Thesis advisor: Franziska Seraphim / This dissertation locates post-occupation Japan and U.S.-occupied Okinawa during the period between 1952 and 1972 within global and transnational histories of extraterritoriality. The subject of the historical inquiry is the politics surrounding the postwar U.S. policy of retaining extraterritorial jurisdiction over criminal cases involving its military personnel and locals in Japan and Okinawa. The primary objective is to historicize the U.S. Department of Defense’ seven-decades-long policy of maximizing national jurisdiction over its service members’ cases committed on foreign soil as well as contemporary Japanese attitudes toward ongoing public debates about Article 17 (criminal jurisdiction provision) of the 1960 Japan-U.S. Status of Forces Agreement. Based on archival documents collected in Okinawa, Japan, and the United States, I demonstrate how the racialized notions of civilization rooted in nineteenth-century western—and particularly U.S.—supremacy drove the rationale for the postwar American military legal regime of exception and invoked varied reactions to it. This dissertation highlights vertical interactions between state policymaking and local/transnational grassroots responses in occupied Okinawa and post-occupation Japan in order to show how U.S. diplomacy manifested on the ground, and how it coped with various forms of resistance and made adjustments in response. Over the two decades beginning with Japan’s recovery of sovereignty in 1952 and ending with Okinawa’s reversion to Japan in 1972, the triangular relationship underwent a process of negotiation over each entity’s legal and political subjecthood. Japanese civil society mobilized a nationalist protest movement against the specter of postwar U.S. extraterritoriality in the immediate aftermath of the Allied occupation asserting the integrity of territorial sovereignty. The lingering tensions between U.S. exceptionalism and Japanese nationalism were defused in the late-1950s as the Eisenhower administration decided to reduce the colossal presence of U.S. armed forces on the Japanese archipelago. In U.S.-occupied Okinawa (1945-1972), the islanders’ resistance to “extraterritorial” military justice also generated popular fronts. Yet, in contrast to the Japanese resistance which by and large relied on the Euro-centric Westphalian principle of national sovereignty, Okinawans came to employ the egalitarian spirit of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the mid-1950s to demand legal justice and proper compensation even under military rule. As most U.S. military bases in Japan were moved to tiny Okinawa resulting from Washington’s realignment of U.S. armed forces in Asia in the late 1950s and thereafter, Okinawans’ protest against U.S. military incidents evolved in parallel with their institutionalization of popular human rights activism, and the process invigorated the consolidation of political forces for reversion. My research finds that as Japanese, American, and Third World activists joined Okinawans in solidarity as they all protested the postwar American military legal regime of exception, a new meaning of “civilization” was born through collective appeals for the rule of law and universal human rights that had long-term consequences even as Okinawa was integrated into the Japan-U.S. Status of Forces Agreement in 1972. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2021. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: History.

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This dissertation investigates the various levels at which the multi-scaled dynamics of war take shape in the everyday, embodied lives of the people whose job it is to produce it—soldiers and their families and communities at and around Ft. Hood, in central Texas. As the largest military installation in the world and the single biggest point of deployment to Iraq and Afghanistan for all U.S. forces, Ft. Hood and its surround may represent the greatest single concentration of Americans directly involved in the production of global military force outside of Iraq, Kuwait and Afghanistan. The repercussions of war and routinized war-making extend throughout the lives of the people who inhabit, serve and surround the base. The length, scale and distinct character of the Iraq War have exposed these soldiers and their family members to new and chronic hardships and forms of vulnerability, including the stresses of longer and more frequent tours, unprecedented rates of posttraumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury, overburdened institutional supports, and an abundance of extreme characterizations of soldiers in American public culture. These vulnerabilities are bodily and affective, intersubjective and shared, and bases for scrutiny and recognition. I base my analysis on the difficult and distinctive role that the soldier occupies as at once the agent, instrument and object of state violence. The soldier’s life is simultaneously shaped by discipline, empowered by the right to kill, and allowed to be exposed to harm and death. I use soldiers’ “exceptional” status as a starting point for understanding the dense sets of material, institutional, discursive, and social relations in which they are embedded. The dissertation chapters are organized around broad themes that emerged from my informants’ words, actions and experiences and that capture the impacts of war across diverse arenas of everyday life. I treat each theme as a field within which to explore not merely the effects of war, but its lived affects—-the “feelings” of war that are the variously sensory, psychic and emotional imprints of the everyday, organized production of military violence. / text

