The Territory of Guam is an island in the Mariana Islands
archipelago in the Western Pacific Ocean, which has the status of an
unincorporated organized territory of the United States (that is,
not part of the United States, but being their possession). Guam is
the westernmost territory belonging to the United States, along with
the rest of the Mariana Islands. As a political entity, Guam shares
an archipelago with the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana
Islands.
The capital of Guam is the city of Hagatna, and the
most populous city is Dededo. Guam has been a member of the Pacific
Community since 1983. Residents of Guam are called Guamanians and
are American citizens by birth. Native Guamanians are Chamorros who
are related to other Austronesian natives of Eastern Indonesia, the
Philippines, and Taiwan. The Chamorros settled the island about
4,000 years ago.
As of 2016, 162,742 people lived in Guam.
Guam has an area of 544 km², so the population density is 299 people
per km². In Oceania, it is the largest and southernmost of the
Mariana Islands and the largest island in Micronesia. The highest
point is Mount Lamlam, 406 meters above sea level. Since the 1960s,
tourism and subsidies from the US military have been the main
revenue items of the island budget.
On March 6, 1521, the
Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan, who was in the service of
Spain, became the first European to visit the island. Guam was
colonized by Spain in 1668; among the settlers was the Catholic
Jesuit missionary Diego Luis de San Vitores. In the 16th and 18th
centuries, Guam was an important staging post for Spanish galleons
bound for Manila. On June 21, 1898, during the Spanish-American War,
the United States captured Guam. On December 10 of that year, Spain
ceded Guam to the United States in accordance with the Treaty of
Paris.
Before World War II, there were five American
territorial entities in the Pacific: Guam and Wake Atoll in
Micronesia, American Samoa and Hawaii in Polynesia, and the
Philippines.
On December 8, 1941, a few hours after the
attack on Pearl Harbor, Guam was captured by the Japanese, who
occupied the island for two and a half years. During the occupation,
Guamanians were subjected to forced labor, rape, torture, and
beheadings. American troops regained control of the island on July
21, 1944.
Guam's unofficial motto is "Where America's Day
Begins", a reference to the island's proximity to the International
Date Line.
Hagatna (Agatna) - the administrative center
Dededo is
the largest city
Tumon is the most popular tourist destination, with
the resort area of Tumon Bay
By plane
The
island has an international airport. Antonio B. Won Pat (IATA:GUM).
The official languages of the island are English and Chamorro.
The US dollar is used as the currency.
The territory of Guam is considered a duty-free zone Duty Free. The prices will pleasantly surprise you.
The international dialing code for Guam is +1-671. Internet domain of the island .gu
Guam Island stretches from north to south for 50 km, the width in the
narrowest middle part is 12 km. The northern tip of the island is Cape
Ritidian (English Ritidian Point).
Guam has an area of 544 km²,
making it the 32nd largest island in the United States, and has a
coastline of 125.5 km.
Guam is the southernmost and largest
island in the Marianas, and also the largest in Micronesia. It stretches
along the Mariana Trench 340 km northeast of the deepest point in the
world's oceans - the "Challenger Abyss" with a depth of 10,911 m.
The island is of volcanic origin and is surrounded by coral reefs.
The relief of the northern part of Guam differs sharply from the
southern one. The northern part is a limestone plateau composed of
corals. The plateau is Guam's main source of drinking water. In the
northwest and north, the plateau drops off steeply towards the shore.
The southern part of the island is of volcanic origin and has a hilly
relief. The hills are composed of lavas, as well as quartzites and
shale. There are outcrops of granites and sandstones. The highest point
of the island is Mount Lamlam (406 m).
There are no large rivers,
the Talofofo, Ilig, Pago, Hagatna and Apra rivers have the largest
basins.
The Mariana chain, of which Guam is a part, was formed as
a result of the collision of the tectonic plates of the Pacific Ocean
and the Philippine Sea. Guam is the closest landmass to the Mariana
Trench, a deep subduction zone that runs east of the Marianas. Due to
its location near the subduction zone, earthquakes occasionally occur on
Guam. In the past, most epicenters near Guam had magnitudes ranging from
5.0 to 8.7. Unlike Anatahan Island in the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam
is not volcanically active, although the vog (volcanic smog) from
Anatahan reaches it.
