Asahi wrote on Saturday that during a press conference on Friday, Defense Minister Iwaya admitted that measures need to be taken to protect an Aegis Ashore battery to be installed at a GSDF camp in Akita from tsunami because the site is very close to the shoreline. In addition to the administrative errors that occurred while conducing geographical surveys for identifying appropriate locations for the state-of-the-art missile defense platforms, the latest acknowledgement has reportedly raised fresh doubts about the ministry’s conclusion that the SDF facility in Akita is the only suitable location in eastern Japan. The daily quoted an unnamed senior MOD official as saying: “One more mistake would make the deployment plan almost impossible to implement.” The defense minister reportedly plans to visit Akita today to apologize for the errors and renew his efforts to obtain local understanding for the deployment.