to the management and disposal of one third. The larger States would after a while revolt from the idea of receiving the law from the smaller. To acquiesce in such a privation of their due importance in the political scale, would be not merely to be insensible to the love of power, but even to sacrifice the desire of equality. It is neither rational to expect the first, nor just to require the last. The smaller States, considering how peculiarly their safety and welfare depend on union, ought readily to renounce a pretension which, if not relinquished, would prove fatal to its duration."
Your option, instead, is forcing millions of American citizens, against their will, into a sovereign situation that they might not be prepared for. Versus letting them make their own choice.
> Politically, Palau is a presidential republic in free association with the United States, which provides defense, funding, and access to social services.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palau
[oops, it's mentioned, nvm]
In the case of the Pacific Islands and the US, free association has to do with military protection and guaranteed sovereignty in exchange for shared military access. It oftentimes takes the place of vassalage or protectorate status, but with equal party station (either party can leave, if they see fit versus the more powerful entity enforcing the situation).
The Marshall Islands, Micronesia, etc are free associations.
I actually got trouble entering Guam because back then I was on L1 visa, which only allows me to enter the US for work, and my employer does not have any office at Guam and I don't have a connection from Guam to US mainland. After being held at the airport for hours (I believe they called my hotel for verification) they finally stamped a parole on my passport and let me in.
I assume you're making some point/remark regarding their status and the political mindfield surrounding it, but that doesn't change their subnational/sovereign situation.
It would be like saying that Bora-Bora or New Caledonia were in Europe. Well no, they are part of France and the European Union, but not Europe.
The America/USA ambiguation is very annoying to hear or even considered rude/insulting for most america inhabitants outside of the USA.
You know, putting your own house in order and stuff like that.
Your umbrage at the word is your problem and your insecurity. Americans are quite aware of the difference between America and America, and it's pretty clear in context. As a Spanish speaker, it's also obvious in 99% of contexts in Spanish. So there's nothing to fix beyond your feelings, which affects no one but yourself.
If you're not Latino, it's even further mind-boggling how you would think this was an American derived phenomenon or in any way unique to American language. It goes back to intra-European communique well before the revolution and any concept of the US began.
Lastly: I'm Mexican, living in Mexico. Literally the only time I've ever heard any Latino refer to themselves as "American" (in English or Spanish) is specifically for the made up injustice you seem to have latched onto. So again, there's nothing to fix, beyond your hurt feelings and insecurities (vicarious or internalized), since the language is unambiguous.
I'm sure you'll have something to argue back with or some weird little nitpick that makes you think you've "won" though...so you can have the last word. Ciao.
Two, actually.
Bad comparison: the American Revolution was a group of colonialists rebelling against their colonialist bosses, not a rebellion of the colonised against the coloniser. Indeed, one of the American Revolution’s complaints was that London was too protective of Native American rights, and was limiting its colonies expansion into Native American territories. So rather than an anti-colonialist rebellion, it was a pro-colonialist rebellion
But people like to have a simplified view of history that validates their beliefs and bristle when confronted with the reality that things weren't so simple, and their heroes were often darker, more complex and tbh more problematic than they realise.
I've never heard of this. Do you have some links to read more about it?
See also https://www.ushistory.org/us/13f.asp which says (my emphasis):
> from the perspective of almost all NATIVE AMERICANS the American Revolution was an unmitigated disaster… Gradually, however, it became clear to most native groups, that an independent America posed a far greater threat to their interests and way of life than a continued British presence that restrained American westward expansion.
> With remarkably few exceptions, Native American support for the British was close to universal.
The vast majority of Native Americans supported the British in the Revolutionary War, because while the British did not always respect their rights, they did so to a greater degree than the Revolutionaries did
I think the reality is that so long as these territories are not states, I think most Americans are "fine", and barely even register that this is happening. I think even the status of places like Puerto Rico (US citizens since 1917!) has only fairly recently been understood by most Americans compared to 20 years ago.
Things are nuanced and not totally black and white, and with the Philippines it does feel like the ball was rolling so strongly that any colonial ambitions would be hard to establish. But Guam was also taken at the same time and is still a territory!
Places small enough to be permanent military bases are likely good candidates for permanent colonialisation by the US gov't.
The US role in the Philippine-American War (1899-1902) is underdiscussed, but it includes large-scale civilian deaths, cholera, famine, torture, mutilation, executions, (by both sides) concentration camps; it has been claimed the cholera was intentionally used against the civilian population. Casualties were as high as 1 million of the 6-7 million total population. [1] Mark Twain (along with other anti-imperialists) famously opposed the war and said it betrayed the ideals of American democracy by not allowing the Filipino people to choose their own destiny.
