Japan's Aging Air Force Plans Major Overhaul

Underscoring Japan's uphill battle in an increasingly heated race to control the skies over Asia, the air review came just a week after the country's entire F-15 fleet was ordered into its hangers for safety checks following a midair accident, the second such order in three months.

But in an effort to counterbalance big strides by China and Russia toward deploying new stealthy aircraft, Japan's Air Self-Defense Forces are about to get a multibillion dollar overhaul.

The F-15s the workhorse of Japan's air defenses were relegated to ground displays, either parked on the runway or allowed to taxi but not take off. Last weekend, an empty fuel tank burst and detached from a F-15 on a training flight, causing the grounding order. In July, an F-15 flying out of Okinawa crashed into the ocean. The pilot is listed as missing and presumed dead.

The accidents reinforced what military planners already knew: Japan's aging air force has seen better days. But after years of delays and budget battles, Japan is expected to announce by the end of December a new fighter deal that will likely shape Asian air security for decades to come.

"The JASDF is on the edge of becoming a major tool of power projection," said Michael Auslin, a Japan security expert with the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank. "With its fighter selection process, it will signal whether it intends to be qualitatively competitive with leading air forces around the region over the next generation."

Japan with 362 fighter jets, mostly F-15s, F-4s and F-2s is already one of the top air powers in the region. But planners have long been concerned by the increasing age and expense of maintaining the fleet along with this country's ability to match the improving air capabilities of neighboring Russia and China. Japan has been using the F-15 as its centerpiece fighter since the early 1980s, though they have been updated over the years. Japan flies about 200 of the planes.

Tokyo's first choice was the United States' stealthy F-22 Raptor, which can cruise at supersonic speeds and is hailed by many aviation experts as the most advanced fighter in the skies. Japan is the only country where the F-22 is regularly deployed overseas, having done several rotations to the U.S. Kadena Air Base on the southern island of Okinawa.

Acquiring the F-22 would have been a quantum leap for Japan. Because of its sensitive technology, the U.S. Congress has opposed selling the F-22 abroad. Budget restraints in the United States have further forced Washington to drastically reduce its own orders for the pricey plane, whose future is now cloudy.

With the F-22 out of the picture, Japan has set its sights on three jets as its next mainstay fighter the Lockheed F-35, Boeing's F/A-18 Super Hornet and the Eurofighter Typhoon. The hotly contested deal for more than 40 "F-X," or next generation, planes is worth upwards of $8 billion. The first planes are expected to begin arriving in 2016. Japan is likely to go with one of the American options.

Retrieved from: http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/japans-air-force-plans-major-overhaul-14746219

WW-II Imperial Japanese Naval Aviation

 

At the begining of World War II, the Imperial Navy had created the finest naval aviation corps in the world. Japanese aircraft were at least the equals of anything then flying in the West, and in some cases (as with the legendary Zero fighter) were substantially better. Japanese aircrews were superbly trained and had been battle tested in the conflict in China during the late 1930's. When war tore across the Pacific in December 1941, the IJNAF was more than a match for any of its opponents. It is not surprsing, then, that Japanese aviators scored victory after stunning victory during the first six months of the war, from the attack on Pearl Harbor, through the sinking of the British men-of-war Prince of Wales and Repulse, to the fearsome raids on northern Australia and the IJN's rampage through the Indian Ocean in April 1942. Only after the defeat at Coral Sea and the debacle at Midway was this force finally able to be engaged on nearly equal terms. Throughout the war, the IJNAF remained a potent weapon, though Japanese equipment was eventually outclassed by newer American models, and relentless attrition began to take its toll on pilot quality. Even in defeat, though, the IJNAF refused to wilt away, finally immolating itself in the form of the Kamikaze air corps.

Retrieved from: http://www.combinedfleet.com/ijna/ijnaf.htm