Japanese premier resigns two weeks after Okinawa airbase decision

Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, who ended five decades of single-party rule when he swept to power in August but stumbled when he confronted the country’s longtime ally, the United States, resigned Wednesday, Washington Post reports. He opposed moving the Futenma U.S. Marine Corps airbase from a populated part of Okinawa to a more isolated part of the island saying that he would prefer it if the Marines left Okinawa altogether. But he never came up with a different solution. And after months of battling with the White House, the Pentagon and the State Department, during which U.S. officials, including President Obama, questioned his trustworthiness to his face, Hatoyama finally gave in two weeks ago.