The Moro Rebellion (1899–1913) was an armed conflict between the Moro people (Muslims in Southern Philippines: Mindanao, Jolo, Sulu) and the US military during the Philippine–American War. [2]
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mindanao#Spanish_colonization_...
[1]: Casualties https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippine%E2%80%93American_Wa...
I was in Mindanao just this week, and did not get a full understanding of some of the groups hostile to Americans. (Notably the Moro, but not the only group)
Guam is like Guantanamo, or Diego Garcia. We're there only because they are of strategic importance for the post-war (WWII) projection of power and nothing more. Else all those little island bases would be quiet places like so many other small islands that dot the oceans.
Or should you give it to the "native" people that were there before them? Or the ones before those ones?
Or maybe just accept that the one constant of life is everyone takes everyone else's shit if/when they can/want.
Sure. But if this is normal, why is it so hard to accept what Russia is doing to Ukraine?
Just because evils were done in the past, doesn’t mean we should just accept it as universal truths and continue doing the same things to others (islanders).
If you accept that Russia is wrong, then invading natives was wrong and taking land from islanders *IS* wrong.
Disagree?
Complete gibberish. You can’t seriously be claiming that cities in Guam are being turned to rubble under heavy artillery fire, and children being kidnapped etc.
Ukraine is at war.
Let's say China started supporting people in Guam who want independence, and supplying them with weapons - that would be just and a good thing, right?
Because you did posit in the previous reply that it's completely expected and a fact of life that larger powers overtake these smaller ones - like USA and Guam, and Russia and Ukraine.
Sounds like you’ve forgotten that Russia marched on Ukraine’s capital, deliberately shelling civilian targets, and Ukraine fought off the Russians on their own for weeks, completely defying everyone’s expectations, which is why the West is now supplying weapons to them.
On top of that Ukraine was an independent state with a treaty with a Russia guaranteeing that.
Can you tell us again how Guan is like Ukraine?
I think you’re just making that you, but in case you aren’t you’ll be able to quote where I said that.
Because before significant aid could even reach Ukraine, the Ukrainians stopped Russia - ergo they didn’t “defeat the natives” and instead are being defeated.
So your comparison here doesn’t really make sense. It also doesn’t make sense because we Russia is actively attacking Ukraine today.
Islanders had their land taken from them and still don’t have it (just like natives). How is this different from Russia taking Ukraine’s land?
If Russia had kicked Ukraine's ass what do you think would have happened? NATO declaring war? Remember that Putin got away with Crimea in 2014.You only have sovereignty if you can defend it.
Fairness doesn't come into it.
> How is this different from Russia taking Ukraine’s land?
Hasn’t happened yet (in the context of the 2022 invasion - aware of previous annexation). And bigger, more powerful countries like the United States are helping Ukraine stop Russia from doing so.
But since this is ongoing we can say “hey that’s wrong!” And do something about it. Not much we can do (though there is some) about events hundreds of years old.
So it’s normal because it has occurred through your history, and also possible for us to stop today, hence we are. If you want to really dig into the whole might makes right thing (and at the nation state level it does) then the US is the mightiest and is stopping Russia from taking from Ukraine.
The justifications we give are just words.
It actually makes a difference in the long run.
Jesus christ, that's a logical jump if I've ever seen one, but ok, I'll bite:
IF Russia succeeds at taking Ukraine, then sure in few hundred years it should be accepted as "normal" that's just what Russia's territory is. Just like most European countries where their borders have shifted through wars and violence many times in the past. That doesn't make the present actions ok, just like the past actions of European colonists in North America aren't ok.
There is literally ZERO reason to accept what Russia is doing now. They should be fought against with all might that can be offered, because it's barbaric, brutal, and has no reason to happen. Just like I'm sure Native Americans and all "first people" of any lands have fought against invaders in their time.
There are some positive economic impacts for the locals.
-- Socialism pointing at subsistence farmers happy at earning a good wage
(Okinawa has DC offices because the prefecture and the Japanese mainland gov't are not aligned on these topics at all. The prefecture basically wants these bases gone, and don't really want SDF bases there either. Tokyo wants the bases.)
Why do you think it is happening at their expense? The other option is leaving these alone and letting the likes of China and Russia run the world.
If we did not spend those extra tens of billions per year in projecting power, we could better serve our students, workers, retirees, infrastructure, etc. Instead, they go to ensuring Japan, Korea, Philippines, etc. don't have to spend so much on defense.
As China ascends to No. 1, will they take over the spending? (I'd be happy of they were the ones keeping shipping lanes for their own exports open and not us)
History's not on your side for that one. You're talking about the country that, plagued by pirates disturbing its coastal shipping, went to massive expense to construct an enormous system of inland canals running parallel to the coast that the pirates couldn't reach.