The Köppen climate on Guam is humid tropical, although
March, as the driest month, also falls under the classification of
tropical monsoon climate, moderated by seasonal trade winds from the
northeast.
The average daily air temperature in Guam is the same
throughout the year and stays around 26-27 °C. The dry season runs from
January to May, and the rainy season runs from July to November, when
the southwest monsoon sets in. The average annual rainfall between 1981
and 2010 was about 2490 mm.
The wettest month on record was
August 1997 with 977.6 mm of precipitation; the driest month is February
2015 with 3.8 mm of precipitation. The wettest calendar year was 1976
with 3345.2 mm of precipitation, and the driest year was 1998 with
1470.2 mm of precipitation. The rainiest day on record was October 15,
1953, when 393.2 mm of rain fell.
The average high temperature is
30°C and the average low temperature is 24.4°C. In general, temperatures
rarely exceed 32.2°C or fall below 21.1°C. Relative humidity typically
exceeds 84% at night throughout the year, however the average monthly
humidity hovers around 66%. The highest temperature was recorded in Guam
twice: April 18, 1971 and April 1, 1990 - and amounted to 35.6 ° C; the
lowest is 18.3 °C on February 8, 1973.
Guam lies in the path of
typhoons and the island is prone to tropical storm and typhoon threats
during the rainy season. Typhoon risk is highest from August to
November, where typhoons and tropical storms are most likely in the
Western Pacific. The most intense typhoon to hit Guam in recent memory
was Typhoon Pongsona. The wind speed in it was 232 km / h with gusts up
to 278 km / h. A typhoon hit the island on December 8, 2002, causing
widespread destruction.
After the destruction caused by Typhoon
Pamela in 1976, many wooden buildings were replaced with concrete ones.
So, during the 1980s, wooden poles began to be replaced with
typhoon-resistant concrete and steel ones. After the local government
introduced stricter building codes, many home and business owners began
building their structures using reinforced concrete and installing storm
shutters.
The soils of the island are fertile ferrallitic, thin in places. The northern part of Guam is covered with savanna vegetation. Tropical rainforests are found only in river valleys and on the hillsides of the southern part of the island. Along the coast are groves of coconut palms.
The fauna of Guam is poor. There are rodents (rats, mice), bats. In the forests there are deer brought by the Spaniards from the Philippines. Wild boars can be found in the northern and southern parts of the island. Until the mid-1940s, the island was inhabited by many species of birds, most of which were subsequently exterminated by the brown snake, accidentally introduced at the end of World War II. Although the snake is only slightly venomous and practically harmless to humans, it has nevertheless become a real disaster for the local fauna. Rapidly breeding snakes have led not only to the extinction of some species of birds, but also cause short circuits in high voltage wires. The density of snakes, which were not previously found on Guam, has reached 2,000 per square kilometer, which is one of the highest rates in the world. According to Reuters in 2013, to prevent the spread of snakes, it was decided to dump poisoned mice on the island.
According to DNA analyses of old skeletons, Guam and the other islands of the Marianas were first settled by settlers from the Philippines around 3,500 years ago. Another theory is that the island was first settled from southeastern Indonesia. Sources for the time before the Europeans include the legends and myths of the Chamorros, archaeological excavations, Jesuit records and research by scientists such as Otto von Kotzebue and Louis de Freycinet.
On March 6, 1521, Ferdinand Magellan headed for the Marianas
archipelago, which he named "Las Islas de los Ladrones" (The Islands of
Thieves) after some misunderstandings with the locals. Five years later,
the flagship of the ill-fated Loaisa expedition also stopped on Guam. To
their surprise, the crew met a Spaniard, Gonzalo de Vigo. Vigo had
deserted during Magellan's circumnavigation of the world. In 1565, Guam
was claimed for Spain by Miguel López de Legazpi. In 1668, Jesuits
reached the island, spread the Christian (Catholic) faith and changed
the name of the archipelago to the Marianas, after Marianne of Austria,
the widow of Spain's King Philip IV.
