- Japanese lawmakers will investigate sightings of so-called Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP) going down within the skies over Japan.
- Japan is following the U.S. lead of conducting a government-level investigation into sightings.
- The priority is that the sightings could also be of Chinese aircraft intruding into Japanese airspace.
Members of the Japanese government will investigate recent sightings of unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), to find out if the sightings are credible. The group will work to find out if the spotted craft are in any way a threat to Japan’s security.
While the Japanese group is open to exploring all sightings, their focus could be very much on the potential for earthbound threats, especially from neighboring China, fairly than extraterrestrial ones.
A High-Level Effort
Japanese F-15J pilot scramble to their planes during an air defense exercise, 2017.
In keeping with Jiji Press, the group consists of roughly 80 Japanese lawmakers, including the ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s parliamentary affairs leader, and three former defense ministers. The group, mostly drawn from Japan’s legislative body, or Weight-reduction plan, believes the UAP phenomenon is under-scrutinized by the federal government, especially in light of recent sightings of unidentified objects in and around Japan.
The as-yet-untitled group has decided to incorporate the term “unidentified anomalous phenomena” in its name. “UAP” is a term recently promulgated by the U.S. Department of Defense to distinguish its own investigative effort from past efforts to review unidentified flying objects, or UFOs, which have strong associations with alien craft and possible extraterrestrial sightings.
Thus far, the group lacks any direct government or agency support, just like the Ministry of Defense or the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), the Japanese equivalent of NASA. That said, as lawmakers, the investigators can approve spending to involve those agencies in UAP analyses.
A Latest Threat?
A television at Seoul’s Yongsan Railway Station displays news about North Korea conducting a drill to launch the Hwasal-2 strategic cruise missile off its west coast. A low-flying, subsonic cruise missile like Hwasal-2 could possibly be mistaken for a UFO.
Like most countries, Japan has traditionally not paid a whole lot of attention to UFO sightings. Numerous aspects have boosted awareness of UAPs: a lot of high-profile sightings reported by U.S. military pilots, radar operators, and other personnel; the event of unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones; and China’s use of balloons to gather intelligence regarding foreign countries.
The broad concern is that China or Russia could possibly be behind the sightings. The best concern is that either country may need experienced a technological breakthrough that permits its aircraft to conduct aerial maneuvers which are unattainable by today’s standards. In 2004, for instance Navy personnel reported monitoring craft that might fly as much as 7,200 miles an hour, faster than the fastest-known aircraft, and quickly changing altitude, going from 20,000 feet to 80,000 feet in a matter of moments. Any military aircraft able to such maneuvers would have a decisive advantage over an American or Japanese aircraft.
A Chinese spy balloon flies over Charlotte, North Carolina, February 2023, shortly before it was shot down.
One other possibility is that a foreign power might conduct espionage against Japan using drones or balloons, and that sightings of such devices could possibly be chalked as much as sightings of alien craft—and because of this, not be taken seriously. A Chinese drone could literally operate in plain sight, with eyewitnesses ridiculed by the authorities, because it gathered sensitive intelligence about Japanese political, military, and economic targets.
In 2020, the Ministry of Defense ordered the Self Defense Forces to create a reporting protocol for UAPs. In February 2023, shortly after a Chinese spy balloon flew over the US, the Japanese government reported that three previous sightings of unidentified flying objects were “strongly suspected” to have been of Chinese origin. The sightings, in 2019, 2020, and 2021, took place across Japan and involved overflying Japanese airspace, a breach of international law under the Chicago Convention on International Aviation.
After the incidents were made public, Japanese Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada told the press that the Self-Defense Forces, Japan’s armed forces, will likely be allowed to make use of weapons, including air-to-air missiles, in coping with craft that violate Japanese airspace. In 2021, the Asahi Shimbun reported that members of the Air Self Defense Force had on a minimum of two occasions reported seeing unusual flying craft.
Japan vs. the Flying Saucers
An SM-3 missile is launched from the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force destroyer JS Kirishima, October 2010. The SM-3 is able to intercepting targets in low Earth orbit.
Japan is an island archipelago of 14,125 islands, and relies on air and sea routes for trade with the skin world. It also imports most of its food and energy from abroad, vital to keeping the world’s fourth largest economy humming. Consequently, Japan maintains strong air and naval forces to maintain those routes open, and its alliance with the US means it has a strong partner against aggressive neighbors resembling China, Russia, and North Korea.
The Self Defense Forces of Japan are a few of the most technologically advanced on the earth. Japan is about to buy 147 F-35 Lightning II fighter jets, which will likely be the second largest F-35 fleet outside of the US. Meanwhile, the 2 countries co-fund the SM-3 exoatmospheric ballistic missile interceptor, which shoots down incoming missile warheads, and Japan operates what is usually considered essentially the most advanced non-nuclear powered attack submarines in existence, the Taigei class. Japan can also be set to double its spending on security, including defense spending, by 2027.
All of that spending is targeted on countering known, specific threats, resembling North Korean Hwasong ballistic missiles, Chengdu J-20 fighters of the Chinese Air Force, and missile submarines of the Russian Navy. If, just like the balloons that flew over Japan from 2019 to 2021, there are other threats which are being reported, but disregarded because they’re catalogued as “UFOs”, that creates a blind spot for the Self Defense Forces that an adversary can proceed to use.
As UAP study group chairman and former Defense Minister Hamada said, “Leaving something unknown is an issue for national security.”
The brand new Japanese effort to review UAPs is several steps behind the US, whose All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office, or AARO, is currently investigating UAP sightings. Just like the U.S., Japan is more keen on the potential for enemies from China piloting mysterious craft as a substitute of little green men from Mars.
Kyle Mizokami is a author on defense and security issues and has been at Popular Mechanics since 2015. If it involves explosions or projectiles, he’s generally in favor of it. Kyle’s articles have appeared at The Day by day Beast, U.S. Naval Institute News, The Diplomat, Foreign Policy, Combat Aircraft Monthly, VICE News, and others. He lives in San Francisco.
