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| JASDF F-15 Eagle (Image: Wiki Commons) |
By Victoria Knowles
Last year witnessed a record 306 Japan scrambled fighter planes respond to Chinese aircraft intrusions, the Defense Ministry's Joint Staff announced Wednesday.
This is the first time scrambles responding to Chinese aircraft have exceeded those against Russian planes. For the 2012 fiscal year, overall scrambles against Russian jets were 248, which is a rise of only one incident from the fiscal year previous.
Air Self-Defense Force scrambles against Chinese planes increase as a result of amplified tensions over the Japanese-governed Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea after September, when Tokyo gained effective nationalization of the island chain.
Read the full story at Armed Forces International