In the Spanish East Indies,
Guam was an important base, used primarily by the Manila galleons as a
stopover on their long voyage across the Pacific. These ships usually
brought Far Eastern goods from the Philippines to Mexico once a year,
and less frequently to Lima on the South American Pacific coast.
During the Spanish-American War, Guam was captured without bloodshed
by U.S. troops on June 21, 1898. With the Treaty of Paris ratified in
1899, the island finally came under U.S. administration.
Despite
increasing tensions between Japan and the United States in 1941, Guam
was not fortified by American forces. The island was given the lowest
priority for defense, although several submarine cables ran through
Guam, including the one connecting the U.S. West Coast and the
Philippines.
On December 8, 1941, shortly after the attack on
Pearl Harbor, Guam was attacked by the Japanese. The invasion fleet
consisted of four heavy cruisers, four destroyers, two gunboats, six
attack submarines and two minesweepers, and also received air support
from nearby Saipan. In the first battle for Guam, 547 US soldiers,
including Marines, other military personnel and police officers, faced a
Japanese superiority of 5,900 Japanese soldiers who were landed by the
invasion fleet. The island remained under Japanese rule until July 1944.
The period of occupation was a hard experience for the population, as
the Japanese army ran a brutal occupation regime.
The Japanese
occupying forces attempted to Japanize the inhabitants of Guam through a
new school system.
The landing of American troops on July 21,
1944 marked the beginning of the second battle for Guam, which ended on
August 10 with the victory of the US forces after the Japanese defenders
had put up fierce resistance for almost three weeks. Their commander,
Hideyoshi Obata, committed ritual suicide (seppuku). Individual Japanese
soldiers who managed to evade capture carried out various ambush attacks
even after the Americans had recaptured the island. The case of the
Japanese corporal Shōichi Yokoi, who was only discovered on January 24,
1972, became famous: he had been hiding on the island for almost 28
years after the end of World War II. While the fighting was still going
on, as had previously happened in Saipan and Tinian, Guam began to be
expanded into a huge military base. But it was not until the last month
of the war that B-29 bombers also attacked Japan from Guam.
The territory has been on the UN list of non-self-governing
territories since 1946. In 1949, Harry S. Truman signed the Organic Act,
a law that made Guam an external territory of the USA with internal
autonomy, which it has remained to this day.
From 1962, the
United States Navy expanded the port of Apra into a naval base for
nuclear submarines equipped with UGM-27 Polaris strategic medium-range
missiles (SSBN).
In 1996, the USA carried out a covert
evacuation. From September 15 to December 16, 6,500 Kurds were flown
from Iraq to the USA via Guam as part of Operation Pacific Haven / Quick
Transit.
On August 6, 1997, a Korean Airlines Boeing 747-300 on Korean Air
Flight 801 from Seoul to Agana (Guam) crashed into a hill 5 km from
Hagåtña Airport in heavy rain. The plane burst into flames. Of the 254
people on board (231 passengers and 23 crew members), 26 survived the
crash. The cause was a combination of pilot error, inadequate maps and a
malfunctioning airport radar. Today, there is a memorial at the crash
site.
On February 23, 2008, a B-2 stealth bomber crashed
immediately after takeoff at Andersen Air Force Base. It was the first
crash of an aircraft of this type, which is by far the most expensive
aircraft in the world. Both pilots were able to escape using the
ejection seat, but sustained injuries. The cause of the crash was
determined to be an incorrectly calibrated speedometer.
On July
21, 2008, an unarmed B-52H of the US Air Force (20th Expeditionary Bomb
Squadron) crashed on the east coast of the Pacific island of Guam. The
plane was supposed to fly over a celebrating crowd on the 64th
anniversary of the island's liberation from Japanese occupation. All six
crew members were killed in the crash.
On May 19, 2016, a US B-52
bomber crashed at the American Air Force's Andersen Air Force Base. All
seven people on board were uninjured.
