Japanese fighter jets scrambled on Monday as China sent an unmanned aerial vehicle over a strategic waterway near the southwestern islands of Japan.
A Chinese TB-001 reconnaissance and attack drone flew from the East China Sea and transited the Miyako Strait, the Japanese Defense Ministry's Joint Staff Office said. Newsweek's map roughly illustrates the flight path taken by the drone as it circled over waters south of the strait before returning.
The Miyako Strait separates the Japanese island of Miyako and and Okinawa. It is an important gateway for Chinese naval deployments to the Philippine Sea and wider Pacific Ocean, as well as a potential maritime choke point in wartime due to U.S. and Japanese missile systems installed there.
The Japan Self-Defense Forces regularly monitor and report the movements of Chinese and Russian military aircraft inside Japan's air defense zone, shown in the map as a dashed white line.
China's Defense Ministry did not immediately respond to a Newsweek email seeking comment about the TB-001's maneuvers.
The TB-001 is also known as Twin-Tailed Scorpion, a medium-altitude, long-endurance UAV with a maximum range of around 3,700 miles, according to manufacturer Sichuan Tengden. Publicly available research suggests the drone can carry various payloads including munitions.
The Chinese Military Aviation blog, which maintains a database about China's military aircraft, said the TB-001 appeared to be equipped with an electro-optical turret, a search and rescue pod, as well as a suspected surface search radar. Its analysis was based on an image taken by Japan's air force in 2021.
China has sent drones near its East Asian neighbor at least six times this year, according to reports by Japan's Joint Staff Office. Another TB-001 flew between the East China Sea and the Philippine Sea on June 4.
Meanwhile, a Chinese WZ-7 long-range semi-stealth unmanned aerial vehicle conducted flight operations over the eastern end of the East China Sea on June 25, approaching the southwestern coast of Japan. It has a reported range of around 2,800 miles.
The United States military has multiple drones deployed across the Western Pacific region. One of them is the Navy's MQ-4C Triton, a high-altitude, long-endurance platform for maritime surveillance, according to Northrop Grumman.
Open-source flight tracking data showed a MQ-4C circling waters east of Taiwan on Saturday during a deployment from Kadena Air Base, an important U.S. air power hub in Japan's Okinawa Island.
The U.S. Navy has completed temporary relocation of MQ-4C drones from Guam to Kadena, the Japanese newspaper Okinawa Times reported last month. The Navy is expected to begin full-scale intelligence and surveillance operations in the region.
Besides the Navy's drones, the U.S. Air Force has deployed eight MQ-9 Reapers at the same base "indefinitely" since October last year, according to the paper.
Unlike the MQ-4C, the MQ-9 can provide close air support and conduct precision strike. In April, a Reaper drone dropped a laser-guided bomb during an air power exercise in South Korea for the first time.
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Ryan Chan is a Newsweek reporter based in Hong Kong, where he previously had over a decade of experience at ... Read more