Approved for public release; distribution in unlimited. / The thesis studies the Israel Defense Forces' (IDF) transformation in the context of the U.S. military transformation. The thesis argues that the uniqueness of the U.S. military transformation does not prevent other militaries from applying the relevant concepts and considers the IDF as a good candidate for such a demonstration. Therefore, the thesis explores the U.S. military transformation as a model to be benefited in the IDF's continuing transformation. The thesis also studies IDF from many perspectives to identify the transformational imperatives and the relevance of the current IDF transformational efforts. Main areas of interest are the Israeli security environment, societal transformation, and the features of the IDF's transformational efforts. During the analysis, the thesis discovers weak points concerning, both, the U.S. military transformation and the IDF's current organization. The examination of the IDF's transformation in relation to the U.S. transformation reveals similarities between the two transformations and comes up with recommendations, primarily for the IDF, but to a lesser extent for the U.S. military. / First Lieutenant, Turkish Army

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Hospitality Management and Dietetics / Junehee Kwon / The purpose of this study was to assess the food choices and consumption of soldiers and their satisfaction with current and initial military training (IMT) menu standards through a survey and analysis of food selection and consumption. Participants were recruited during lunch periods before and three weeks after implementing IMT menu standards, which are healthier than current menu standards, in an Army dining facility (DFAC). Direct observations, digital photography, and plate waste methods were used to assess soldiers’ food selection and consumption. A survey was also administered to determine soldiers’ attitudes toward health, nutrition knowledge, reported food selection and consumption behaviors, and overall satisfaction with meals served under the two menu standards. Food selection and consumption were evaluated using the Army’s Go for Green Nutrition Labeling Program and the Military Dietary Reference Intakes (MDRIs). Descriptive and inferential statistics were calculated to summarize and compare data, and to identify potential associations among variables. A total of 172 and 140 soldiers participated before and after the menu change, respectively. Soldiers’ food selection patterns were similar to the proportion of green-, yellow-, and red-labeled items offered in the DFAC under both menu standards and significantly improved after the intervention (p<0.001). Soldiers consumed 886 kcal (38.6% from total fat and 11.2% from saturated fat) and 1784 mg of sodium before the menu change. Three weeks after the change, all figures improved (705 kcals, 31% of kcals from total and 9% from saturated fat, and 1339 mg of sodium) (p<0.01). Overall satisfaction and meal acceptability before and after the intervention were not different, and “food appeal” ratings actually improved. With the exception of sugar-sweetened beverage consumption, attitudes toward health were significantly associated with all reported food behaviors (p<0.01) but not with actual behaviors (p>0.05). Nutrition knowledge significantly influenced some but not all aspects related to attitudes toward health. Perceived hunger levels were positively associated with intakes of calories, protein, total fat, sodium, and cholesterol (p<0.05). Findings suggest that implementing the IMT menu standards in non-trainee Army DFACs is feasible and has the potential to improve the overall healthfulness of soldiers’ food selection and consumption.

A memoir that focuses on the complications of growing as the only daughter of a mother from Okinawa and a father from the United States. They met at a nightclub, where her mother worked as a waitress, outside an Army base, where her father was stationed during U.S. Military occupation of the island. These marriages between Okinawan women and U.S. Servicemen have been quite common since 1945, after the Battle of Okinawa, when a massive complex of bases was first established. Okinawan women must leave their homes and their families to follow their husbands to the United States, where they are faced with challenges of racism, language barriers and isolation. Their children often grow up rejecting and resenting their Okinawan identities, causing further alienation.

In 2002, members of the U.S. Congress requested the Department of Defense (DoD) investigate the issue of 'human trafficking' after Fox News and an ensuing Time Asia article suggested to the American public that their soldiers had been buying the sexual services of women who had been 'trafficked' to work at the clubs in Korean camptowns. The result of the DoD investigation was their adoption of a zero tolerance policy for human trafficking and prostitution. In this thesis I examine why the zero tolerance policy is likely to be as unsuccessful in South Korea as it has been found to be in the Balkans. I do this by exploring two primary questions: (1) has the U.S. military facilitated the prostitution and/or trafficking of women in South Korea?; (2) how do patriarchal constructions of masculinity influence attitudes toward trafficking and prostitution among military commanders and soldiers? To answer these questions, I use a multi-method qualitative approach including a historical analysis of primary and secondary sources, a discourse analysis of letters to the editor in Stars and Stripes newspaper, and a computer-mediated discourse analysis of texts on an online forum for U.S. military in South Korea. Due to questions surrounding the ethics of Internet research, I also examine the Canadian Tri-Council Policy Statement and the Code of Federal Regulations in the United States that covers the 'Protection of Human Subjects' in research. I argue that not all Internet research constitutes research involving 'human subjects'. I further look at current ethics review policies relevant to Internet research and discuss the ways in which ethics review boards can engage in "academic gate-keeping". The findings of my research indicate that the DoD has failed to consider sufficiently the various cultural contexts that USFK members bring with them to South Korea, as well as those they encounter once they are there. Without providing USFK members with the background needed to understand the complex phenomenon of human trafficking, the DoD's policies will do little to affect the most important element in the trafficking nexus in South Korean camptowns, that is, the attitudes and behaviours of USFK members. / Thesis (Master, Education) -- Queen's University, 2009-04-22 17:23:39.409

