Word: ryukyu
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...Okinawans, the special treatment afforded U.S. service members is symbolic of a deeper problem. The bases represent the latest face of the hard fate that Okinawa has endured since the once independent kingdom, the heart of the Ryukyu island chain, was annexed by Japan in 1879. The Japanese then tried with partial success to exterminate the local culture and language. Toward the end of World War II, 150,000 local people--nearly a third of the population--and 12,520 U.S. troops and 100,000 Japanese soldiers died there in the bloodiest of the campaigns in the Pacific...