Pacific Magazine > Daily News

Marshalls In Showdown With U.S. Over Kwajalein

By Giff Johnson on Majuro
Friday: April 18, 2008

Unhappy Marshall Islanders who host the Pentagon’s most important missile testing base say they’d rather lose $20 million than sign an unfair deal to extend American use of the facility to 2086. The standoff could result in the U.S. shutting down a testing range that has been at the center of so-called “Star Wars” and theater missile defense development.

A special escrow account has been building up since the end of 2003 with rent money for landowners at the Reagan Test Site at Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands that this week totals $18.4 million. The fund by the December 18 deadline for signing a new pact will top $20.5 million. The funds are the difference in rental rates from the existing lease, which expires in 2016, and a newer disputed agreement for extended use of the base.

“If there is no signed land use agreement (LUA) by December 18, 2008, the money in escrow plus interest will be returned to the U.S. Treasury,” U.S. Ambassador to the Marshall Islands Clyde Bishop said Thursday. “Once the money is returned to the U.S. Treasury, there will be no way to retrieve such funds in connection with any eventual agreement on an amended or new LUA.”

Kwajalein Senator and traditional chief Michael Kabua said that landowners “just want a fair deal.” But he made it clear that the landowners aren¹t going to jump for the $20 million if it means signing the current deal on the table.

The dispute at this multi-billion dollar U.S. facility in the western Pacific is over a mere $4 million a year: the landowners want $19 million annually in rent; the U.S. is paying $15 million. Five years ago, the U.S. and Marshall Islands governments signed a deal to extend U.S. use of Kwajalein to 2086, but approval of the landowners is required by the
country¹s Constitution since all land here is privately owned.

There is virtually no anti-American sentiment in this former American colony. Indeed, Kabua said if the U.S. meets the rent demand, it can stay at Kwajalein forever.

Landowners just want more money for use of their boomerang-shaped coral atoll that acts as the catcher’s mitt for missiles launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California and from submarines in the Pacific.

“We want a deal that is good for the U.S., good for the Marshall Islands and good for the landowners,” Kabua said. “That¹s what we¹re looking for.”

But with all discussions stalemated on a new land use agreement since a new Compact of Free Association was signed between Washington and Majuro, the Marshall Islands capital, in 2003, the landowners still waiting for a landowner-friendly government that was elected in January to put forth a new proposal on the Kwajalein rent situation to the U.S. for review, and the U.S. cutting back its operations at the missile range, reaching a new agreement over the next eight months won’t be easy.

Landowners’ unhappiness over the U.S. rental offer is exacerbated by deteriorating health and social conditions on the over-crowded island of Ebeye where the landowners live.

“The situation at Ebeye could further deteriorate into a disaster if no immediate action and resources are provided to stabilize the increasingly fragile infrastructure and other essential systems,” said the government¹s Chief Secretary Casten Nemra in a report this week proposing to spend $4.7 million to fix broken power, sewage, and fresh water systems for the 12,000 islanders who live packed into the 80-acre island.

And last week, the U.S. Army laid off 7 percent of islanders who work at the base -- the first of planned cutbacks that will see the Marshall Islands and American workforces slashed by about 30 percent over the next four years.

In the absence of a new land use agreement by December 18, the U.S. government must tell the U.S. Congress what it plans to do at Kwajalein, including plans to shut down the base.

“If no amended or new LUA exists by December 18, 2008, operationally, the U.S. ambassador to the Marshall Islands must submit a report to the president on the recommended intentions of the U.S. with respect to the use of Kwajalein Atoll after 2016,” Ambassador Bishop said. “The president will report to Congress on any plans to relocate activities carried out on Kwajalein Atoll.”

Bishop added: “The amended Compact stipulates that five years after the enactment of the Compact resolution (by the U.S. Congress), if no agreement has been concluded between the government of the Marshall Islands and the landowners of Kwajalein Atoll, the funds held in escrow shall be returned to the U.S. Treasury.”

While the $18.4 million sitting in escrow is an enticing carrot, Kabua said it won’t get the landowners to change their minds about the current U.S. offer. “Everyone on Kwajalein understands that the escrow money was put there as a carrot to get the landowners to approve the Compact extension of U.S. use at the missile testing range² to 2066 and beyond,” he said.

“We won¹t jump just because money is there,” Kabua said. “I’ve talked to the people (of Kwajalein) and they¹re very strong.”

Still, Kabua said he remains optimistic that a new agreement can be reached by the deadline. “If we sit down and talk things out I hope that we can come up with something we all agree is fair for everyone,” he said. “The point is we want fair.”