30 ASDF flights canceled in Iraqi airlift mission over threats

TOKYO, Dec. 16 Kyodo -
Japan's Air Self-Defense Force transport unit was forced to cancel some 30
flights due to security alerts during the nearly five years of its Iraqi
airlift mission that ended last week, sources informed of the cases said
Tuesday.

About 20 of the cancellations concerned flights into Baghdad, they said,
apparently in response to risks around the Iraqi capital, which even a Japanese
court determined to be a ''combat zone'' in a ruling in April.
In some of the cases, ASDF C-130H cargo planes were diverted elsewhere after
flying in a holding pattern near Baghdad airport following the reports of
security threats, according to the sources.
Security alerts the ASDF received in the mission included tips suggesting
surface-to-air missile attacks by armed militias and sightings of suspicious
people.
In June, a rocket bomb landed about 50 meters away from Self-Defense Forces
barracks built within the compounds of multinational forces at the airport, but
it inflicted no damage on the facilities, the sources said.
''We did not disclose individual cases because if troops' specific movements
following security alerts were revealed, future operations would be affected,''
a senior official of the Defense Ministry told Kyodo News.
A roughly 200-member ASDF transport unit was sent to the region in early 2004
to help provide what Tokyo says was humanitarian and reconstruction assistance
to Iraq in the wake of the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.
Beginning March 2004, the unit served a total of 821 flights in the airlift
mission and suffered no loss of life during the period.
The unit's three C-130H aircraft initially ferried goods and supplies for
Japanese Ground Self-Defense Force troops, who were deployed to Samawah from
January 2004, connecting Kuwait's Ali Al Salem Air Base and Ali airfield near
the southern Iraqi city.
After the GSDF withdrawal in July 2006, the aircraft transported personnel and
supplies for U.S.-led multinational forces and the United Nations, linking the
Kuwaiti base and three Iraqi cities, including Ali and Baghdad, five times a
week.
The sources said that of the roughly 30 flight cancellations, the remaining 10
or so cancellations concerned those into Ali airfield.
In late August last year, an ASDF cargo plane suffered engine trouble just
before its departure from Baghdad airport, according to the sources.
At that time, a reserve cargo aircraft was flown from the Kuwaiti base with
repair equipment and personnel aboard, and the engineers worked overnight to
repair the affected plane.
Although unmanned U.S. drones keep an eye on areas around Baghdad airport from
the sky, risks of attacks remain high around the airport at night, experts say.
After transporting roughly 46,500 personnel and about 673 tons of cargo, the
ASDF unit began withdrawing from Kuwait, its duty base in the mission, on
Monday.
Of the personnel the ASDF unit transported during the mission, about 30,000 are
believed to have been troops from multinational forces.
About 3,500 ASDF personnel took part in the mission over the years, around 320
of them twice or more.
==Kyodo