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China-Japan-Koreas
ChiCom airliner equipped with radar pod enters Japanese air space
2006-01-27
From East-Asia-Intel, subscription
A Chinese electronic reconnaissance aircraft intruded into JapanÂ’s air defense identification zone recently, prompting renewed concerns over ChinaÂ’s military activities.
Probing, ever probing.
The Chinese have used a civilian aircraft modified for electronic intelligence-gathering to penetrate the air defense zone several times since October, the Sankei Shimbun newspaper reported last week. Japanese Air Self Defense Force (ASDF) fighters scrambled to intercept the jet and spotted a radar pod on the Chinese jetÂ’s airframe.
"We've got an electronics surveillance plane up here masquerading as an airliner, instructions."
“China's aim is to extract more information on the radar of the Self Defense Forces (SDF) by disguising civilian passenger planes and intensifying the gathering of radio-wave [intelligence] in the area around the gas fields,” the newspaper reported, quoting government sources. “For an attack by fighter aircraft, it is essential to neutralize the other party's radar,” the report said. “It would appear that the objective of China's reconnaissance activities is to analyze the SDF's radio waves in preparation for that, and the East China Sea is exhibiting the look of information warfare.”
More food for the worry-plate.
The aircraft was identified as a Tu-154MD, a Russian-built passenger jet.
It's a passenger jet like the EC-135 is a passenger jet.
It was the first time the Tupelov had been detected in Japanese air space.
If it has a radar pod, it's no longer a 'passenger' jet.
Japanese forces have detected Y-8EW electronic reconnaissance aircraft around the disputed gas fields off the East China Sea more than 10 times last year. The aircraft are based in Shanghai.
Would be cool to make an EMP and fry the little bugger's electronics. Wonder if the planes are hardened against EMP.
A Japan Defense Agency official said Tu-154MD "symbolizes the rapid upgrading of their military and technical capabilities."
Posted by:Alaska Paul

#6  I lived in Miami at the time of KAL007. The Miami Herald had a brilliant illustrator named Kent Barton. The illustration he drew for that incident (in the Sunday Opinion section)is still vivid in my mind: The drawing was the full width of the paper, just the massive head of a grizzly bear with a commercial airliner splintered in its jaws.
Posted by: Seafarious   2006-01-27 14:16  

#5  Looks like a popular new sport...

MOSCOW (AFP) - Russia denied one of its military aircraft had violated Japanese airspace the previous day, directly contradicting Tokyo's allegation as well as its claim that Moscow had already admitted the incursion.
"According to the onboard GPS system, Russian radar and the Pacific Fleet, the Antonov-72 of (Russia's post-KGB intelligence service) the FSB, which was following a poachers' ship in the Sea of Japan, did not violate the Japanese border," the FSB said, quoted by the Interfax news agency.
"Our aircraft came no closer than three kilometres (1.8 miles) from the border," the FSB added.
Earlier Thursday, Japan's foreign ministry said a Russian border patrol plane penetrated its airspace Wednesday on seven occasions, for a total of 26 minutes, near the northern island of Rebun, without the authority of Japanese air traffic control. The Russian border patrol is part of the FSB.
Japanese Vice Defence Minister Takemasa Moriya said Russia's border security force on the Far East island of Sakhalin informed the Japanese consulate there Thursday that the plane was one of its Antonov-72 transport aircraft.
Rebun is 1,100 kilometers (700 miles) north of Tokyo, facing Sakhalin across La Perouse (Soya) Strait and lying close to the main northern Japanese island of Hokkaido.
Japan scrambled six fighter jets and sent radio warnings to the aircraft to leave the territory, the Defense Agency said.


The FSB on Sakhalin Island? Wonder if the same guy that brought you KAL 007 is still in charge?
Posted by: tu3031   2006-01-27 12:22  

#4  They should have forced it to land like the P-3.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble   2006-01-27 08:50  

#3  I wouldn't want to lose a pilot, but maybe if we had a drone, it could fly loops around the airliner, then get too close and "oops!"
Posted by: Jackal   2006-01-27 08:47  

#2  Fat Kimmie and Solyent Green-happy NorKor makes the verbal threats, China's PLAAF and PLAN does the actual flyin' and a penetratin', ergo proving that NK and China are not colluding.
Posted by: JosephMendiola   2006-01-27 01:32  

#1  If it has a radar pod, it's no longer a 'passenger' jet.

I suspect that the radar pod in no way interferes with its ability to carry passengers.
Posted by: Abspemblable Snowspemble   2006-01-27 01:12  

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