Yankee, Go Home!
By Robert Higgs • Saturday September 3, 2011 3:23 PM PDT • 31 Comments
After the Japanese government surrendered to the Americans and their allies in 1945, the U.S. military occupied the Japanese home islands and ruled the nation for several years. In due course, however, Japan’s situation was normalized, and, moreover, in 1946 the Japanese adopted a new constitution that renounced war as an instrument of national policy:
CHAPTER II: RENUNCIATION OF WAR
Article 9:Aspiring sincerely to an international peace based on justice and order, the Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes. 2) In order to accomplish the aim of the preceding paragraph, land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained. The right of belligerency of the state will not be recognized.
Major U.S. Military Bases in Japan
At that point, Japan no longer represented a threat, or even a potential threat, to the United States, apart from the threat that developed later that the Japanese would sell American consumers superior automobiles and consumer electronics, among other things.
Yet the Yankees never left Japan. Their military installations remain there today, sixty-six years after Japan’s surrender. These bases are staffed by some 36,000 U.S. military personnel and more than 5,000 American civilians employed by the U.S. Department of Defense.
About three-quarters of the U.S. military bases in Japan are located on the islands of Okinawa, where the fiercest battle of the Pacific war occurred in the spring of 1945, causing horrendous losses on both sides, including many thousands of civilian deaths, and the destruction of about 90 percent of the islands’ buildings.
As if the wartime devastation were not enough, the American military personnel on Okinawa since 1945 have made themselves a chronic nuisance to the local populace, perpetrating crimes that range from automobile-related incidents, such as hit and run, to assaults and rapes. U.S. aircraft sometimes crash into civilian areas. Most Okinawans devoutly desire that these unwelcome, seemingly permanent American occupiers would get out.
U.S. Military Bases in Okinawa
And well they should; indeed, they should have done so a long time ago.
Yet, many well-placed U.S. officials and public-opinion molders have insisted, and continue to insist, that even if Japan does not threaten the United States, maintenance of U.S. forces in Japan serves to protect Americans from other threats, such as that posed by China. However, the idea that the Chinese, who rely on Americans to purchase a large share of their exports and who currently own more than $1 trillion of U.S. Treasury securities, would wish to attack the United States militarily seems more preposterous by the day. This far-fetched tale is, however, the sort of story that neocons enjoy telling their children at bedtime, when the little tykes have tired of the one about the impending Iranian nuclear strike.
Keeping U.S. military forces in Japan, like keeping them nearly everywhere else they are kept around the world, serves primarily to preserve the global empire of bases that gives U.S. generals and admirals plush commands and U.S. policymakers at the Pentagon and the State Department something to toy with when they are running out of ideas about how to make the world poorer and more dangerous. At the same time, though, the U.S. government, which must borrow 40 percent of the dollars it spends and whose once-riskless securities have begun the descent toward junk status, must expend hundreds of billions every year to maintain its imperial forces abroad. Even if these foreign bases had a genuine rationale, which for the most part they do not, the simple fact is that the government can no longer afford to maintain them.
The solution ought to be obvious: Yankee, go home!
Tags: American History, Budget and Tax Policy, Defense, Imperialism, Japan, Military, Peace, Power, The State, War 
“At that point, Japan no longer represented a threat, or even a potential threat, to the United States, apart from the threat that developed later that the Japanese would sell American consumers superior automobiles and consumer electronics, among other things.”
It ought to be obvious that the Japanese constitution rendered the state, as such, non existent. The Yankees never went home because they were there to protect the new corporatocracy that was to become Japan’s future. A trial run for what they are doing to us now. Japan is one of the most unfree societies in the world. It just isn’t their government that is oppressing them.
