The Daily duties of JASDF

You may think that the work of JASDF is only "intercepting enemy aircrafts".(This is a bit over description.)
However, JASDF has a lot of duties,which are very important!!

++Aerial Duties++
Piloting fighter,transport,reconnaissance plane,AWACS,rescue plane and v.i.p plane, they defence air,collect information,search for people who is lost and supply supplies.

+++Air Traffic Controll+++
Instructing airplanes which will land or take off at an airfield.

+++Ambush Controll+++
Watching our territorial airspace and finding approaching aircrafts(including unkown,sometimes invade the territorial airspase).If it is the time, they lead fighter jets to intercept.

The Aircrafts of JASDF part 2

<Transport aircraft>
Transport aircraft is used to deliver troops, weapons and other military equipment. Its operation includes transporting VIP. JASDF has a lot of transport aircraft.

C-1

The C1 is a short-range transport.It was made by Kawasaki Heavy industries.The number of built is 31.The maximum flight range is 1,300 km.
As you can see, It is very cute.

C-130H

The C-130H is a four-engine turboprop transport aircraft.It was made by Lockheed.
JASDF purchased 16 in total from Lockheed by 1998. C-130H can flight longer than C-1 because it doesn't have jet engines. The maximum range is 3,800km.
JASDF C-130Hs was active in Iraq for the transportation for 2004-2008.

The Aircrafts of JASDF

Today, I would like to introduce the aircraft of JASDF!!
The previous article, I've written a lot of aircraft's names(F-15J, F-2A/B, CH-47J, etc...).
Let's take a look!

<Fighter>
Fighter has been responsible for commanding the air, intercepting enemy fighters, attackers and bombers. However, modern fighter jets can sortie many  kind of operations. For example, in addition to the description above, they can carry GPS guiding bombs, Anti surface-to-air(SAM) missiles like AGM-88 or jamming systems. So, today's fighter jets are mostly categorized  in "multi-role fighter". Eurofighter typhoon(EU), Su-35(Russia), F-15E(USA), F/A18 series(USA), F-35(USA,in the process of developing) are categorized in it. Although F-2A/B is called "support fighter" in Japan, its actual ability is multi-role fighter.
There are three types of fighter jet in Japan.
F-15J/DJ

F-15J/DJ is a main jet fighter in Japan. It is based on F-15C, which was the strongest intercepting fighter jet in the world until appearing of F-22. F-15J has an excellent BVR(Beyond Visual Range) shooting ability.It also has an high-level maneuverability, so is good at WVR(Within Visual Range) combat.
JASDF has used F-15J/DJ more than for 30 years, so they improve some parts of the aircrafts. That modernized version of F-15J is called F-15kai.

F-2A/B

F-2A/B is a support fighter in Japan. It was built by Mitsubishi Heavy industries and Lockheed Martin. F-2 is based on F-16C block40/42. So they look like the same, but F-2 is largely modified from F-16C!

First, F-2 can carry four ASM-1 or ASM-2(both are Air to ship missile.)in a sortie!

Therefore F-2 is the strongest fignter jet in Air to ship mission in the world.

Also, F-2 has a  quick maneuverability in the air.