Japan has protested the breaching of its airspace by a Chinese surveillance aircraft, in what it called the "first known case of incursion by China’s military into its territorial airspace." According to Japan’s defence ministry, a PLA spy plane briefly entered Japanese territory near Nagasaki Prefecture around 11:30 a.m. on Monday.
According to the Japanese Ministry of Defense, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Y-9 surveillance aircraft entered Japanese airspace very briefly for two minutes over the uninhabited Danjo Islands in the East China Sea. China and Japan are engaged in territorial disputes over large swathes of the East China Sea.
In response, Japan’s Self-Defense Force (JASDF) scrambled fighter jets on high alert and issued a warning to the Chinese aircraft.
The Japanese government has protested the incursion with China. According to the Japanese Foreign Ministry, Japan’s Vice Foreign Minister Masataka Okano summoned a senior official at the Chinese Embassy in Tokyo to lodge a complaint about the incursion and to demand no such breaches happen again in the future. The Chinese Foreign Ministry has not commented on the incident.
Though JASDF aircraft regularly warn off Chinese aircraft operating outside its airspace, this is said to be the first time that one of these has actually entered Japanese territorial airspace. Such incidents are prominent near the Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea, which both China and Japan stake claim.
The incident that occurred a day before White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan's visit to Beijing has raised brows. While military analysts think Monday’s airspace violation could be a message from Beijing challenging Japan’s delineation of its territorial border, the fact that it occurred near Nagasaki Prefecture and not Senkaku has stoked confusion.
"There is no doubt that a military aircraft violating territorial airspace sends a very strong message," a senior official of the Self-Defense Forces told local media.
Many Japanese officials reportedly believe that it was a mistake. "It would be understandable if it were the Senkaku Islands, but Nagasaki is a surprise," a source close to Prime Minister Fumio Kishida was quoted by Japan's The Asahi Shimbun newspaper. Some in the Defense Ministry and SDF believe the Chinese Y-2 plane accidentally took the wrong course and entered Japan’s territorial airspace.
"After analysing the route of the Chinese plane, we can assume that the sharp angle the plane took immediately after the airspace violation may have been caused by panic by the pilot," a military official told the newspaper.
The official believes that the plane was likely collecting intelligence about two Air SDF monitoring radar facilities in the area.
"The aircraft that violated Japan’s airspace this time has been gathering information on the SDF radar frequencies," the ministry official said. "It is natural to assume that the aircraft entered the airspace while concentrating on intelligence gathering."