Seth | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
The crux of your article, Bob, seems to be relying on one dubious assumption: that the Japanese would have forever renounced war as a means of national policy had the United States not occupied them, and that since the Japanese government renounced war, that it can be trusted. I will go as far to say that, should the Americans leave, CH 2, Art. 9 of the Japanese constitution would be either repealed, or “legal” means found to circumvent it (the same way most of the US Constitution is currently circumvented). Governments are governments, and the Japanese government is no exception to this rule. What I am saying is the Japanese government has behaved itself internationally because of the US occupation. What I am NOT saying is that the US government should stay in Japan. I agree that the US should leave immediately. One government’s misbehavior does not justify another government’s misbehavior. Two wrong never make a right. That said, if the US government pulls its troops out of Japan, I give the Japanese government less than ten years before they violate their own constitution, or repeal the prohibition of war. it is the nature of the beast whether that beast was born in Japan or born in the USA.
PaulTheCabDriver | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
You are making grave, simple-minded errors regarding your geopolitics.
Praxeology predicts Imperialism and war or the threat of war. Most prominently, if one State or alliance of states doesn’t dominate, another will.
Pete McAlpine | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
@Pete
OK, let’s pretend that Russia, China, the U.S., England, Australia, and other big and/or powerful countries decided to stop being imperialistic. Does that mean that we’d eventually see Zimbabwe “dominate” if the others bowed out? You are making grave and simple-minded errors regarding your logic.
Michael | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
Agree completely. Thanks for the article. The only way out of this mess is to vote for Ron Paul in 2012. He is the only one who will stop this madness of empire.
Ken | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
What you say may be true, but whether one wishes to maintain — or dismantle — the American Empire, it doesn’t really matter.
It WILL be dismantled at some unknown point in the future by the simple laws of economics.
Bruce | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
P.S. My comment was directed at Pete.
Bruce | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
So immoral foreign imperialism is justified because someone else would do it?
phil | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
It’s the method of “domination” that most find troubling and I can see where objection to such methods would seem simpleminded to the shortsighted.
Praxeology predicts state aggression and, empirically speaking, they are a historical indicator that a state is no longer able to address necessity internally in any way other than to assimilate and/or eliminate other competing states/ideas in order to stave off its own inevitable internal collapse.
Praxeology predicts, necessity dictates.
Ignatius Crumwald | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
I suppose Mr. McAlpine believes we should never forget 12/7. Perhaps all persons of Japanese descent should be placed in internment camps so McAlpine will feel safe.
Tom Blanton | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
Mr. McAlpine,
Interesting that you should find my statements erroneous in the light of praxeology. I favor a policy of peace, free trade, and free flows of financial and other resources across national borders, and I oppose military imperialism. These are the same views espoused by Ludwig von Mises, the inventor and greatest developer of praxeology.
Robert Higgs | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
Of course the imperialists would love a conflict with China. How better to default on your obligations and paint the US government for the ponzi scheme that it is.
David | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
It is obvious that Mr. McAlpine has opened the door to our way of thinking but has not stepped through the threshold completely. He may be using this new(to him) train of thought to justify an aggressive US foreign policy. There was a time that I did this as well. Give him time, as with me, and he will cross that threshold into our way of thinking by continuing a critical thought process in the light of Austrian School thinking.
Scott Ayers | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
Love it, just as the Soviets never intended to bomb us during the Cold War (it was no accident that the USAF put all our warheads under Missouri and Kansas-the Russian bread basket), the Chinese have no intention of bombing us. And, face it, we are arming our military to face that Soviet threat while we remain the monolithic force that was unable to combat Vietnamese guerrillas in the late 60s. We had a “peace dividend” in the 90s that caused the military industrial pocketbooks to suffer, we should have a “global trade” dividend now-it’s the least we should expect given the only answer certain politicians can give us regarding outsourcing is to demand wage protections be dropped
Cindy | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
I don’t think Mises claimed to have invented or even named praxeology, Dr Higgs.
