Photos of the first tests of the F-35 Jump-Jet on a Japanese aircraft carrier

• The Japanese aircraft carrier JS Kaga completed sea trials off the coast of California on Friday.
• The light aircraft carrier was converted with a cockpit for F-35B stealth fighters.
• The flat-topped destroyer is the first aircraft carrier to be operated by Japan since World War II.

Japan’s destroyer-aircraft carrier just completed sea trials off the coast of California on Friday, the country’s navy said.

The JS Kaga was refitted with a cockpit that would allow crews to “conduct fixed-wing aircraft operations,” the US Department of Defense said in a statement last month.

The Kaga is the first aircraft carrier operated by Japan’s navy since World War II, as the country overhauls its maritime forces amid tensions in the Indo-Pacific. Central to the light aircraft carrier’s power is the short take-off and landing version of the F-35 stealth fighter.