Japan Air Self-Defense Force pilots scrambled a record 23 times against Chinese drones during the past Japanese fiscal year, which runs from April to March, compared to eight times during the same period in fiscal 2023. (Japan Joint Staff)
China last year sent more drones to probe Japanese airspace than in any previous year, part of an overall increase in scrambles against foreign military aircraft, according to Japan’s Joint Staff.
Chinese drones made 23 passes near Japanese airspace in fiscal 2024, compared to eight the previous year, an “extreme increase,” Gen. Yoshihide Yoshida, chief of the Joint Staff, said during a news conference Thursday. Japan’s fiscal year runs from April 1 to March 31.
The number of Chinese drone challenges last fiscal year was equal to all previous years combined, he said.
Approaching Chinese aircraft typically penetrate Japan’s 230-mile-wide air defense identification zone but turn back before reaching territorial airspace, a 14-mile-wide zone that begins at the coast.
In total, Japan Air Self-Defense Force pilots intercepted foreign challengers — nearly all of them Russian or Chinese — 704 times between April 2024 and March, compared to 669 interceptions the previous fiscal year, according to Joint Staff data released Thursday. That’s 5% more scrambles by Japanese fighters year-over-year.
Chinese aircraft — the most frequent challengers in fiscal 2024 — provoked 464 intercepts, according to the Joint Staff. China made 479 challenges in fiscal 2023.
By comparison, Russian aircraft prompted 237 intercepts in fiscal 2024, up from 174 the previous year.
Japan first intercepted a Chinese drone near its airspace on Sept. 9, 2013, according to the Joint Staff.
Yoshida said Japan is working on sending drones in response to foreign drones challenging its airspace, a Joint Staff spokesman told Stars and Stripes by phone Friday.
“Our drones do not have the capability to scramble during airspace violation measures, but we are considering it,” Yoshida said, according to the spokesman. “I think that the Chinese military drones shifted from an experimental flight phase to an operational phase.”
Some Japanese government officials may speak to the press only on condition of anonymity.
Airspace challenges have generally been on the rise in the past decade. Since 2013, Japanese pilots have scrambled an average of 877 times each fiscal year, with a high of 1,168 in fiscal 2016. The 669 scrambles in fiscal 2023 were the lowest since 2012, when Japanese fighters intercepted foreign aircraft 567 times.
On Feb. 26, a Chinese GJ-2 reconnaissance and attack drone was spotted for the first time flying near southern Japan, including Okinawa and Kyushu. Japan scrambled an unspecified number of aircraft in response.
On Aug. 26, a Chinese Y-9 surveillance aircraft entered Japanese airspace just southeast of the Danjo Islands, about 100 miles southwest of Nagasaki. This was the first airspace violation by China, according to the Joint Staff’s news release.
A Russian IL-38 reconnaissance aircraft entered Japanese airspace three times on Sept. 23, prompting Tokyo to scramble fighter jets to intercept and warn off the aircraft with flares. This was the first flare warning directed at Russian aircraft since the start of airspace violation measures, according to the Joint Staff release.
