People’s Liberation Army (PLA) - Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association https://www.garnertedarmstrong.org Let No Man Take Your Crown Tue, 06 Jul 2021 15:26:29 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=7.1.1 https://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/cropped-Screen-Shot-2024-05-16-at-1.06.13-PM-32x32.png People’s Liberation Army (PLA) - Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association https://www.garnertedarmstrong.org 32 32 Gravitas: China deploys “thousands of troops” close to India border https://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/gravitas-china-deploys-thousands-of-troops-close-to-india-border/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=gravitas-china-deploys-thousands-of-troops-close-to-india-border Tue, 06 Jul 2021 15:26:29 +0000 http://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/?p=40036  

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]]> Are the Chinese Gearing Up for War in the Taiwan Strait? https://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/are-the-chinese-gearing-up-for-war-in-the-taiwan-strait/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=are-the-chinese-gearing-up-for-war-in-the-taiwan-strait Mon, 16 Nov 2020 00:13:35 +0000 http://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/?p=37609 Martial signaling notwithstanding, the likelihood that Beijing is about to embark on a major military endeavor in the Taiwan Strait remains fairly low. Here’s What You Need to Remember: Although Beijing is undoubtedly committed to further widening the military imbalance in the Taiwan Strait and to deploying assets that can delay or even prevent a U.S....

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Martial signaling notwithstanding, the likelihood that Beijing is about to embark on a major military endeavor in the Taiwan Strait remains fairly low.

Here’s What You Need to Remember: Although Beijing is undoubtedly committed to further widening the military imbalance in the Taiwan Strait and to deploying assets that can delay or even prevent a U.S. intervention, China’s ability to prosecute a quick invasion of Taiwan at acceptable cost remains, by most yardsticks, too much of an uncertainty.

Since the beginning of 2020, China’s signaling of its purported intentions toward Taiwan has taken an unmistakable turn for the belligerent, with editorials clamoring for military action and a substantial increase in People’s Liberation Army (PLA) activity around the democratic island-nation. Recently, PLA aircraft have frequently cut into Taiwan’s Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) and crossed a median line in the Taiwan Strait that, although unofficial, had nevertheless served to reduce the risks of collision and miscalculation over the years. With Xi Jinping’s adjuring the PLA to “prepare for war,” commentaries in state-run media putting Taipei on notice, and the deployment of new DF-17 missile units and advanced stealth aircraft near Taiwan, it appears that war in the Taiwan Strait is just around the corner. Global media have weighed in on the issue, with several alarmist articles appearing in recent weeks.

Martial signaling notwithstanding, the likelihood that Beijing is about to embark on a major military endeavor in the Taiwan Strait remains fairly low. Most assessments indicate that despite quantitative and qualitative improvements in recent years, the PLA still does not have sufficient amphibious capabilities to launch an assault against Taiwan. Other variables complicate Beijing’s calculations, including uncertainty, despite ongoing advances in the PLA’s anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) capabilities, over a potential involvement by the U.S. in a Taiwan contingency, as well as the potentially high losses involved in amphibious operations in the Taiwan Strait, for which eventuality the Taiwanese military has been preparing for decades.

Although Beijing is undoubtedly committed to further widening the military imbalance in the Taiwan Strait and to deploying assets that can delay or even prevent a U.S. intervention, China’s ability to prosecute a quick invasion of Taiwan at acceptable cost remains, by most yardsticks, too much of an uncertainty. In fact, no such thing may even be possible. As the Department of Defense’s 2020 report to Congress indicates, China’s Joint Island Landing Campaign (登岛战役)—the most prominent of PLA plans for a major military campaign against Taiwan—“envisions a complex operation relying on coordinated, interlocking campaigns for logistics, air, and naval support, and EW [electronic warfare]. The objective would be to break through or circumvent shore defenses, establish and build a beachhead, transport personnel and materiel to designated landing sites in the north or south of Taiwan’s western coastline, and launch attacks to seize and occupy key targets or the entire island.”

It continues: Large-scale amphibious invasion is one of the most complicated and difficult military operations. Success depends upon air and maritime superiority, the rapid buildup and sustainment of supplies onshore, and uninterrupted support. An attempt to invade Taiwan would likely strain China’s armed forces and invite international intervention. These stresses, combined with China’s combat force attrition and the complexity of urban warfare and counterinsurgency, even assuming a successful landing and breakout, make an amphibious invasion of Taiwan a significant political and military risk.

Warnings by Xi, bellicose editorials by retired PLA officers, and military exercises ostensibly aimed at Taiwan, therefore, need to be assessed for their more immediate value to the CCP. And those lie in the realm of propaganda, aimed chiefly at the Chinese public. The shift to a more confrontational strategy vis-à-vis Taiwan reflects a deep frustration in Beijing over Taiwan since 2016, when Tsai Ing-wen of the Taiwan-centric Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) was elected. Beijing’s hopes for “peaceful unification” with Taiwan, which seemed within reach during the eight-year rule (2008-2016) under the Beijing-friendly Ma Ying-jeou of the Kuomintang (KMT), culminating in a historic, albeit purely symbolic, summit in Singapore in 2015, have completely collapsed. Efforts to “buy” the Taiwanese through various economic incentives and elite capture, accompanied by sustained efforts to isolate Taiwan internationally, have only succeeded in delivering a Taiwanese public that is increasingly committed to its democracy and way of life. The recent crisis in Hong Kong has only served to deepen that sentiment for independence and completely negated the appeal, such as it was, of the “one country, two systems” formula, which remains the only offer on the table.

The re-election of President Tsai in the January 2020 election with a record number of votes, followed by Taiwan’s successful handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and bourgeoning ties with the international community, have driven home for Beijing the hard reality that its longstanding strategy has failed.  Thus, as delegations of senior U.S. officials, former Japanese prime ministers and Czech representatives defy Beijing’s warnings and interact with Taiwan, and with a series of U.S. arms sales announcements in the past year, Beijing has been compelled to react. Threats of military action, underscored by intense PLA activity, have been used to signal Beijing’s displeasure, with the hope, perhaps, that such behavior would have a psychological effect on the Taiwanese public (the effect has been the exact opposite, however). A secondary consideration has been the necessity of responding to a more visible presence by the U.S. military in the area, which has reacted to ramped up PLA activity with passages of its own, creating an escalatory cycle of action and counteraction.

