Beijing scales back airspace challenges but boosts drone activity, Tokyo says

Chinese pilots made the fewest approaches toward Japanese airspace in more than a decade this spring and summer, even as Beijing increased its drone flights near Japan’s westernmost island, according to Japan’s Joint Staff.

Japan Air Self-Defense Force pilots scrambled 265 times to meet foreign aircraft from April to September, down from 358 during the same period last year, Self-Defense Force data released Friday showed.

That’s about 26% fewer intercepts in the first half of Japan’s 2025 fiscal year than in 2024, continuing a three-year decline. Japan’s fiscal year runs from April 1 to March 31.

Of those sorties, 198 involved Chinese aircraft, compared with 242 during the same period last year. The last time that number dropped below 200 was in the first half of fiscal 2013, when Japan scrambled 149 times against Chinese aircraft.

Only one aircraft — a Chinese helicopter — entered Japanese airspace without permission this year, flying near the Senkaku Islands on May 3, according to the Joint Staff. Most approaching aircraft enter Japan’s 230-mile-wide air defense identification zone but turn back before reaching its 14-mile-wide territorial airspace.

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