Japan's Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda flew to Okinawa Sunday on a tough mission to persuade local islanders into accepting a plan to move a controversial US military base to another part of the island.

On his first visit to the subtropical island chain in the East China Sea since taking office last September, Noda was due to meet Okinawa's governor Hirokazu Nakaima on Monday.

But Nakaima has already vowed to reject the long-stalled plan as he demanded the base -- the Futenma marine corps air station -- be moved out of Okinawa to help reduce a huge US military presence there.

Successive Tokyo governments have faced strong objections from islanders to an agreement with Washington to relocate the Futenma base from a growing urban area to a scenic coral seashore on the main Okinawan island.

Speaking to reporters in the main Okinawan city of Naha, the premier pointed to the strategic importance of US forces on the islands and the dangers of the base located in the crowded area.

"We will try in a concrete manner to maintain the (military) deterrence and reduce the burden on Okinawa at an early date," Noda said. "We must remove the dangers of the Futenma base as soon as we can."

The island group, where fierce battles were fought in the closing days of World War II, erupted in massive anti-base protests after the rape of a 12-year-old Okinawan girl by three US servicemen in 1995.

The protests led the US government to pledge efforts to realign the US forces and reduce burdens on Okinawa.

The Okinawa governor told the Defence Ministry last week that it would be impossible to protect the environment around the envisaged relocation site under the current plan.

The relocation of Futenma had been part of a 2006 Japan-US agreement which also included redeployment of some US marines stationed in Okinawa to Guam.

But the two countries agreed earlier this month that they would delink the Futenma issue from the planned transfer of about 8,000 marines from Okinawa to Guam.