A more important consideration for the CCP is the need to demonstrate that it and it alone has the ability to dictate the outcome of the dispute in the Taiwan Strait. Undoubtedly cognizant of the fact that its Taiwan strategy has failed, for ideological reasons the CCP cannot admit to the Chinese public that it is so. Xi’s style simply cannot countenance such an admission. The strategy, therefore, is to continue to insist, against all the evidence to the contrary, the a small clique of Taiwan “separatists” and their foreign allies are responsible for the standoff, and to demonstrate that Beijing can, if it so chooses, resolve the matter once and for all. The propaganda maintains that China is acting defensively—due to unreasonable forces that continue defy historical trends, the CCP is compelled to threaten force to defend reason and the country’s honor. In this context, an increasingly active military around Taiwan, and the accompanying signaling in state-controlled media, are arguably more part of psychological warfare and propaganda effort than preparations for imminent all-out war against a stubborn neighbor.

All of this comes with a major caveat, however, as it is predicated on rational decision making in Beijing (Allison and Zelikow’s classic Essence of Decision remains an indispensable guide on this issue). In other words, it assumes that the CCP calculates and weighs the costs and benefits of its actions in a way that militates against reckless behavior. But what if that isn’t the case? Given the closed political system in China, tight controls on the media and heavy censorship, it is difficult to assess the current levels of instability in China that may exist in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic which, if serious enough, could encourage an insecure CCP to seek external distractions—along the border with India, in the South China Sea or, as the mother of all rallying points for Chinese nationalists, the unfinished business of Taiwan.

For this reason, Taiwan and its allies must nevertheless prepare against the possibility, however slim for the foreseeable future, that China is indeed preparing to launch an invasion of Taiwan (likelier scenarios include a limited amphibious assault against Taiwan’s outlying islands or assets in the South China Sea). However unlikely an attempt to seize Taiwan may be at the moment, Taiwan cannot afford to be sleeping at the wheel, as the cost of unpreparedness would have catastrophic repercussions for the island-nation and its people. A CCP which feels that its legitimacy may be compromised by an underperforming economy, or an embattled Xi who needs to counter a factional challenge stemming from an increasingly unfavorable international environment which some have blamed on his hubris, could conceivably seek to inflame nationalistic sentiment as a way to redirect discontent and sideline internal adversaries. In such a scenario, a regime could be tempted to embark on behavior that, to outsiders, seems irrational and bound to be counterproductive.

There is, however, historical precedent for this, chiefly the case of Japan on the eve of World War II, which, while well aware that it could not possibly win a protracted war against the U.S., nevertheless launched attacks against Pearl Harbor, hoping against hope for a resounding knock-out that would encourage Washington to seek negotiations on Japanese terms. U.S. failure to conceive of such an attack, let alone to prepare against it, stemmed from an inability to understand the psychological pressures, fear, and honor, that underpinned decision making in Tokyo. North Korea provides another example of a regime that, when the status quo has become untenable, has shown a proclivity to engage in what may appear like irrational and highly risky behavior.  Under certain conditions, Xi and the CCP could also feel that their honor is being unacceptably undermined by a succession of developments favoring Taiwan. Having sold the Chinese people a series of lies as to their ability to control the situation, and fearing a nationalistic backlash against them should they “lose” Taiwan, the leadership could conclude that action is necessary before it is too late. It is quite possible that in such a scenario, an unusually risk-prone regime in Beijing could seek a similar bolt from the blue against Taiwan as Japan did against U.S. naval forces in 1941, especially if it convinces itself that the U.S. is unwilling to risk hostilities with China over Taiwan or is too distracted, perhaps due to a constitutional crisis over the outcome of the November elections, to orchestrate a coherent response.

While a PLA assault arguably remains a less likely scenario than continued coercion, Taiwan and its partners must as discussed earlier, prepare against such an eventuality. More importantly, every effort should be made to reduce the risk that China will resort to force. This can only be accomplished through greater investment in Taiwan’s military deterrence through the acquisition and development of a layered defence, a counterforce capability, training, and mobilization, and an active campaign to raise public awareness and boost morale within the military. Additionally, a unified position by the international community that makes it clear to Beijing that an attack against Taiwan would result in retaliatory action—a combination of cyberattacks, sanctions, and an economic embargo that would cripple the Chinese economy, must be elaborated. A concerted warning of this sort, however, can only occur if the international community recognizes the highly destabilizing effects that an invasion of Taiwan would have on the region, and agrees that Taiwan, rather than being an internal matter for China, is in fact a frontline in an emerging clash of ideologies with global implications.

J. Michael Cole is a Taipei-based senior fellow with the Global Taiwan Institute in Washington, D.C., the Macdonald-Laurier Institute in Ottawa, Canada, and the Taiwan Studies Programme at the University of Nottingham, U.K. He is a former analyst with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service in Ottawa. His latest book, Insidious Power: How China Undermines Global Democracy, co-edited with Dr. Hsu Szu-chien, was published in July.

Source: https://nationalinterest.org/blog/reboot/are-chinese-gearing-war-taiwan-strait-172723

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]]> India-China War: Why India ‘Outrightly Rejects’ US Help Even When Beijing Has Asked Its Army To Be Ready For War? https://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/india-china-war-why-india-outrightly-rejects-us-help-even-when-beijing-has-asked-its-army-to-be-ready-for-war/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=india-china-war-why-india-outrightly-rejects-us-help-even-when-beijing-has-asked-its-army-to-be-ready-for-war Wed, 21 Oct 2020 09:24:21 +0000 http://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/?p=37187 While the border tensions between India and China are still persisting, Washington has been warming up with New Delhi, extending its solidarity and throwing full-weight behind India. Recently, Chinese President Xi Jinping has called on Chinese troops to “put all (their) minds and energy on preparing for war” on October 13, CNN reported quoting Xinhua....

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]]> While the border tensions between India and China are still persisting, Washington has been warming up with New Delhi, extending its solidarity and throwing full-weight behind India.

Recently, Chinese President Xi Jinping has called on Chinese troops to “put all (their) minds and energy on preparing for war” on October 13, CNN reported quoting Xinhua. The remarks were made when he was inspecting the Marine Corps of PLA in Chaozhou City, added CNN. Xi ordered the troops to “maintain a state of high alert” and called on them to be “absolutely loyal, absolutely pure, and absolutely reliable”.

