A howitzer is displayed to the public during a firing drill conducted by the Okinawa-based U.S. Marine Corps at the Ground Self-Defense Force’s Yausubetsu Training Area in Hokkaido on the morning of Oct. 19, 2019.

TOKYO – The spread of the new coronavirus at U.S. military bases is casting a shadow over the relocation of the exercises conducted by the Okinawa-based U.S. Marine Corps to mainland Japan. The Ministry of Defense (MOD) announced yesterday that the Marine Corps will cancel a live-fire drill using 155-millimeter howitzers it had scheduled to conduct at the Yausubetsu Training Area in Hokkaido in August due to the new coronavirus. In past years, the drill was conducted in Hokkaido with the aim of dispersing the firing exercises “over Prefectural Route 104” of Camp Hansen to the GSDF’s training areas in mainland Japan based on the 1996 Japan-U.S. agreement. The drill has not been conducted this fiscal year. (Abridged)