The Japanese government has agreed to allow the U.S. Marine Corps to fly V-22 Ospreys in the country following Pentagon investigations into two recent crashes involving the tilt-rotor aircraft that concluded pilots were to blame.
Pentagon spokesman George Little said recently that Japan’s permission opens the door for providing a “a critical capability” for the alliance. “Secretary Panetta is pleased that we have been able to reach agreement with the government of Japan that permits the Osprey to commence flight operations in Japan,” he said. Panetta discussed the issue with Japanese officials during a visit to the country this week.
“Secretary Panetta has placed a high priority on reaching this agreement, directed numerous senior officials at the Department of Defense to work on this issue over the past several months, and raised the issue in multiple discussions with Foreign Minister (Koichiro) Gemba and Defense Minister (Satoshi) Morimoto, including earlier this week,” Little said.
Japan had insisted on learning the final conclusions into the accidents before green lighting operations for the dozen V-22s that arrived in Iwakuni, Japan on July 23. The Marines plan to base them at Marine Corps Base Futenma, which lies in a densely populated area of Okinawa, as part of plans to replace legacy CH-46 Sea Knight helicopters.
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.
The Marines said in August that pilot error was behind the Morocco accident and the Air Force offered the same conclusion in the second crash. The Marines shared the results of their investigation with Japanese officials before publicly releasing the results.
The Japanese government, along with Okinawa residents historically weary of the Marine presence on the island, have been worried that the Ospreys pose a safety hazard, a concern that grew following the accidents.
The United States sought to assure the Japanese that the aircraft are safe. Washington emphasized that the Ospreys, built by a partnership between Boeing [BA] and Textron [TXT] unit Bell Helicopter, have come a long way since being plagued by development problems in the 1990s that produced several fatal accidents and forced the program to be put on hold.
Marine Commandant General James Amos said in August he had assured the Japanese that pilots would “make every effort” to minimize flying over heavily populated areas, and he noted the successful operations of the aircraft in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Pentagon has said that the V-22’s ability to fly at higher altitudes, faster speeds and longer ranges is a significant capability upgrade over the CH-46s to respond to military contingencies, disasters and for humanitarian operations.
Morimoto flew on a V-22 during a visit to Washington in August.