India and the US have been long-standing allies, however, China’s confrontation with several countries including Japan, the US, and Australia has raised alarm against China’s expansionist strategy.

During the recent Quad meeting, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called China an aggressor in the “South [China Sea], in the East China Sea, the Mekong, the Himalayas, the Taiwan Straits.”

In an interview, Pompeo said that the Quad countries are developing policies to present a resistance to the threats that China posed to each of the four nations.

“They’ve all seen it, whether it’s the Indians, who are actually having a physical confrontation with the Chinese up in the Himalayas in the northeastern part of India, the Chinese have now begun to amass huge forces against India in the north,” he said. 

“(India) absolutely need the United States to be their ally and partner in this fight,” he added. He also noted that Beijing has stationed “60,000 soldiers against the Indians in the north,” in an interview with Fox News.

Secretary Pompeo@SecPompeo
US government account
Productive meeting today with Indian Minister of External Affairs @DrSJaishankar. Together we are advancing U.S.-India relations, combatting COVID-19, and ensuring a secure and prosperous #IndoPacific for all.

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US National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien also acknowledged the thriving relationship between India and the US calling it the “key partnerships for the United States in the 21st century.”

Reportedly, US secretary of state Mike Pompeo along with defense secretary Mark Esper are expected to travel to India for India US 2+2 dialogue from October 26-27.

While New Delhi and Washington are cooperating on different fronts including security, trade, and commerce, India had been hesitant in accepting US’ help to counter China. 

Nitasha Kaul, an Associate Professor of Politics and International Relations at the University of Westminster in London, talking to the BBC said that “the United States can participate in areas such as military intelligence (which will be limited), hardware and training, at the most.”

While US officials are extending their full support to India, the American people are apprehensive of the interference in India-China conflict.

In a survey conducted by Vasabjit Banerjee, a professor of political science, and Timothy S. Rich, over 63 percent of Americans support neither China nor India if they were to engage in a military conflict, reported The Week. It further said that 60.6 percent of the people want no interference in case of economic conflict between India and China.
trump-modi
PM Modi with President Trump.Via Flickr

“For those who did choose to support one of the countries, however, it was overwhelmingly in favor of India,” the paper said. “For a military conflict between India and China, 32.6 percent preferred that the US support India, as opposed to 3.8 percent who preferred that the US support China.

For an economic conflict, 36.3 percent of respondents preferred US support for India, while 3.1 percent preferred US support for China,” the paper said.

Moreover, Kaul also told BBC that the US foreign policy is moving in a contradictory direction and Trump is reducing America’s commitments globally. “Thus, Trump administration’s oral statements don’t hold a lot of importance.” She further said that America has not proved to be a reliable strategic partner in various parts of the world under US President Donald Trump. 

Although India and China have displayed intentions to maintain peace at the border, the possibility of violent confrontations cannot be fully ruled out. The Chief of Defense Staff General Bipin Rawat had earlier said that if the ongoing negotiations between China and India for ending the deadlock do not reach any conclusion, then India is ready for a military alternative. 

IAF chief Air Chief Marshal RKS Bhadauria has also echoed a similar sentiment saying that the Indian Air Force is ready for any possible conflict, including a two-front war, referring to China and Pakistan who share the northern and eastern border with India.

On the other hand, the mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party, Global Times (GT), stated in an article titled ‘China ready for peace, and war’, that “China should continue to strive for a peaceful settlement of China-India border disputes, but must keep its army prepared.” 

At the 7th round of military talks held at the Indian side of Chushul-Moldo Border Personnel Meeting (BPM) point, both the sides “agreed to maintain dialogue and communication through military and diplomatic channels, and arrive at a mutually acceptable solution for disengagement as early as possible.”

Brahma Chellaney@Chellaney
Why did the Indian foreign ministry join hands with authoritarian China to cover up the failure of yet another round of military talks by issuing such a disingenuous “joint press release”? With China’s land grabs nearing the six-month mark, it’s past time to face up to the truth.

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Beijing and New Delhi have repeatedly declined any foreign interference and have turned down Trump’s offer to mediate between the two neighbours.

Trump had earlier offered to mediate after the bloody clash that broke out at the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in eastern Ladakh in June. Twenty Indian soldiers were killed during the clash. Calling the situation very tough, Trump said at the time, “We’re talking to India. We’re talking to China. They’ve got a big problem there”.

The second offer came after tensions escalated in August when the Indian Army accused People’s Liberation Army (PLA) of conducting “provocative” actions at the contested area of Pangong Tso.

Ashok Swain, professor of peace and conflict research at the Department of Peace and Conflict Research, Uppsala University in Sweden, told BBC that India shouldn’t trust the US.

“India definitely needs to have a good relationship with America, but it should not go against China. India should learn a lesson from Pakistan’s past experiences, if not from others. America hasn’t been a trustworthy ally to anyone and this has become more evident under President Trump’s rule,” he said.

Source: https://eurasiantimes.com/india-china-war-why-india-outrightly-rejects-us-help-even-when-beijing-has-asked-its-army-to-be-ready-for-war/

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]]> The border spat between India and China is turning into an all-out media war https://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/the-border-spat-between-india-and-china-is-turning-into-an-all-out-media-war/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-border-spat-between-india-and-china-is-turning-into-an-all-out-media-war Tue, 09 Jun 2020 13:36:51 +0000 http://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/?p=32935 China and India have been engaged in an ongoing border dispute along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Himalayas. Hong Kong (CNN) China and India’s latest border dispute may have mainly involved scuffles and troop maneuvers on the ground, but it has been all-out war in the respective countries’ media. Tensions have been growing in...

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]]> China and India have been engaged in an ongoing border dispute along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Himalayas.
China and India have been engaged in an ongoing border dispute along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Himalayas.

Hong Kong (CNN) China and India’s latest border dispute may have mainly involved scuffles and troop maneuvers on the ground, but it has been all-out war in the respective countries’ media.

Tensions have been growing in the Himalayas along one of the world’s longest land borders, with New Delhi and Beijing both accusing the other of overstepping the Line of Actual Control (LAC) that separates the two. The territory has long been disputed, erupting into numerous minor conflicts and diplomatic spats since a bloody war between the countries in 1962.