The radio station KPRG broadcasts from Hagåtña on FM 89.3 MHz. Trans World Radio has been broadcasting Christian programs from Guam since 1977.
The national holiday is always the first Monday in March (Discovery Day).
Guam has its own National Olympic Committee and has participated in
every Summer Olympic Games since 1988; in 1988, a biathlete was also
sent to the Winter Olympic Games. No athlete has won an Olympic medal to
date. The current NOC president is former judoka Ricardo Blas senior.
The Guam national soccer team is a member of FIFA and AFC. In 2002,
Guam took part in the World Cup qualifiers for the first time, where it
played two games with 0 goals scored and 35 conceded. Guam's first
international victory came on June 11, 2015, when they defeated
Turkmenistan 1-0 in a qualifying match for the 2018 FIFA World Cup.
Around 37.1% of Guam's inhabitants are Chamorro, 26.3% of the
population are Filipinos (mostly Malays), 11.3% come from other Pacific
islands, 6.9% are European, 6.3% are of Korean, Chinese or Japanese
origin, 2.3% have another origin.
In 2017, 47.5% of the
population was not born on Guam.
38.3% of the population speak English, which is the official and common language. In addition, 22.2% speak Chamorro, 22.2% speak Filipino languages, 7% speak another Asian language, 6.8% speak a language from other Pacific islands and 3.5% speak another language.
29.4% of the population is under 15 years old (male: 25,645 / female:
23,887),
64.1% of the population is 15-64 years old (male: 55,115 /
female: 52,935),
6.5% of the population is 65 years old or older
(male: 5,157 / female: 5,825).
Life expectancy in 2016 was an
average of 79.1 years (men: 76.1 years, women: 84.2 years).
85% of the population are Catholic, and the capital is also the seat of the Archdiocese of Agaña. 15% are of other religions or have no religion.
The population largely views the connections to the USA positively,
and the military bases are also important for Guam's economy. American
culture is widespread among the residents.
The island is of great
strategic importance to the USA. Around a third of the island is
occupied by Navy and Air Force facilities. There are fears of high
unemployment if - as planned - four naval facilities are closed.
The head of state is the incumbent US president, and the governor is Democrat Lou Leon Guerrero, who was elected on November 6, 2018 and took office on January 17, 2019.
Guam has a unicameral parliament with 15 seats, with members elected for four years. In the election on November 2, 2010, the Democrats won nine seats and the Republicans six seats.
There is the US District Court of Guam, which has jurisdiction equivalent to the Federal District Courts and Bankruptcy Courts. Its judge is appointed by the US President. There is also a Territorial Superior Court, whose judges are initially appointed by the governor and then elected by the people after eight years. There are also specific courts, such as a probate, traffic and juvenile court.
Guam has a similar party landscape to that in the USA, there is a Democratic Party and a Republican Party.
Guam is an external territory of the USA with internal autonomy. The residents are US citizens, but are not allowed to vote for president. Guam sends a non-voting delegate to the US House of Representatives. The current delegate since January 3, 2023 is James Moylan of the Republican Party.
Of the 885 km of public roads, 675 km are paved. Another 685 km of
roads, which are classified as non-public, are partly on military bases
and government facilities. There is no rail service.
Guam's
airport is Antonio B. Won Pat Airport, which serves as a hub for United
Airlines. There are flights to Japan, Hawaii, Hong Kong, the
Philippines, the People's Republic of China, the Republic of China
(Taiwan) and the Republic of Korea (South Korea). Since Guam is not a US
state, the island handles and is responsible for its own customs and
quarantine services. The United States Customs and Border Protection
merely monitors compliance with entry regulations.
Most of the
island has modern cell phone connections and high-speed Internet
connections via cable or DSL. Guam has been connected to the North
American Numbering Plan (NANP) since 1997, the telephone area code is
671. This made calls to the continental USA easier and cheaper, as they
were no longer considered international long-distance calls. Guam is
also a major hub for intercontinental submarine cables: twelve cables
connect the western states of the USA, Hawaii, Australia and Asia, most
of which run to China.
