The Sankei Shimbun reported that the Japanese Ministry of Defense is considering a plan to constantly fly a number of drones over the East Sea to detect and track hypersonic weapons.
They say they are considering a plan to organize and deploy a team of dozens of fixed-wing UAVs capable of flying in the air for a long time in the East Sea or East China Sea by zone.
The drone monitors the low altitude with a small infrared sensor mounted on it and transmits the acquired data to the ground base.
The deployment of unmanned aerial vehicles is being considered as a countermeasure against hypersonic weapons.
Hypersonic gliding weapons (HGVs), etc., fly at a lower altitude than normal ballistic missiles at a speed of Mach 5 or higher, so they escape the anti-aircraft radar network and are difficult to detect and track with conventional MD systems.
Accordingly, the United States is promoting the so-called satellite constellation strategy, which deploys more than 1,000 small infrared observation satellites at an altitude of 300 to 1,000 km to counter the new missile.
It is a plan to detect new missiles by monitoring closer to the ground than early warning satellites operating in geostationary orbit at an altitude of 36,000 km.
Japan's Ministry of Defense is seeking ways to participate in the satellite force plan to share information secured by the United States, but it is also considering the concept of unmanned aerial vehicles separately.