On Saturday, military leaders met at the border to “peacefully resolve the situation in the border areas,” according to a statement from India’s foreign ministry. Even today, just what occurred on the ground in the highly militarized region remains unclear — in part because the main body of this distinctly 21st-century conflict has so far mostly played out through propaganda, strategic leaks, and aggressive posturing in the media.

Ahead of Saturday’s meeting, Chinese broadcasters aired footage of People’s Liberation Army (PLA) maneuvers in the region — complete with planes and trucks full of troops — in what state media described as “demonstrating China’s capability of quickly reinforcing border defenses when necessary.” Unconfirmed — and in some cases, debunked — videos have also circulated on both Chinese and Indian social media purporting to show troop incursions and scuffles between soldiers.

Writing in India’s Hindustan Times, strategic affairs analyst Shishir Gupta said Sunday that Chinese reports on PLA maneuvers were part of a “disinformation campaign” designed to sap Indian resolve, and “overwhelm the enemy into panic so that his capacity to negotiate is weakened.”

Jingoistic rhetoric

Both Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi have built public support in large part on nationalism and a promise of future greatness. This often translates into jingoism and aggressive rhetoric, particularly when playing to a domestic audience.

Such an approach was evidenced in Chinese coverage of the PLA maneuvers in the Himalayas. Equally, despite Delhi’s announcement Saturday of easing tensions, leading Indian government figures struck an aggressive tone Monday, with Home Affairs Minister Amit Shah telling a rally of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) that “any intrusion into the borders of India will be punished.”

“Some used to say that US and Israel were the only countries which were willing and capable of avenging every drop of the blood of their soldiers,” Shah said. “(Modi) has added India to that list.”
Defense Minister Rajnath Singh also weighed in Monday, saying: “I would remind everyone, India’s leadership will not let our self-respect suffer. India’s policy is clear, we won’t hurt any country’s integrity and dignity. At the same time, we will not let any country to hurt our integrity.”

Their statements came amid growing pressure from opposition parties to take a stronger line, with the Congress party’s Rahul Gandhi repeating claims that Delhi was downplaying the scale of the Chinese incursion, saying in a tweet “the media is muzzled and terrified. The truth seems dormant.”

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]]> North Korea Is Afraid Of America, But Should It Also Fear A Chinese Invasion? https://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/north-korea-is-afraid-of-america-but-should-it-also-fear-a-chinese-invasion/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=north-korea-is-afraid-of-america-but-should-it-also-fear-a-chinese-invasion Sun, 08 Dec 2019 04:21:07 +0000 http://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/?p=29972 It could happen. Key Point: China only has so much patience, and won’t let the entire peninsula fall into American hands. North Korea is both a blessing and a curse for China. The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea is an independent state that is openly hostile to the United States and other regional powers. Pyongyang’s military...

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It could happen.

Key Point: China only has so much patience, and won’t let the entire peninsula fall into American hands.

North Korea is both a blessing and a curse for China. The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea is an independent state that is openly hostile to the United States and other regional powers. Pyongyang’s military is a deterrent to attack without posing a direct threat to China. As a result, nearly a thousand miles of China’s borders are occupied by a regime that finances its own defense and will never fall willingly within the U.S. sphere of influence.

The situation is far from perfect. While North Korea has traditionally been a Chinese client state, ties between the two countries have deteriorated in recent years. Pyongyang’s fiery anti-American rhetoric and nuclear weapons program have provoked the United States, making North Korea a major point of contention between Washington and Beijing. The country’s flagrant violation of international norms have tested Beijing’s patience.

There are persistent rumors that Beijing has long prepared to intervene in North Korea, whether in the aftermath of a government collapse or should the country’s leadership make credible threats against China. No one outside of Beijing knows what those preparations might be, but we can outline some scenarios. One thing seems reasonably certain, however: if China goes into North Korea, the presiding regime, whether of Kim Jong-un or someone else, will not survive.

One possible scenario is a military incursion into North Korea in response to regime collapse. An imploding economy, military coup, or Syria-like rebellion could all cause the regime to fold, and it will likely fold quickly. When it does, the national food distribution system will likely fail, causing refugees to flee the country. Given that the border with South Korea is notoriously fortified and the Russian border is relatively far and remote, the least difficult border to cross is into China.

Beijing, obsessed with internal stability, would almost certainly not tolerate millions of refugees crossing into northern China. From a Chinese perspective, it would be far better for those refugees to stay in North Korea. In the event of regime collapse, we could see the three People’s Liberation Army (PLA) armies in the country’s Northern Theater Command move south. One option is to create a buffer zone in North Korea, but that would not solve the problem of political and economic instability. If the PLA does move South, it would likely go all the way to Pyongyang in order to establish a puppet government and reestablish some level of stability.

The most likely scenario is that China launches an all-out invasion to topple the existing regime. Of the sixteen armored, mechanized, infantry and artillery corps that make up the Korea People’s Army (KPA), only two are deployed along the Sino-Korean border. Three more corps are stationed in and around Pyongyang. Nearly 70 percent of the KPA is south of the Pyongyang/Wonsan line, sited to support a cross-border attack against South Korea.

China’s Northern Theater Command ground forces consist of the 78th, 79th, and 80th Armies. These armies are what would be considered corps in the U.S. Army, collectively controlling eighteen combined arms brigades supported by three special operations, three aviation, three artillery, and three engineering brigades. This gives the PLA a powerful force equivalent, at least on paper, to roughly five or six U.S. combat divisions. Supported by the two air attack divisions of the Chinese Air Force assigned to the Northern Command, the three PLA armies could quickly cross the border and march south into the KPA’s strategic rear.

To what extent would the KPA resist an invasion? It depends. If the regime in Pyongyang is still in place, it China could face considerable resistance. A lack of fuel reserves, dictated by China, would likely strand many of the remaining fourteen army corps in place, rendering them unable to resist a Chinese invasion. If the government collapses the KPA could become part of the hungry, leaderless masses—masses with weapons. Ideally, Beijing would cultivate ties with the KPA leadership before a move South and persuade it to not resist and maintain order.

It’s difficult to foretell how well the PLA would do in wartime. The last time the Chinese Army engaged in such large scale combat was the Sino-Vietnamese War of 1979. Using inferior, outdated tactics, China’s ground forces suffered heavy casualties against their battle-hardened Vietnamese opponents, and Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping vowed never to repeat such a costly war. It is unlikely that Beijing would order the attack if it did not have full confidence in the PLA to carry it out without embarrassing failure.

