It appears the Balikatan joint exercise got interesting this year…
Japan didn’t fire those Type 88 anti-ship missiles in the Philippines because Tokyo needed target practice; they fired them because China needed to see the smoke.
The physical target was a decommissioned Philippine Navy ship, but the audience sat in Beijing, where Chinese President Xi Jinping has spent years watching neighbors argue, hedge, complain, and sometimes fold.
Japan just stepped onto Philippine soil, launched ship-killing missiles during Balikatan 2026 (the annual military exercise between the Philippines and the United States), and reminded China that the First Island Chain isn’t a string of paper lanterns waiting for strong winds.
The facts don’t need embellishment; Japan’s Self-Defense Forces fired Type 88 anti-ship missiles from northern Luzon on May 6, hitting the BRP Quezon roughly 46 miles off Paoay.
Over 17,000 troops joined 2026, including about 10,000 Americans and roughly 1,400 Japanese personnel. Japan, Canada, France, and New Zealand joined as active participants for the first time.
Full article, HERE from PJ Media, and HERE from Stars and Stripes
The US also fired a few ‘toys’ including HIMARS, a TLAM, and a few other things. Pretty much all of them pointed at China’s ‘first islands’ claim. And the irony is the Japanese P-3 also can carry and fire the Harpoon anti-ship missile…
I’m ‘sure’ this is just a coincidence, since President Trump is going to China in a couple of weeks…
Back in the day, this was ONLY a US/Philippine exercise, no other players. Things are changing in more ways than one with the Bilat and Trilat participation we’re seeing in those heretofore singular exercises…
Will it get somebody’s attention? One hopes…
Did you ever get a chance to launch live ordnance from a P-3?
Gerry- Sadly, no. Lots of extorps, TLM Harpoons, and dummy mines. Never the real thing.
Japan is also selling the Philippines a few warships that it is retiring early having just changed the law to allow for weapons sales to foreign countries
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/japan-plans-early-transfer-of-warships-and-aircraft-to-philippines/ar-AA22qj77
That is a huge win win because those ships will be a massive upgrade to the Philippine navy and selling them instead of scrapping them means Japan has additional budget to build more ships itself.
China won’t be deterred. Like Putin the CCP has to demonstrate they are “winning” or risk losing power. So their attempt at conquest will continue. When we have these “demonstrations” we are simply providing the PLA with data to use in nullifying our weapons. Not a good idea. Test without letting the CCP see what happened. They have already harvested a cornucopia of data from the Iranian action. There next gen of hardware will reflect that.