Despite the picture portraying the U.S as a western, democratic and equal country, the U.S military has faced several downfalls when it comes to its female force, especially in relation to sexual assault. This study poses the question of how can western ‘model countries’ such as the U.S, promote democracy when its military institution seem to miss one of the central pillars to a democratic society that is equality. Furthermore, the study seeks to dive further into the military culture of the U.S military in order to understand if women adjust to the military culture or if the military culture adjusts to the influx of women. By examining narratives of male and female soldiers and veterans, who tell their stories online, this research is conducted as a case study, using Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of cultural capital and Judith Butler’s theory of performative gender as an analytical tool in order to recontextualize the findings and gain a further understanding of the military culture from an inside perspective. In conclusion, the study essentially confirms the notion of the military constituting a male centered culture, as well as a crowd oriented culture, which contributes to females adjusting to the culture rather than it adjusting to the influx of women. In addition to this, gender equality is perceived as something applied by actors from the outside when it is convenient or solely talked about with respect to physical capabilities. Ultimately, research in relation to the U.S military needs to include a focus on culture in order for it to change and become gender equal.

Operation Iraqi Freedom launched with the backing of U.S. Coalition Forces (CF) on March 20, 2003 to remove Saddam Hussein from power. The United States occupied Iraq by bombing and cleansing Iraq of weapons (Dahabour 105-130). During the first year of occupation U.S. soldiers at the detention facility Abu Ghraib tortured detainees in their charge. This torture becomes known to the public through worldwide media coverage in May 2004. My thesis will cover my service as a Military Police officer (MP) at Abu Ghraib from December 2005-August 2006. During my tour of duty at Abu Ghraib I was required to complete the military goals for success which conflicted with some of my own beliefs and moral values. In this thesis I write an autobiographical description of my nine months of duty as an MP at the U.S. military Forward Operating Base (FOB) Abu Ghraib. I use my own photographs to recreate the environment as vividly as possible for my story. This thesis helps to explain some of the frustrations that U.S. military personnel experience. The U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) needs to conduct, and implement research on how to prevent military personnel from torturing detainees. After the research is conducted the DOD needs to implement that research in detainee operations. That includes a need for more realistic detainee operations training that emphasizes not torturing detainees, and it should be the standard for all the U.S. military branches.

This project explores the military and political mobilization of rural and urban working sectors of Puerto Rican society as the Island transitioned from Spanish to U.S. imperial rule. In particular, my research is interested in examining how this shift occurs via patterns of inclusion-exclusion within the military and the various forms of citizenship that are subsequently transformed into socio-economic and political enfranchisement. Analyzing the armed forces as a culture-homogenizing agent helps to explain the formation and evolution of Puerto Rican national identities from 1868 to 1952, and how these evolving identities affected the political choices of the Island. This phenomenon, I argue, led to the creation of the Estado Libre Asociado in 1952. The role played by the tens of thousands of Puerto Ricans in the metropolitan military in the final creation of a populist project taking place under colonial rule in the Island was threefold. Firstly, these soldiers served as political leverage during WWII to speed up the decolonization process. Secondly, they incarnated the commonwealth ideology by fighting and dying in the Korean War. Finally, the Puerto Rican soldiers filled the ranks of the army of technicians and technocrats attempting to fulfill the promises of a modern industrial Puerto Rico after the returned from the wars. In contrast to Puerto Rican popular national mythology and mainstream academic discourse that has marginalized the agency of subaltern groups; I argue that the Puerto Rican soldier was neither cannon fodder for the metropolis nor the pawn of the Creole political elites. Regaining their masculinity, upward mobility, and political enfranchisement were among some of the incentives enticing the Puerto Rican peasant into military service. The enfranchisement of subaltern sectors via military service ultimately created a very liberal, popular, and broad definition of Puerto Rico’s national identity. When the Puerto Rican peasant/soldier became the embodiment of the Commonwealth formula, the political leaders involved in its design were in fact responding to these soldiers’ complex identities, which among other things compelled them to defend the “American Nation” to show their Puertorriqueñidad.