Japan is scrambling fighter jets at a rate not seen since the height of the Cold War to ward off incursions from a newly assertive Russia and from China's aggressive exertion of sovereignty in the East China Sea.

Instances of fighters scrambled by Japan have jumped 16 percent in the past year, a Japan's Self Defence Force spokesman said at a press briefing on Wednesday, according to Reuters. Japanese fighters scrambled 944 times in the year ending March 31, the second-highest number since records began in 1958.

Both Russia and China's defense budgets have increased aggressively in recent years. Chinese defense spending rose 167 percent from 2005 to 2014. Russia's rose 97 percent over the same period, while Japan's decreased by 3.7 percent, according to the Stockholm International Peace Institute.

Japan is planning a slight increase in defense spending, with plans to buy more long-range patrol aircraft, cargo jets and helicopter carriers as well as V-22 Ospreys and F-35 stealth fighters.

Russian combat planes frequently stage incursions near Hokkaido and the disputed Kuril Islands, and also commonly fly around the Japanese mainland.

Chinese incursions have been focused on the East China Sea, near the disputed Senkaku islands, which China claims as the Diaoyu Islands. The past year has seen flights by Chinese military planes over Japanese airspace and into the western Pacific.

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