If Chinese merchants wanted the sea kept clear, say because they wanted to trade with nearby islands, they had do that in their own private capacity. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koxinga
Except that's history. Reality today is not on your side. PRC has more ship building capacity than rest of world combined. Annual production of dead weight tons per year is about 6x-8x more than output US emergency ship building program during WW2. Not to mention most new PRC surface combatants do anti piracy tours out to Africa. If PRC/PLAN wanted to take over piracy protection for her SLOCs, they can basically do so already, plenty of small hulls being retired to coast guard that even they have enough capacity to do it.
This is laughable. If we didn’t spend billions projecting power, we’d be much poorer because world trade would become much more costly for us, as China reshapes it to its own advantage.
China isn’t looking in great shape to do any ‘ascending’ anyway.
OPEC was formed on September 14, 1960. The definition of "world currency" is somewhat nebulous, but for the purposes of determining when the "dollar became the world currency", perhaps the best date to use is the Bretton Woods conference, which set up the main international financial system, establishing that everyone would peg their currencies to the US dollar, as well as the existence of the IMF and the World Bank. This was done--on purpose, not "by accident"--in June, 1944, 16 years before OPEC ever existed. The Bretton Woods system itself collapses in the 1970s.
Because that's what superpowers do if they want to keep their position as superpowers.
You can, for example, stop policing shipping lanes. But then can't complain once shipments start disappearing as other countries don't take the slack. There is less justification to keep warships near 'interesting' countries in that scenario too. You get to keep the military machine well oiled. And the list goes on.
The US is not doing this out of benevolence.
The United States was the world's superpower on December 6, 1941.
It did not get to that position by keeping the military machine well oiled.
On December 6, 1941, the US vs. rest of world might have been a fair fight. Maybe.
That didn't happen by being the world police.
No, it wouldn't have. The US would likely have lost the fight, especially if you consider that in such a counterfactual world there probably wouldn't have been a WW2 going on for the past few years.
While it is difficult to be more precise about when the US became the top world power than "during WW2", it is pretty clear to most knowledgeable observers that the answer is definitely not before WW2 breaks out (it is at best at parity with Britain). And honestly, I'd be skeptical of putting it before the Guadalcanal Campaign, where the US throws battleships into a cruiser battle because it has run out of cruisers. The point I'd go for is when the Essex carriers start coming online, which is 1943.
The US had industrial power before 1941, before 1911, starting in the 1890s.
The US could turn that into military power any time it wanted to, and in the time period between the world wars, it didn't want to.
After 1941, it wanted to. Because of a lot of lies, but that's another discussion entirely.
To me, that is worth a lot.
Sweden had an atomic bomb program which was dropped in the 1970s after assurances from the US to extend its “nuclear umbrella” to protect Sweden.
One big reason Sweden jumped into NATO now is that the Swedish military is, not exactly a shadow of its former self, but very small.
If Sweden would have had an equivalent of the military power it had in say, 1991, I doubt a NATO application would have been made, or at least not as hastily.
The USA and Europe have a role to play in keeping the peace. It's not a accident that China is regularly violating Japanese territorial waters (as they did last week, he 8 mile line here, not exclusive economic zones) and threatening their neighbors over possession of islands that can strangle world trade.
When China (and Russia for that manner) show that they can be apart of a international community based on common principles of human rights, there won't be a need... but until then.
Is US pritectibg Europe, or US interests in Europe?
Over the past 40 years the US spending on arms has grown, but fewer and fewer pieces are being produced. Pentagon fails audits.
Now it got to the point where USA cannot supply Ukraine with enough artillery rounds, and they are like the aimplest item to produce. Economy of Russia is like 10x smaller, this should not even be a contest in terms of production.
Imagine if there is a real conflict, and things like cruise missiles need to be replaced, what happens then - you place an order and wait 2 years for it to be delivered? China has 10 the manufacturing capabilty of Russia.
I doubtwe need to spend so much, but why are we not getting our money's worth?
Never in modern history has a country been able to sustain a full-blown war without adapting its production capacity. It's not surprising that an economy dimensioned for peacetime doesn't successfully sustain a war.
> Imagine if there is a real conflict, and things like cruise missiles need to be replaced, what happens then - you place an order and wait 2 years for it to be delivered?
Basically, yes. Always was. As explained in the Vietnam war example [1]: "D to P stocks are those war reserves of ammunition which are stocked in peace time to provide the necessary reservoir of ammunition to sustain combat operations until such time that the planned production base can be activated"
[1]: http://webdoc.sub.gwdg.de/ebook/p/2005/CMH_2/www.army.mil/cm...
Are you aware that the US acquired Guam decades before WWII?
People always focus on the fact that there is a military base in some of the territories and assume that is the primary reasoning, while ignoring the fact that there are hundreds of US airbases in California alone, along with the marine, naval and army bases. Yet that's hardly the reason California is a part of the US.
