Guam: a tiny island that's making big news.

While watching the news at a local watering hole, the story about North Korea threatening to bomb Guam appeared. A friend of mine said "Big deal. What's so special about Guam?"

I was then I realized that perhaps not a lot of people know what Guam means to the US.

Hence...this post.

Guam is a small island, with all of 210 square miles of land, and a population of about 162,000.

In 1950, Guam was declared an unincorporated organized territory of the United States. That's fancy talk for saying Guamanians were now US citizens, but couldn't vote.

Guam has two major industries supporting it. The first is, of course, tourism.

Most of its tourist traffic comes from Japan, but it also gets plenty of tourists from South Korea, the U.S., the Philippines, and Taiwan.

Its second major industry?

The US military. And there is lots of it in Guam.

Andersen Air Force Base

US Naval Base Guam

Apra Harbor, controlled by the US Navy.

Plus:
- US Navy Ordnance Annex
- U.S. Coast Guard Sector Guam
- Naval Computer and Telecommunications Station, U.S. Navy
- Joint Force Headquarters-Guam, Guam National Guard

Here's an interesting story on the military presence in Guam, which is referred to as America's "permanent aircraft carrier": http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-04-27/americas-navy-airforce-bases-in-guam-ramp-up-construction/7360776

So, considering Guam (210 sq. miles) has less land than the city of Chicago (234 sq. miles), it is a critical island to the military stability of the area.

And any threat to it is in essence a threat to every peace-loving country in the Pacific.