People of Pagan and Tinian to take their appeal directly to Obama to save islands’ rare ecosystems from ‘irreparable damage’ and residents from forced relocation

If the Pentagon gets its way, a pair of idyllic Pacific islands have just two years before their tranquillity is pierced by the roar of US B-52 bombers, fighter jets and artillery fire.



Faced with the destruction of their homeland, residents are to take their appeal directly to Barack Obama in an attempt to block US military plans to turn Tinian and Pagan – US territories that form part of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands – into a simulated theatre of war.



Facebook Twitter Pinterest Pagan, one of the Northern Mariana Islands. Photograph: Alamy

Campaigners say the arrival of thousands of navy seamen and marines on the tiny islands would obliterate rare coral ecosystems and wildlife, and force some residents to relocate.

Juanita Mendiola, a local resident, said the US military would do “irreparable damage” to the islands’ people and environment.



“These little islands cannot be the only alternative,” she told the Guardian. “There is no justification in taking small islands with very little resources … and destroying them for military purposes.”



The islands, located north of the US Pacific territories of Guam and Saipan, are home to pristine black sand beaches and rare animal species that experts say would not survive the arrival of troops and their hardware.



A change.org campaign has so far attracted more than 109,000 signatures; the petition will be presented to the US president once it reaches 150,000.



Resistance to a US military “invasion” among residents – who are American citizens – has intensified since the US navy proposed using all of Pagan, which is largely uninhabited, and two-thirds of Tinian for live-fire exercises at least 16 weeks a year.

The marines are among about 8,000 US troops who will be moved from the southern Japanese island of Okinawa and sent to Guam and other US Pacific territories under a controversial relocation agreement between Tokyo and Washington.



Some of Tinian’s 3,000 residents own homes on land already leased to the US military and fear the arrival of troops could force them to leave or squeeze into the 10 sq miles of the island that will be left for civilian use.



The whole of Pagan, a 10-mile-long island that has been uninhabited since a volcanic eruption in 1981, would be turned into a simulated war zone to enable troops to prepare for possible confrontations sparked by increasingly assertive Chinese claims on islands in the East and South China Seas.



The US defence department seized on Pagan as a potential site after public opposition forced local officials to abandon plans to turn it into a dumping ground for debris created by the March 2011 tsunami in north-east Japan.



Facebook Twitter Pinterest US soldier on hillside overlooking Tinian town. Photograph: Alamy

Last month, the Pentagon released a 1,300-page draft environmental impact assessment in which it said it “would seek to acquire a real estate interest for the entire island of Pagan”.



“The US is rebalancing military forces in the Asia-Pacific region,” it said. “In support of this, the US military is proposing to increase joint military training capabilities by developing live-fire ranges and training areas on the islands of Tinian and Pagan.”



The mayor of Pagan and other neighbouring islands, Jerome Aldan, said residents of the islands were “100%” opposed to the live drills.



Aldan said that 50 families evacuated from Pagan after a volcanic eruption still hoped to return. Although the island had no permanent residents, people returned temporarily to fish and farm.



“Our history goes back as far as the 1300s, and the military keeps coming out and stating in every press conference or document that the island is uninhabited, but that’s not really true,” Aldan added. “There are a lot of people who consider Pagan island their homeland.”

“We are mere guardians of a legacy left behind by our ancestors and we are entrusted to keep these islands safe for future generations,” he added.



Under the plan, hundreds of marines would simulate battles on Pagan’s beaches and in its forests, possibly alongside allies such as Australia and Japan, as part of Obama’s mission to pivot US forces towards the Asia-Pacific.



“This is a perfect training opportunity for us,” Craig Whelden, executive director of Marine Corps forces in the Pacific, told the Los Angeles Times. “It’s also a beautiful island with some endangered species. We would protect it like it was our own.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Two US Marine Corps aircraft participate in a military exercise in 2014 in Tinian. Photograph: Alamy

“The economy is going to benefit. There’s going to be hundreds of millions of dollars in construction contracts, and to the extent we can use local contractors, use local food, it will maximise the benefits.”



Pagan, which housed a Japanese air force unit during the second world war, is home to rare indigenous wildlife – including fruit bats and tree snails – that would be at risk of extinction from the live-fire exercises, said Mike Hadfield, a professor emeritus of biology at the University of Hawaii who conducted fieldwork on the island.



Despite military occupation by the Japanese and the 1981 eruption of Mount Pagan – which forced the permanent evacuation of 300 indigenous Chamorro people to Saipan 200 miles away – Hadfield and his team found a “biological treasure trove”.



“I came away knowing that I had been to a beautiful place with biological richness,” he told the Guardian. “Anyone who believes the US marines and navy when they say they’ll leave the place better than they found it must be slightly crazy.”



The Republican governor of the Northern Marianas, Eloy Inos, has yet to decide if he will back the Pentagon or residents. Locals say he is weighing up protests from indigenous groups and environmentalists against lucrative construction contracts that could boost the island chain’s flagging economy.



“Pressure is being applied in Washington but the key is to get the ear of President Obama,” Hadfield said. “The people of the Mariana Islands don’t want this. It is far from a done deal.”