The PLA of today, however, is a completely different beast. While the PLA lacks the institutional skill of the battle-tested U.S. Army, it is certainly better than the Korean People’s Army. The army has modernized both its equipment and military doctrine—Xi Jinping’s repeated calls to be “combat ready”, often interpreted as outwardly aggressive, are more likely to be exhortations toward general readiness and against corruption in the ranks. A recent and pervasive emphasis on high speed, mechanized warfare will pay the PLA dividends in a drive on Pyongyang.

The most dangerous aspect of a Chinese invasion of North Korea is if it is launched concurrent with a U.S. and South Korean assault northward from the demilitarized zone. While the U.S. and South Korea would operate with the same objectives in mind, they would likely be very different from China’s. The possibility of fighting breaking out between those armies marching north and those marching south would be very real.

Barring a total collapse of the Pyongyang regime, China is unlikely to invade North Korea any time soon. The economic, political, and military costs outweigh the benefits—at least for now. That having been said, if the calculus changes China maintains the forces, just over the border, to decisively intervene in its smaller neighbor. Whether China, South Korea, or anyone is ready for the outcome is a very good question.

Kyle Mizokami is a defense and national-security writer based in San Francisco who has appeared in the Diplomat, Foreign Policy, War is Boring and the Daily Beast. In 2009, he cofounded the defense and security blog Japan Security Watch. You can follow him on Twitter: @KyleMizokami. This first appeared years ago.

Source: https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/north-korea-afraid-america-should-it-also-fear-chinese-invasion-102917

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]]> Hong Kong’s Unrest Poses a Threat to China’s Legitimacy https://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/hong-kongs-unrest-poses-a-threat-to-chinas-legitimacy/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=hong-kongs-unrest-poses-a-threat-to-chinas-legitimacy Mon, 28 Oct 2019 07:50:32 +0000 http://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/?p=29438 In  December 2004, the Heritage Foundation’s Hong Kong office hosted a speech by Henry Hyde, Chairman of the then-named House International Relations Committee (now the Foreign Affairs Committee.)    Hyde, a veteran of World War II who fought in the battle for the Philippines, had an abiding personal interest in post-war political developments in Asia,...

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In  December 2004, the Heritage Foundation’s Hong Kong office hosted a speech by Henry Hyde, Chairman of the then-named House International Relations Committee (now the Foreign Affairs Committee.)    Hyde, a veteran of World War II who fought in the battle for the Philippines, had an abiding personal interest in post-war political developments in Asia, including the challenges posed by a rising China. In his remarks, he saw political developments in Hong Kong as a key test as to whether Beijing would emerge as a responsible stakeholder or, alternatively, an authoritarian threat in the 21st Century.

Speaking of Hong Kong, he said: “Many years ago, those laboring in mines deep underground, faced the deadly problem of the buildup of fatal but undetectable gases.  To warn them of approaching danger, they would bring with them a small and fragile bird, imprisoned in a cage, which became known as the miners’ canary…Hong Kong is the miners’ canary.  Its vulnerability makes it an unmistakable indicator of the course of China’s historic transition and the impact it will soon have on us all. We must watch carefully.”

Hyde died in 2007.  Yet his words of caution remain relevant for Americans today.  These include President Trump who, according to a CNN report on October 4th, made another questionable promise on Hong Kong in one of his now-famous phone calls to global leaders:  “During a private phone call in June, President Donald Trump promised Chinese President Xi Jinping that the US would remain quiet on pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong while trade talks continued.”  CNN further reported that the State Department told then-U.S. Consul General in Hong Kong, Kurt Tong, “to cancel a planned speech on the protests in Washington because the President had promised Xi no one from the administration would talk about the issue.”

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and NBA star LeBron James should also take heed.   Their concerns for human rights and the rule of law are blinded by what Chairman Hyde called in his 2004 speech “the fool’s gold of pure selfishness” – in this case, the glitter of Chinese gold.  Zuckerberg, seeking a breakthrough for Facebook in China after it was blocked in 2009, bought several copies of China strongman Xi Jinping’s book on governance in 2014, so that “he and (his) colleagues could learn about socialism with Chinese characteristics,” according to a December 9, 2014 article in the South China Morning Post.

And LeBron James more recently got caught in the awkward position of appearing to excuse Beijing’s current crackdown in Hong Kong in some ill-advised online comments.  This happened soon after a high school student protester was shot in the chest by police on China’s National Day, October 1st, in an eerie echo of the Tiananmen Square massacre, and prior to a leader of Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement being hospitalized after an assault on the street by thugs with hammers.  Commenting on LeBron James’s remarks, one disappointed Hong Kong protester told the Associated Press on October 15th: “Please remember, all NBA players, what you said before:  ‘Black lives matter.’ Hong Kong lives also matter.” Perhaps all three — Trump, Zuckerberg, and James — need to take their quotes more from Chairman Hyde and a little less from Chairman Mao.

The spin doctors in Beijing did not care very much for what Hyde had to say in his speech. UPI reported on December 6, 2004, that a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said that Hyde had “viciously attacked China’s development and progress, and insulted China’s foreign policy from his own Cold World view.”

So, what exactly did Hyde say about Hong Kong back in 2004 that drew such ire from Beijing?   Hyde noted that “in sharp contrast with Taiwan, where political reform and liberalization enjoyed sustained government sponsorship, in Hong Kong, the push has had to come from the people themselves, with the government actively attempting to slow or stop altogether any further advance.  I am certain that the standoff that has arisen is dispiriting to many here, especially as the prospects for further progress remain uncertain…Clearly, the commitment to democracy has already sunk deep roots.”

If the situation looked uncertain back in 2004, it looks downright gloomy in 2019.   Reuters reported on September 30th that “last month, Beijing moved thousands of troops across the border into this restive city. They came in on trucks, and armored cars, by bus and by ship. “   Three diplomatic envoys told Reuters that “the contingent of Chinese military personnel in Hong Kong had more than doubled in size since the protests began.  They estimate the number of military personnel is now between 10,000 and 12,000, up from 3,000 to 5,000 in the months before the reinforcement.  As a result, the envoys believe, China has now assembled its largest-ever active force of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) troops and other anti-riot personnel and equipment in Hong Kong.”