There's certainly an argument for the territories' status and where they should end up, but I don't believe the primary motivation is militaristic.
Most of those "quiet places" in the Pacific are in free association with the United States. They still "act as bases" in return for the United States offering guaranteed protection and sovereignty. So I'm not quite sure what your comparison point is supposed to be: a) places that ended up under US possession after the Spanish-American war and are now full of American citizens (barring one specific example that still exists for very racist reasons) after being a part of the US for over a century or b) places that willingly lend themselves a similar situation in exchange for protection from (what they consider) worse options.
>In 1893, Americans overthrew the monarchy in Hawaii, then later annexed the island.
A committee of native-born Hawaii citizens, Americans, and Europeans overthrew the monarchy, not the US government. The US didn't annex Hawaii until the Spanish War in 1898 demonstrated the islands' importance to the US.
>a series of Supreme Court rulings called the Insular Cases that began in 1901, five years after the court allowed “separate but equal” segregation"
The Insular Cases had absolutely nothing to do with Plessy v. Ferguson. The latter is no longer the law of the land; the former still are.
>Though some CHamoru tried to fight the Japanese, the overwhelming narrative holds that American soldiers were the saviors of Guam. Every year on July 21, the island shuts down for the Liberation Day Parade, a grand military procession down Marine Corps Drive to mark the anniversary of Uncle Sam’s return.
This and the following paragraph makes it sound like Guam's residents have been brainwashed into thinking that American soldiers were not, in fact, the saviors of Guam.
>The country wasn’t colloquially referred to as “America” until 1898.
This is so, so, so wrong that I can't even sputter about it.
Small islands are either part of bigger countries, or are protected by them. There is no alternative. One does not have to like it to accept it as the only realistic outcome. If Guam were not American, it would today be a Chinese possession with the entirety of its surface area garrisoned. Without the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans in the Pacific War, the Japanese rapes of native Guamian women would have continued forever.
The native-born citizens in the Committee of Safety [0] were almost all second and third generation descendants of Americans. No ethnic Hawaiians were members.
While the committee was composed of private citizens, they acted with the ultimate goal of annexation with the United States. They were crucially supported by a contingent of US troops that surrounded the palace of the Hawaiian monarchy on the orders of the chief American diplomat, whose interests in annexation aligned with the committee. [1]
0: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Committee_of_Safety_(Hawaii)
1: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overthrow_of_the_Hawaiian_Ki...
So because of their ethnicity, they don't count as "native" Hawaiians despite having been born on the islands with birthright citizenship. Got it.
One begins to understand why they joined the "Committee of Safety" that plotted the overthrow of the monarchy, the same monarchy that was planning to revoke the relatively liberal constitution.
>While the committee was composed of private citizens, they acted with the ultimate goal of annexation with the United States.
Correct. Annexation was something that most people, in the US and in Hawaii, expected during the 19th century would happen eventually. Kamehameha III in the 1850s asked for annexation, but it didn't happen because of US internal politics.
>They were crucially supported by a contingent of US troops that surrounded the palace of the Hawaiian monarchy on the orders of the chief American diplomat, whose interests in annexation aligned with the committee.
US consul John Stevens was a member of the committee that plotted the overthrow of the monarchy. He exploited the time gap between Honolulu and Washington to ask for the soldiers on US Navy ships in the harbor to march off the ships, parade through the city, then march back on. When Washington learned of what Stevens had done he was fired, but it was too late; the queen had been intimidated into surrendering.
And don't even bother to bring up the Blount Report, because I can bring up the Morgan Report. My larger point is to, when discussing something you obviously didn't know anything about before today, not try to refute someone else by citing superficial readings of Wikipedia articles that you, again, had never looked at before today and go "A-ha! Got you!" Just don't.
One of the first things you learn when you spend time in Hawaii is that you don't call yourself a Hawaiian unless you have indigenous roots. These were white Western businessmen with strong American ties. They represented a small minority of Hawaiian nationals, the vast majority of which were ethnically Hawaiian. [0]
0: https://hawaiiankingdom.org/info-census1890.shtml
And please don't make unfounded assumptions about my experience and knowledge of Hawaiian history.
I am aware of how widespread this blatantly racist practice is, yes.
>And please don't make unfounded assumptions about my experience and knowledge of Hawaiian history.
Taking you at your word, no doubt you are also a supporter of Kamehameha's admissions practices. There's a reason why the Bishop estate has consistently settled lawsuits challenging said practices despite the enormous financial cost; it knows very well that it will lose, both in the courts and in the court of national public opinion.
(This is now when you rush to Wikipedia to look up "Kamehameha School" and "Bishop Estate".)