SNA (Seattle) — For almost two-and-a-half decades, Japan and the United States have insisted that a new US Marine airbase at Henoko—a replacement for Marine Corps Air Station Futenma—is absolutely needed as a solid foundation for the US-Japan Alliance. Last year, however, it was officially revealed that the sea floor where the base is being constructed consists of mayonnaise-soft earth, and that any airstrip built there now could sink into oblivion. This is perhaps a fitting metaphor for the entire misguided initiative that “alliance managers” stubbornly refuse to let go of.

On December 25, the Shinzo Abe government released new public estimates for completing the base and achieving Futenma’s return to Japanese sovereignty. The Defense Ministry knew of the sea floor problem by 2016, but kept it from public view until forced to respond to freedom of information requests in 2018. The new official estimates, including the necessary seafloor reinforcement measures, nearly triple the project’s cost from ¥350 billion to ¥930 billion (US$3.2 billion to US$8.5 billion) and expand the time required for construction from eight years to twelve.

That twelve year clock starts, not now, but at an indeterminate date in the future. As the ground reinforcement work represents a change to the construction plan, the Abe administration cannot proceed without the permission of Okinawa Governor Denny Tamaki—or a court order voiding his refusal.

Tamaki promises to fight the central government tooth and nail, so the start of work could be years away. Thus, assuming the twelve-year figure is based exclusively on objective analysis, Futenma is unlikely to be returned before the mid-2030s. Given that the return was originally promised for about 2002, that would make it over thirty years late.

Assuming that politics played no part in these estimates, however, would be foolhardy. The Asahi Shinbun reports that the new cost estimate “came after a government official expressed a preference that the price tag be kept within the threshold of ¥1 trillion.”

Moreover, as Tokyo Shinbun reported, universities employing three of the engineering experts who approved the new construction plan received large research donations from companies connected to the project. Politics has been central to Tokyo’s thinking, starting with its insistence that Futenma’s replacement be in Okinawa as opposed to the main islands, where political blowback could more easily threaten the Liberal Democratic Party’s hold on power.

Over a year before Tokyo released its estimates, the Okinawa Prefectural Government announced its own projections, also taking the soft ground into account: ¥2.65 trillion (US$24 billion) and over thirteen years for construction. While those figures may have seemed outlandish at the time, they now appear rather sound, especially considering that Tokyo’s cost estimate may have been lowered for public consumption.

Even now, Tokyo refuses to face up to the challenges it will face in reinforcing the soft ground. The drilling barges available for the task in Japan can drive sand piles as deep as 70 meters below sea level, but the soft ground extends to a maximum of 90 meters. The Defense Ministry discounts tests done by one of its contractors that indicate this fact, which it shielded even from its own expert committee.

Considering the stakes, as well as the fact that it is supposed to be branch of government with grave responsibility for securing the well-being of the nation, the Defense Ministry should confirm or refute these findings by performing its own tests in the same area, but that is exactly what it’s so far declined to do, apparently not wanting to pose any scientific questions whose answers it doesn’t want to hear.

It would seem that the Abe administration is prepared to risk presenting the US Marines with an airfield supported by a layer of firm ground to a depth of 70 meters, below which lies, in places, 20 additional meters of unstable ground.

Even the Japan Times, whose new owners and top editors have shown little sympathy for Okinawa’s position, is questioning whether the project is still viable.

The Abe administration, however, shows no sign of backing away from the plan, with Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga declaring for the umpteenth time that it remains “the Only Solution.” Journalist Philip Brasor attributes this to ingrained inertia: “once a project has begun, it is impossible to stop.”

We have yet to hear from the one player in this drama with the unquestionable power to move Japan to abandon the project—the United States.

When asked if Japan had worked with Washington on the new schedule, Defense Minister Taro Kono spoke only of coordination “from now on.”

Even if the United States had no advance notice of the major delay, it should not have come as a shock. The Pentagon was surely aware of the soft ground problem, and even earlier had departed from Tokyo’s project completion estimates. In February 2016, when Japan was affirming a target of Fiscal Year 2022 (ending April 2023), Harry Harris, then head of the US Pacific Command, told Congress that “it was going to be done by 2023; now we’re looking at 2025 before that’s done.” Nonetheless, it’s hard to imagine the Pentagon is pleased to hear that it will be closer to 2035.

Robert Eldridge, who worked in external affairs for the Okinawa Marines until he was fired for leaking a video to a far-right news outlet in an effort to discredit anti-base protesters, suggests in a recent piece for Japan Times that virtually everyone involved in the Henoko dispute are effectively grifters and fools. He writes that, while US alliance managers “decried the incompetence of Tokyo after the recent reports,” the delay is no loss for the US Marines, who can keep on using the “infinitely better” and “more strategically sound” Futenma indefinitely.

The degree to which Eldridge reflects the official US government view is questionable, but for the US Marines to have such an attitude is entirely plausible.

Staying at Futenma into the 2030s or beyond, however, means the airbase would continue to endanger the people of Ginowan, which is a danger that even Abe, seeking to justify the Henoko plan, has acknowledged. It would also belie both countries’ endlessly touted commitment to reducing the burden of US military bases on Okinawa.

In any case, signs of a possible fissure can be inferred from the fact that, despite Suga’s continuing invocation of “the Only Solution,” that particular phrase, which had become a mainstay of US-Japan joint statements, was absent from the readout of US Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Defense Minister Kono’s January 14 meeting. It said only that “the Ministers committed to work together closely to implement US forces realignment initiatives, including construction of the Futenma Replacement Facility.”

The delay in construction could have repercussions in the sphere of US politics.

To date, aside from presidents and members of Congress who toe the line that Henoko is “the Only Solution,” almost no politician—even among presidential candidates now vowing to end “forever wars”—has been willing to speak up on the issue. They likely view it as one with risks and few rewards.

However, the project’s likely delay to the 2030s or beyond may finally shift that calculus. Even for politicians unmoved by the injustice of imposing a base upon an unwilling Okinawa, and even for those unaware of the evidence contradicting the strategic necessity of Futenma, or any replacement military base within Okinawa, it is now possible to call for abandoning the Henoko project as a boondoggle that may never be completed.

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