Japan Reviews Pentagon UAP Files, Confirms Own Footage
Three days after the first PURSUE release, Tokyo confirmed it was analysing the Pentagon's UAP files alongside allies — and acknowledged, for the first time on the record, that Japan possesses its own UAP video footage.
The first batch of records released on May 8, 2026 under the Presidential Unsealing and Reporting System for UAP Encounters did not stay a purely domestic matter for long. Among the 161 declassified files posted to the war.gov portal were videos recorded near Japanese airspace and over the East China Sea, and within days the release had become a subject of formal comment by the government of Japan.
On May 11, 2026, Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara addressed the matter at a regular press briefing in Tokyo. He confirmed that the Japanese government was examining the U.S. material “with great interest” and analysing it alongside allied partners. The more consequential part of his statement was an acknowledgement that had not previously been made on the record: Japan possesses its own video footage of unidentified anomalous phenomena. For a government that had historically treated the subject with reticence, the confirmation marked a notable shift in posture.
Two items in the Pentagon trove drew particular attention in connection with the region. One infrared recording from 2023, catalogued in the released materials under the identifier DOW-UAP-PR47, appears to show several contrasting objects holding formation during a military operation. A separate clip recorded in 2024 reportedly captured what observers described as a “football-shaped” object with protrusions extending from its structure. Both were among the files cited as relevant to sightings near Japan.
Kihara was careful to frame Japan’s own position cautiously. Any decision to release Japanese-held footage, he indicated, would be made on a case-by-case basis and weighed against the need to protect the country’s intelligence-gathering capabilities — the same metadata-and-sources concern that shaped the international reaction to the PURSUE release more broadly. As of mid-May 2026 no Japanese files had been published, and none had been promised on a fixed timetable. What had changed was the principle: a major U.S. ally had publicly confirmed it holds UAP material of its own and had formally opened, rather than foreclosed, the question of releasing it.
The episode illustrated how the PURSUE process was beginning to ripple outward. A disclosure effort framed as a domestic transparency exercise had, within a week, prompted an allied government to acknowledge its own holdings and to articulate a disclosure policy of its own. Whether other partners follow Tokyo’s lead remained, as of this writing, an open question.
Sources
- The Japan Times — Tokyo analyzing Pentagon UFO file trove with sightings near Japan
- IBTimes UK — Japan Confirms Possession of UAP Footage After Reviewing Pentagon Videos Near Japanese Airspace
- U.S. Department of War — Presidential Unsealing and Reporting System for UAP Encounters (PURSUE)
- Related case: Pentagon UAP Disclosure (May 8 2026 Release)