June 27, 2008
Q: The Japanese public view of service members and civilians living in Japan is an ongoing effort. This effort is being crushed by Eagle 810 radio commercials. Last weekend while in a store outside the gate I could hear Eagle 810 on the store radio, the commercial was talking about “225-ride” and used the words “you drunk stumbling boobs” to describe the service members. There were a few Japanese teenagers listening and one who repeated what he heard (drunk stumbling boobs), they laughed about it. English is a second language here. As I started to listen to Eagle 810 more, it seems they address service members as losers, idiots and drunks, with sound effects of burping. I enjoy Eagle 810, the radio station is heard throughout Japan, and the image they are portraying about our U.S. service members in these commercials is damaging to whoever is listening.

A: Eagle 810 is the primary delivery service of command information for Armed Forces Network Tokyo, broadcasting to and servicing all major military commands on installations throughout the greater metropolitan Tokyo area. One of the highest priority command information items currently is the prevention of alcohol related incidents including drunk driving. The primary age group of offenders for alcohol related incidents tends to lie in the 18-to-24 year old age group, usually first term military service members. Our aim is always to get their attention and try to sell the message, in this case the Yokota 225-RIDE program which provides free rides home to anyone on base who has had too much to drink. Our customers have been pleased with our information campaigns to date and have cited our products as having a positive impact on their efforts to curb and reduce alcohol-related incidents. We are currently in the process of revising our commercial information products so many of our alcohol incident prevention spots will be changing over the next several weeks.