Cal Engime | Sep 4, 2011 | Reply
Let them dominate by selling us superior automobiles and electronics. That would be fine with me. Dr. Higgs is not saying that we should not have national defense. On the contrary, he is saying we have the exact opposite of that and it is against everyone’s interests, including ours.
bill | Sep 5, 2011 | Reply
Let Asia dominate Asia. We have enough problems of our own to worry about. Japan can defend itself if they desire without military welfare from us. And if you think Japan’s not sitting on a few nukes, naive is all I can say. They are a bit on the sneaky side & certainly not as stupid as American liberals & neocons would have us believe.
kromburner | Sep 5, 2011 | Reply
Thanks, Higgs!
ralph | Sep 5, 2011 | Reply
I did not say that Mises claimed to have invented or named praxeology. I identified him as praxeology’s inventor and greatest developer. I may be wrong about his having invented it; if so, please tell me who did invent it. I can’t recall ever seeing Mises identify someone else as the inventor of praxeology. In any event, I stand by my statement that he was praxeology’s greatest developer.
Robert Higgs | Sep 5, 2011 | Reply
It still baffles the mind that an argument can be made so soundly and there are still those that disagree. Dr. Higgs even slays the bogeyman of China that the Neocons so quickly draw like a gun whenever someone threatens to take away their bloodsport. Whenever I’m treated to a round of “If we cut one dollar out of the defense budget, the Chinese will be storming the beaches of San Diego”, I often answer that if we don’t cut the offense budget, they’ll just foreclose. Great article Dr. Higgs!
CTC 80 | Sep 5, 2011 | Reply
Sooner or later this debate will come down how close to home events get. I think eventually Libertarians will have to admit they’re as crass as the rest of us. They say they’re all for peace, but just try to take what they own and see what happens. It’ll be howitzers, bazookas, and nukes. The difference is this – I have to be willing to defend their right to property They refuse to accept any responsibility for me to keep mine. In other words I must be willing to defend their right to keep property and they skate clean and free.
It must be nice!
Phil Dillon | Sep 6, 2011 | Reply
Mr. Dillon,
I’m not sure of the connection between your comment and what I wrote. Protection of my property or yours is one thing; the U.S. government’s maintenance of a worldwide empire of military bases and a quasi-imperialistic system of economic and military hegemony is something else altogether. The U.S. government’s maintentance of troops and bases in Japan contributes exactly zilch to the protection of my property, life, and liberties; on the contrary.
I’m not asking you to protect my property. I ask you, and everyone else, only to respect my natural rights to life, liberty, and property — and to refrain from supporting the actions of a government that routinely overrides these rights. I will happily respect the same rights of yours and everyone else. I cannot speak for libertarians as a group or indeed for anyone except myself; I can only say that have no desire to free ride on someone else’s sacrifice of money or other resources.
The beginning of wisdom in thinking about the U.S. military, it seems to me, is to understand that what these forces do has virtually no genuine connection with protecting my rights to life, liberty, or property. Anyone who thinks differently has been sold a bill of goods by people who seek only their own interests, at the expense of yours, mine, and most other people’s.
Robert Higgs | Sep 7, 2011 | Reply
Making the world poorer and more dangerous sums things up perfectly.
Marc | Sep 7, 2011 | Reply
Mr. Dillon, you are confusing Libertarians with Anarchists... there is a difference. Libertarian = small constitutionally limited government / Anarchist = no government. And yes, defense and a court system, among others, are part of a libertarian vision of governance, so rest assured your rights will be protected under libertarian governance. It’s a simple mistake, and given the condition of our education system, not a surprising mistake at all…
All, Mr. McAlpine’s statement is correct, but before you attack me as you have attacked him, please note that neither he, nor I have written anything that states that the US should be in Japan. I agree with Mr. Higgs assessment that we must leave and the sooner the better, but that does not change the fact that it is naive to believe that Japan could not become a threat at some foreseeable point in the future. I do find that doubtful given their ability to produce superior products and sell them to us, but it is a possibility. However, EVERY nation has the potential to be a threat to any other nation. As we cannot occupy every nation, I recommend we occupy only one…
Need I remind anyone that Germany was forbidden the ability to make war after WWI???
The winner of today’s comment award however goes to PaulTheCabDriver
joe4liberty | Sep 8, 2011 | Reply
On page 3 of the 1998 release of Human Action by Ludwig von Mises in fn# 1″the term Praxeology was first used in1890 by Espinas...”
Harold K Wiebusch | Sep 8, 2011 | Reply