Air Force Major Lloyd Gruver (Marlon Brando) is reassigned into a Western air base, and is confronted with US racial bias against the Western people. Because some of the soldiers become romantically involved with Japanese women, in defiance of all US military 23, the issue is compounded. Ordinarily an officer who's by the book, Gruver needs to take a situation when a buddy of hisor her enlisted man Joe Kelly (Red Buttons) falls in love with a Western woman Katsumi (Miyoshi Umeki) and marries her. Gruver risks his position by serving as best man at the marriage service.