Chairman Hyde foresaw this coming, as he remarked that “Hong Kong has become an arena for an unavoidable struggle, one with global implications, where rival forces are locked in a battle to determine which of their visions for China’s political evolution will prevail…If we assume that chaos or repression are unacceptable outcomes to both sides, the question becomes:  Is there a route by which Hong Kong can become increasingly free and democratic without challenging the regime’s ultimate authority and thereby provoking a forcible response?” Chinese leader Xi Jinping seemed to answer Hyde’s question in the negative during a recent trip to Nepal. In the face of the ongoing unrest in Hong Kong, Xi warned that any effort to split China will result in “bodies smashed and bones ground into powder,” according to Hong Kong Free Press.   Hyde concluded at the end of his speech, if the repression of civil liberties in Hong Kong was China’s response, that “enamored of aggressive and intoxicating nationalism, it would soon wreak havoc on the world.”

One result of the current political crisis in Hong Kong has been the exposure of Beijing’s formula of “one country, two systems” as a fraud.  Beijing has been steadily seeking to undermine this pledge made at the time of the 1997 reversion of Hong Kong from British to Chinese rule.

Under the Basic Law, based upon the Sino-British Joint Declaration of 1984, Hong Kong was to be a special administrative region (SAR) with its own capitalist economic system, its own currency, its own legal and legislative system, and a guarantee of the people of Hong Kong’s rights for fifty years.  Yet Beijing and its surrogates in Hong Kong have sought to erode these guarantees by such means as the 2003 controversy over the since withdrawn national security measures contained in Article 23 of the Basic Law, the use of Hong Kong immigration to restrict entry of human rights critics of the Beijing regime, and the kidnapping of Hong Kong sellers of books banned in mainland China.

According to a New York Times article of April 3, 2018,  “At a national Communist Party congress in October 2017, President Xi Jinping made clear the party’s expansive vision of control. ‘The party exercises overall leadership over all areas of endeavor in every part of the country,’ he told delegates. No corner of society was out of reach. Even books — ‘socialist literature,’ in Xi’s words — must extol ‘our party, our country, our people and our heroes.’”

Then there was the attempt by Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam, which triggered the current unrest, to ram through the Legislative Council a new extradition bill earlier this year (since withdrawn) which would make both the citizens of Hong Kong and visitors subject to the long reach of Chinese security forces.  The people of Hong Kong decided it was time to either stand up or fatalistically submit to creeping authoritarianism.

Another unintended consequence of the current unrest in Hong Kong has been to completely derail Xi Jinping’s proposal to use the “one country, two systems” formula to settle the Taiwan issue.  In remarks made at the beginning of 2019, Xi said that unification was the key to “national rejuvenation,” according to the South China Morning Post. “The political division across the strait cannot be passed from generation to generation,” he added.  Xi proposed the “one country, two systems” formula for Taiwan.  However, the people in Taiwan have been watching very closely the current political struggles of their Hong Kong cousins and, as a result, see “one country, two systems” as the equivalent of the spider inviting the fly into its web.

A further unintended consequence has been placing Hong Kong’s special status in U.S. legislation as a separate customs area with special trading status distinct from China at risk. The U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, in a report to Congress last year, noted that Beijing’s “encroachment” on the city’s political system could diminish its standing as a global business hub and affect the export of American technology to the city.  The report recommended an assessment of the export control policy on technology “as it relates to U.S. treatment of Hong Kong and China as separate customs areas.”

Source: https://nationalinterest.org/feature/hong-kong%E2%80%99s-unrest-poses-threat-china%E2%80%99s-legitimacy-90966

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]]> China’s furtive fleet of nuclear missile-laden submarines tests the Pentagon https://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/chinas-furtive-fleet-of-nuclear-missile-laden-submarines-tests-the-pentagon/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=chinas-furtive-fleet-of-nuclear-missile-laden-submarines-tests-the-pentagon Tue, 07 May 2019 06:10:39 +0000 http://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/?p=27361 A Chinese Navy nuclear submarine takes part in an international fleet review to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Liberation Army Navy in the port of Qingdao, in China’s Shandong province, in 2009. | REUTERS HONG KONG – Recent visitors to the bay surrounding a submarine base on the southern coast of...

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A Chinese Navy nuclear submarine takes part in an international fleet review to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Liberation Army Navy in the port of Qingdao, in China’s Shandong province, in 2009. | REUTERS

HONG KONG – Recent visitors to the bay surrounding a submarine base on the southern coast of China’s Hainan Island describe a curious nocturnal phenomenon. Powerful spotlights are sometimes trained directly on the ocean frontages of neighboring hotels at night, making visibility out to sea virtually impossible. Some of the lights are mounted on land and others on passing naval patrol boats.

“The effect is incredible,” said one recent visitor. “The glare is so great you can hardly stand it on the balcony. You go inside and draw the curtains tight.”

The blinding lights cannot obscure something of intense interest to the world’s military intelligence agencies: evidence that China has made a breakthrough in its drive to rival America and Russia as a nuclear arms power.

Satellite imagery reveals the regular presence of nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines at the strategic base near the resort city of Sanya. Specialized surface warships and aircraft designed to protect the subs are prowling key waterways off the coast. Facilities at the base appear to have been built to store and load ballistic missiles. Antenna arrays that support the hunt for foreign submarines have appeared on Chinese-held islands in the hotly contested South China Sea. And a veteran submariner has been appointed to command Chinese forces in the south of the country.

Taken together, this means China has a force of missile submarines that can launch nuclear attacks from beneath the waves and now appear to be heading out on patrols, according to serving and retired naval officers, diplomats and security analysts. That gives Beijing something it has until recently lacked: a more reliable “second strike” capability if its land-based nuclear arsenal comes under attack.

Two Chinese People
Two Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy nuclear-powered Type 094A Jin-class ballistic missile submarines are seen during a military parade in the South China Sea on April 12, 2018. | REUTERS

After six decades of battling to master complex and challenging subsea military technologies, China has joined the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom and France in the nuclear ballistic missile submarine club. In its most explicit assessment so far of this Chinese capability, the Pentagon in its latest annual report on China’s military, published in August, said that Beijing now has a “credible” and “viable” sea-based nuclear deterrent.

An effective fleet of nuclear ballistic missile submarines, known as SSBNs, marks a dramatic boost to China’s nuclear capabilities. Each of China’s four Jin-class submarines is armed with up to 12 ballistic missiles that can carry a nuclear warhead with an estimated range of 7,200 kilometers (about 4,500 miles), according to the Pentagon. That would put the United States within striking distance from the Western Pacific. Analysts at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies estimate these missiles could fly at least 8,000 kilometers. The U.S. believes China has up to 100 nuclear missiles based on land.

