Shelter Building Plan in Southwestern Islands

Assuming military attack from a foreign country, the government of Japan released a new guideline of building shelters for local communities. It plans to build the shelters, where the residents can hide themselves for a certain period of time in Sakishima Islands, the southernmost islands of Okinawa prefecture including Ishigakijima and Miyakojima. The policy is regarded as preparing for a contingency in Taiwan or development of nuclear weapons and missiles by North Korea.

According to a report of Mainichi Shimbun, the guideline defines the shelter as “special temporary evacuation facility,” which can protect the people from the blast caused by bombings or ballistic missile attacks for around two weeks. A contingency also includes landing of troops for invasion or special operation by guerilla. The government begins consultation with local governments in Sakishima Islands region to build those shelters underground of public facilities. The national government is going to offer financial support for building the shelters.

 

A shelter needs to have solid wall, which separates the shelter from outside, made of reinforced concrete with thirty centimeters or more of thickness. The room for residents requires two square meters of space for an evacuee and a restroom for twenty evacuees. The guideline also requires electric power resource for emergency, ventilator and draining device. The shelter needs to have two entrances distancing each other.

 

The government selected the location for those shelters in isolated islands, which could only be approached by ships and planes. Sakishima Islands, where the local governments have been exercising evacuation drills of protecting the residents. As the result, five cities or towns, Ishigaki, Miyako, Yonaguni, Taketomi and Tarama, were picked up for the first region for new shelters.

 

Although the national government has designated over fifty thousand of facilities in all over Japan as “emergency temporary evacuation facilities,” preparing mainly for natural disasters. However, they are not solid enough to deal with military attacks. There are a few such facilities in Sakishima Islands. Evacuation in Sakishima was anyway included in the three security documents, which the national government decided in December, 2022.

 

Sakishima Islands are located only one hundred and ten kilometers away from Taiwan at the nearest island of Yonaguni. Evacuation of the people in Sakishima Islands, which population amounts to one hundred and twenty thousand, in a contingency is a major concern of Japan’s security policy. There is an argument that the national government should make further diplomatic effort to prevent a military attack from foreign country as a measure for protecting the people.