Substantial redeployments of US military forces and assets, triggered by the need for additional troops in Afghanistan and ongoing problems over the US-Japan status-of-forces agreement, are already taking place. Media reports indicate, for example, that nearly 25,000 US marines, soldiers, family members, and civilian employees are to descend on the tiny island of Guam in the next five years to ease the overconcentration of US forces on the Japanese island of Okinawa without pulling back too far from the flashpoints of Taiwan and North Korea.