Guam has been served by the US Postal
Service since 1899. Although Guam is not a US state, the US Postal
Service treats Guam as domestic for rates. Private companies such as
FedEx, UPS or DHL, on the other hand, have no obligation to consider
Guam as part of the 50 states and therefore charge foreign rates.
The speed of transport between the mainland USA and Guam depends on
the weight and size of the letters and packages, but also on the time of
year: while lighter, higher priority shipments usually take less than a
week to get from the mainland to Guam, larger shipments can take between
one and two weeks. Less urgent shipments such as magazines are not
shipped from the continental USA to Guam by plane, but by ship via
Hawaii.
The port of Guam, Apra Harbor, is the lifeline of the
island: most goods are imported through it. At the same time, it serves
as a transit port for other islands in Micronesia with a population of
more than 500,000 people. The port also serves as a supply station for
Guam's military facilities.
The United States Armed Forces have several bases that cover a total
of 16,000 hectares. This corresponds to about 29% of the total area of
the island. The individual bases are:
Naval Base Guam, United
States Navy in Sumay
United States Coast Guard, Guam Sector, in Sumay
Andersen Air Force Base, United States Air Force in Yigo
Apra Harbor
on the Orote Peninsula
Ordnance Annex, United States Navy in the
South Central Highlands (previously called Naval Magazine, with the same
function as an arsenal)
Computer and telecommunications base of the
United States Navy in Barrigada and Finegayan
Joint Command of the
Guam National Guard in Barrigada and Fort Juan Muna
In addition to
the military facilities on the island itself, Guam and the rest of the
Marianas are to form the westernmost training area for the US armed
forces. Guam is one of the most important bases for the Navy and Air
Force in the Pacific region.
Before 2010, the US armed forces had
planned to relocate some of the Marines stationed on the Japanese island
of Okinawa (8,600 soldiers plus 9,000 dependents) to Guam and at the
same time build a new pier for aircraft carriers. Together with the
construction workers required for this, this would have meant a 45%
increase in the island's population (at least temporary in terms of
construction workers). The United States Environmental Protection Agency
publicly opposed the plans in February 2010 because it feared negative
effects on the water supply, garbage problems and effects on the
offshore coral reefs. In 2012, the plans were changed and a maximum
increase in the number of Marines of 4,800 was decided. Two thirds of
them are to be stationed on Guam on a rotational basis, without their
dependents.
Due to the relocation of the Marines from Okinawa to
Guam and the expansion of the military bases, the military facilities
will take up around 40% of Guam's land area in the coming years. In
January 2011, it was announced that the Marines' move would be delayed
due to budget cuts and might not be completed until 2020.
Guam's
residents and military personnel are connected in many ways. Many
residents are retired military personnel. Many of the U.S. soldiers live
outside of the military areas in the island's towns. In addition, some
of the military personnel are involved in social projects on the island.
The Navy and Air Force facilities are the most important employers.
40% of employees work in the service sector, 26% of employees work in
the public sector, 24% work in trade, 10% in industry.
15% of the
island's inhabitants are unemployed, 23% of the population live below
the poverty line.
Tourism is also very important (only Hawaii is
a more popular destination in the Pacific), especially for Japanese, for
whom a flight from Japan is much shorter than to Hawaii. Due to the
pristine coral reefs and the numerous large Pacific fish, as well as the
warm water temperatures and good visibility, Guam is a popular
destination for divers and snorkelers. The island is visited mainly by
visitors from East Asia, with Japanese far more than South Koreans. Of
the 1.27 million visitors in 2012, 901,000 came from Japan and 165,000
from South Korea. This means that Japanese and South Koreans make up
72.7% and 13.3% of visitors, or 86% in total. In contrast, visitors from
the United States fall significantly short at 4.1% and from Taiwan at
4.0%.
The official national currency is the US dollar (US$). The
gross domestic product per capita in 2013, adjusted for purchasing
power, was approximately 30,500 US dollars.
Guam has its own
university, the University of Guam.