The Pentagon plans to begin deploying F-35 Joint Strike Fighters to Japan by 2017 in what would be the first overseas deployment of the Lockheed Martin [LMT]-built aircraft, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said yesterday.
During a speech at the National Press Club, Panetta said the F-35 will be part of plans to locate “our most advanced aircraft in the Pacific” as the United States shifts toward a greater emphasis on the Asia-Pacific region, a strategy outlined by Panetta and President Barack Obama 11 months ago.
The military will also look to station more Air Force F-22s and Marine Corps V-22s in Japan, and the first F-35s will be deployed to a Marine Corps base in Iwakuni, Japan under the plan to have “60/40” Pacific-Atlantic split of U.S. military assets and capabilities by 2020, Panetta said.
V-22 Ospreys began arriving for the first time in Japan earlier this year. But the Japanese government would not sign off on operating the tilt-rotor aircraft until it was satisfied they would operate safely following two earlier V-22 accidents. Tokyo cleared operations in August following the completion of the investigations in to the V-22 accidents.
An accident involving a Marine Corps version of the Osprey, known as the MV-22, in Morocco in April that killed two crew members, followed shortly after by a mishap of an Air Force version, a CV-22, in Florida, prompted the Japanese to hold off on V-22 operations until the investigations were complete. No one was killed in the second accident.
Both services blamed the pilots for the accidents.