Why are we in Okinawa?

In this compelling history, award-winning journalist, Jon Mitchell, traces how the islands of Okinawa have been annexed by Japan, occupied by the United States and now menaced by China. In response, Okinawans have developed one of the world's most resilient - yet overlooked - pacifist movements. Once a wealthy kingdom, Okinawa was seized by Japan in the late-19th century and, after World War II, abandoned to US colonial rule. For twenty-seven years, residents were denied civil and labor rights, but their non-violent resistance grew so strong that, in 1972, they forced the return of the islands to Japanese control. Today, thirty-one US bases dominate a land mass smaller than Rhode Island and Okinawans remain Japan's poorest people. Tensions are rising as China questions Japan's control of Okinawa and fires missiles into nearby seas. Angry at being pawns in the play of greater powers, islanders resist through mass protests, music, comedy and art. Okinawa offers an inspirational model of grassroots democracy and civic engagement for the rest of Japan and beyond.

Jon Mitchell is an investigative journalist based in Japan and recipient of the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan's Freedom of the Press Lifetime Achievement Award. An expert in the US Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), his scoops often top the front pages and TV news in Japan - and they have featured in reports for the US Congress. Author of four acclaimed Japanese books about Okinawa, in 2021, Mitchell's first English book, Poisoning the Pacific: The US Military's Secret Dumping of Plutonium, Chemical Weapons, and Agent Orange, was a winner in the Society of Environmental Journalists' annual awards. In 2023, he received Japan's most prestigious journalism prize, the Ishibashi Tanzan Memorial Journalism Award for public service.

Foreword: Challenging the Projects of Empires An Introduction 1. The Ryukyu Kingdom: A Bridge of Nations 2. Disposal, Discrimination, and Diaspora 3. The Storm of Iron 4. Forgotten Island 5. Showcases of Democracy 6. The Vietnam War in Okinawa 7. Reversion 8. Broken Promises 9. Relieving the Burden 10. All Okinawa vs. Japan and the United States 11. Islands of Peace? Coda: So Why Are We Really in Okinawa?