Yoshiko Sakurai, 80, journalist and president of the National Institute for Basic National Issues, appeared on Fuji Television’s “Sunday News THE PRIME” (Sunday 7:30) on July 7. He referred to the fact that a J-15 fighter jet, which departed from the Chinese Navy’s aircraft carrier Liaoning, irradiated radar at an Air Self-Defense Force F-15 fighter jet over the high seas southeast of Okinawa’s main island on August 6. Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi held a special press conference early in the morning of August 7 and said, “This is a dangerous act and extremely regrettable. We have strongly protested to the Chinese side and have strictly demanded that they prevent a recurrence of such an incident. The Self-Defense Forces suffered no damage. According to the Ministry of Defense, this is the first time that irradiation of an SDF aircraft by a Chinese military aircraft has been confirmed and announced. With Japan-China relations rapidly deteriorating over Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s comments regarding the Taiwan contingency, tensions are expected to further increase. Sakurai said, “The Chinese side has been very aggressive against Japan in the wake of Mr. Takaichi’s statement in the Diet about the existential crisis situation. And it took about six days from the statement to their taking action. I think that during that time, President Xi Jinping showed his anger at Japan because he thought that Japan was inexcusable,” he surmised. “Looking at each embassy, the ambassadors of each country are now engaged in a tremendous historical battle of criticism against Japan, depending on the country. So I think that each department is trying to get in Xi Jinping’s good graces by harassing Japan as much as possible, and by taking actions and words to humiliate Japan. So I think it is possible that the pilots on the ground decided to irradiate the SDF aircraft with radar,” he said. He added, “China is now waging a tremendous information war to make Japan look bad, so this radar irradiation is a chance to make a broad appeal to the rest of the world. As you can see from the preparations for the invasion of Taiwan, and as you can see from this radar irradiation, China is the country that is trying to change the status quo by using its military power. I think Japan is in a very dangerous situation. Japan is now at a critical juncture, and it is being outmatched in the information war. I think it is time for Japan to take advantage of this situation to make another comeback,” he said. The radar attacks occurred intermittently on the 6th from 4:32 p.m. to 4:35 p.m. and from 6:37 p.m. to 7:08 p.m., respectively, against different F-15s, which detected that they were being irradiated by their sensors.