Beijing’s enhanced nuclear capability is one of the hallmarks of Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s ambitious revamping of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), the world’s largest fighting force. China’s nuclear submarine fleet, Western strategists say, has added to the challenge that the increasingly powerful Chinese military poses to U.S. dominance in Asia.

“The opposing side can never be exactly sure that it knows where all of the submarines are,” said Peter Horobin, a retired Australian submarine commander and veteran of the Cold War battles to detect and monitor Soviet subs.

China’s Ministry of National Defense, the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command and the Pentagon did not respond to questions from Reuters.

It is still unclear if the Chinese are deploying fully armed submarines to maintain a round-the-clock deterrent, as the other ballistic missile submarine powers do. Some analysts doubt China has advanced that far.

But the United States and its allies are behaving as if China has. Western military officials say privately that in operational terms, America and its allies — including Japan, Australia and the United Kingdom — are already attempting to track the movements of China’s missile submarines as if they are fully armed and on deterrence patrols.

Asked about their role in tracking Chinese subs, Japan and the United Kingdom said they don’t comment on operational details.

“China’s military modernization is consistent with its rapid economic growth,” the Australian Department of Defense said. “As with all countries, we encourage China to be transparent about its military capabilities and strategic intentions to provide greater assurance to its neighbors.”

Two U.S. Navy P-8A Poseidon aircraft fly in formation over the East China Sea last September.
Two U.S. Navy P-8A Poseidon aircraft fly in formation over the East China Sea last September. | REUTERS

Growing stockpile

“An armed Jin-class SSBN will give China an important strategic capability that must be countered,” Adm. Harry Harris, then head of the U.S. Pacific Command, told a congressional committee last year.

That response appears to be happening. The United States and its allies are expanding their anti-submarine naval deployments across East Asia. This includes stepped-up patrols of America’s advanced, sub-hunting P-8 Poseidon planes out of Singapore and Japan.

With its relatively small force of nuclear missiles, Beijing has always worried that it might be vulnerable to a debilitating first strike. These fears were magnified as Chinese military planners watched Washington employ precision-guided weapons in conflicts like the Gulf wars, Afghanistan, Syria and the Balkans.

As it strengthens and improves its nuclear arsenal, Beijing is the only major nuclear power to be adding warheads to its stockpiles. China is developing an air-launched ballistic missile and plans to build a long-range stealth bomber capable of carrying nuclear weapons. With the sea-based second-strike deterrent in place, those programs suggest Beijing eventually intends to field a triad of air, sea and land-based nuclear weapons like the United States and Russia.

A missile is launched from a Chinese submarine during a joint military exercise with Russia off eastern China
A missile is launched from a Chinese submarine during a joint military exercise with Russia off eastern China’s Shandong peninsula in August 2005. | REUTERS

In the past two decades, the PLA Rocket Force, the service which controls China’s nuclear and conventional missiles, has invested heavily in expanding its stockpile of nuclear warheads and boosted the range and accuracy of the missiles that deliver them. It has also hardened the protection of its silo-based nuclear weapons, according to reports in China’s state-controlled media. The Pentagon and official Chinese military publications have reported that China has also deployed modern, road-mobile missiles that are more difficult for an adversary to find and attack.

Still, China lags far behind the United States and Russia in overall nuclear firepower. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute estimates that China has a total of 280 nuclear warheads. China does not disclose how many of its warheads are deployed and ready for conflict. The United States has 1,750 deployed warheads and Russia 1,600, the institute’s 2018 report said. The United States and Russia each have thousands more warheads held in stockpiles, according to the report.

Hans Kristensen, director of the Nuclear Information Project of the Washington-based Federation of American Scientists, said he had yet to see hard intelligence suggesting China had placed fully armed ballistic missiles on its submarines at sea, despite the intense activity. Just because the submarines exist, he said, “that doesn’t mean that they have the weapons aboard the vessels.”

While acknowledging that China has significantly enhanced its nuclear deterrence, the Pentagon isn’t convinced that Chinese subs are yet conducting around-the-clock patrols. In a January report, the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency said the Chinese Navy would need a minimum of five Jin-class submarines to maintain a continuous nuclear deterrence at sea. China now has four.

Undersea duels

A fleet of nuclear missile submarines hidden in the vast expanses of the ocean would help offset Beijing’s nuclear shortcomings, say Chinese and Western strategists.

Chinese naval designers and nuclear technicians have been working to build a force of nuclear missile submarines since the late 1950s. A single vessel was launched in the 1980s, but it was never fully operational. This submarine served as a test bed as Chinese technicians and designers struggled to overcome problems with nuclear propulsion technology, missiles and excessive noise that would have made the vessels easier for an adversary to detect and target.

To maximize its second-strike capability, China’s missile subs would need to be stealthy enough to go undetected as they sail to their patrol areas in the open ocean. U.S. and other foreign naval analysts say the Jin-class submarines are a sharp improvement over China’s earlier efforts, but they remain less stealthy than their U.S., Russian, French and British counterparts.

A satellite image shows docked vessels at the Chinese military
A satellite image shows docked vessels at the Chinese military’s Yulin Naval Base in Yalong Bay, Hainan Province, last September. | REUTERS

The 11,000-ton Jin-class submarines are stationed on the southern coast of China’s Hainan Island, close to deep water channels leading into and out of the South China Sea. The geography of China’s coastal waters has forced Beijing to base its missile submarines in this area, astride one of the world’s most important shipping lanes.

In the north, the Yellow Sea is too shallow to conceal big, ballistic missile submarines. The East China Sea is deeper but it’s confined by the Korean Peninsula, Japan’s island chain and Taiwan.

And Japanese and U.S. forces can deploy advanced anti-submarine warfare ships and aircraft based in Japan to closely monitor these waters and the channels that pass out into the Western Pacific, where the submarines are ultimately headed. The Chinese need to reach these waters to be in a position to fire on the United States.

Land reclamation is seen at Chinese-held Subi Reef in the Spratly chain of the South China Sea from the Philippines
Land reclamation is seen at Chinese-held Subi Reef in the Spratly chain of the South China Sea from the Philippines. | REUTERS

The South China Sea, by contrast, is much bigger and in parts deeper, making it more suitable for concealed submarine operations, according to Western submariners with extensive experience of patrolling in this area.

