<p>Foreign-born military wives of American servicemen, including Japanese wives, have been generally described as helpless and passive. They are said to be situated in a subordinated position, lacking an understanding of the military environment, and experiencing difficulties in understanding American culture, customs and the English language. This paper is based on approximately one year of research on the married and family lives of Japanese wives living on or near the U.S. naval base in Yokosuka, Japan. It aims to present the case that such wives do not simply live their daily lives in a passive manner. It rectifies the previous stereotypes of foreign-born military wives, focusing rather on the diversity of their lives. At the same time, the paper intends to give an ethnographic account of the Japanese wives on the base or nearby, while also describing the military organization, family services, servicemen's lives, and the American culture that greatly influence their married lives with the servicemen. BRANCAFORTE termed foreign-born wives married to U.S. servicemen as "double outsiders," referring to the fact that they are in a sense outsiders from the viewpoints of both American society and the U.S. military. There is no problem in considering Japanese wives as "double outsiders" in this paper, but it is just a start. Considering their peripheral positions in Japanese society, moreover, they might better be called "triple outsiders." The hierarchy of the U.S. military is prescribed doubly: by rank and by pay grade. Broadly speaking, there are two ranks: officers and enlisted personnel. An officer holds a university degree or higher, and has equivalent status to a cadre member of the Japanese self-defense forces. Certain military facilities are restricted by rank, such as the Officer's Club and Enlisted Club. Officers and enlisted personnel also live in different places of residence. There are two major forms of duty in the U.S. Navy, namely, sea duty and shore duty, and transfers occur every two to three years. In that way, life in the U.S. Navy consists of a lifestyle prescribed by rank, sea or shore forms of duty, and periodical transfers. A military wife used to be given the position of a dependent inside the military community, and was always made conscious of that fact. The husband serves as the wife's sponsor, and he is responsible for all her words and actions. If the wife should act against military regulations and customs, the responsibility for her acts lies with her husband, affecting his rank, promotion, and mobility within his duty assignment. Military wives are expected to stay at home as obedient wives and good mothers. They are also expected to participate in volunteer activities inside the military community. However, the wife must manage domestic matters and bring up children alone when the husband is away on duty. In other words, the wife is expected to perform two mutually conflicting roles. One is to show feminine passivity, obedience toward and dependence upon men, while the other is to take the more masculine role of acting as a leader with decision-making powers. Servicemen and their families go through tremendous stress before and after their deployments in the U.S. Navy. Therefore, the military provides assistance to the families to alleviate their problems amidst the instability of married and family life. One of the forms of assistance provided by the military is a class called Pre-deployment Brief, run by the Fleet & Family Services Center (FFSC). It aims to support the families left behind, and to remove their anxiety when a ship goes off on a long deployment. The military and command supports the family by assigning one woman as an intermediary between the family and military command, whether the ship is deployed or not. She is called an ombudsman, and is appointed by the captain. Before the</p><p>(View PDF for the rest of the abstract.)</p>