Japan’s new patriot missile defense system arrived this morning under the blossoming cherry blossoms:

Japan trucked its first ballistic missile interceptors to an air force base at Iruma, north of Tokyo, on Friday in an effort to beef up its defenses against its unpredictable neighbor North Korea.

The deployment of Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) equipment, capable of shooting down incoming missiles in the final stage of flight as they near their target, was sparked by Pyongyang’s firing of a ballistic missile in 1998 that flew over Japan.

Feeling safer?