China would need to get its submarines out of Hainan, past surveillance and into seas east of the Philippines for their missiles to be in striking range of the United States. This is a key reason why China has gone to such lengths to reclaim and fortify islands and reefs in the South China Sea that are expanding Beijing’s control over this area, according to Western submariners and military attaches.

The sub fleet’s vulnerability to detection also explains China’s extreme sensitivity to the surveillance operations of the United States and its allies in these waters. A Chinese destroyer sailed within 45 meters of the American destroyer USS Decatur in late September, as the U.S. warship patrolled in the Spratlys, a highly contested island chain where China has expanded its foothold in recent years. It was the latest in a series of close encounters in the past decade.

China now appears to be on guard against foreign subs attempting to detect and shadow its ballistic missile fleet. As China’s Jin-class vessels put to sea, they appear to be flanked by protective screens of surface warships and aircraft on station to track foreign submarines, according to military officers and analysts familiar with allied surveillance of the Chinese coast.

Serving and former senior naval officers also point to the extensive, frequent deployments of the Chinese navy’s latest Type 056A corvettes into key waters south of Japan and east of the Philippines. The Type 056A is China’s most advanced submarine hunter. It is able to tow sonar arrays and other listening equipment deep beneath the surface to detect enemy submarines — advanced technology that China did not have just five years ago.

China has also installed an array of sensors, antennas and satellite communications installations on islands in the Spratlys, according to the International Institute for Strategic Studies. The PLA is tracking the foreign undersea hunters from the air, too. It has formed a squadron of Y-8GX6 aircraft on Hainan with the ability to comb vast areas of the sea surface for magnetic anomalies. The turboprop planes have already been seen landing on Woody Island, China’s key offshore holding in the South China Sea. These patrols are not the infrequent exercises of the past, but now near-constant deployments, shadowing foreign warships as well.

“We’re looking at them looking for us,” said one Western military attache.

A Chinese Z-9 helicopter prepares to land aboard the People
A Chinese Z-9 helicopter prepares to land aboard the People’s Liberation Army Navy frigate CNS Huangshan as the ship conducts a series of maneuvers and exchanges with the guided-missile destroyer USS Sterett in the South China Sea in June 2017. | REUTERS

Furtive force

The submarine base near Sanya is now under direct control of the Central Military Commission, the top military decision-making body, chaired by Xi himself. The new communications installations in the South China Sea have helped knit together the new command structure, allowing tighter control from Beijing, right down to individual vessels.

In 2017, Beijing appointed a veteran submariner, Vice Adm. Yuan Yubai, to head the Southern Theater Command, which is responsible for the South China Sea. His promotion was a clear indication of the importance China attaches to supporting nuclear sub operations, according to Chinese naval experts. Yuan is the first naval officer to head a command of this type, a promotion that’s part of a sweeping overhaul of the military structure by Xi.

Commercial satellite images of the submarine base give insight into the furtive force stationed there. They appear to show missile submarines regularly tied up alongside long piers in the harbor. Satellite images from Google Earth in June last year show what appear to be three Jin-class missile submarines at the base.

The vessels have a distinctive shape, with a hump-like structure that houses the missile tubes behind the sail, the vertical structure that rises from a submarine’s hull. Clearly visible in the images: a partially submerged entrance to what appear to be underground submarine pens, beneath a hill next to the harbor.

Construction at the base near Sanya also points to the PLA’s ability to stealthily arm submarine-launched missiles with nuclear warheads.

Western intelligence analysts familiar with satellite imagery of the area say a covered railway has been completed that runs into a hillside bunker — the suspected warhead arsenal. The railway in turn is linked by tunnels to the pens built for the submarines. This, they say, means the missiles can be armed and loaded on the submarines — without detection.

Source: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/05/07/asia-pacific/chinas-furtive-fleet-nuclear-missile-laden-submarines-tests-pentagon/#.XNJ1fKBKiUk

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]]> All of the Reasons China’s Military Is a Paper Tiger https://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/all-of-the-reasons-chinas-military-is-a-paper-tiger/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=all-of-the-reasons-chinas-military-is-a-paper-tiger Fri, 26 Apr 2019 23:26:50 +0000 http://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/?p=27110 In appearance it is very powerful, but in reality it is nothing to be afraid of—it is a paper tiger.”—Mao Zedong on the United States, 1956 China’s rise over the past 30 years has been nothing short of spectacular. This article by Kyle Mizokami originally appeared at War is Boring in 2014. After decades of double-digit...

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In appearance it is very powerful, but in reality it is nothing to be afraid of—it is a paper tiger.”—Mao Zedong on the United States, 1956

China’s rise over the past 30 years has been nothing short of spectacular.

This article by Kyle Mizokami originally appeared at War is Boring in 2014.

After decades of double-digit growth, today China is the world’s second largest economy—and possesses an increasingly sophisticated military that’s among the planet’s most powerful. Despite China bordering a number of unstable countries, its borders are secure.

That wasn’t always the case. In 2,000 years, China has suffered invasions, revolutions and humiliations from the outside world—plus its own internal rebellions. It has been brutalized, conquered and colonized.

No longer. China’s defense spending has increased tenfold in 25 years. Beijing is building a powerful blue-water navy, developing stealth fighters and carefully experimenting with peacekeeping and expeditionary operations.

China’s military buildup, along with an aggressive foreign policy, has inspired a fair amount of alarm in the West. Some American policymakers consider Beijing to be Washington’s only “near-peer competitor”—in other words, the only country with the military might to actually beat the U.S. military in certain circumstances.

But they’re wrong. Even after decades of expensive rearmament, China is a paper dragon—a version of what Mao Zedong wrongly claimed the United States was … in 1956.

China’s military budget has grown by double-digits year after year, but inflation has eaten away at the increases. China’s army, navy, air force and missile command are wracked by corruption—and their weapons are, by and large, still greatly inferior to Western equivalents.

Yes, the People’s Liberation Army is slowly becoming more technologically advanced. But that doesn’t mean Beijing can mobilize its armed forces for global missions. Unlike the world’s main expeditionary powers—the United States and the U.K., to name two—China is surrounded by potential enemies.

Russia, Japan and India are all neighbors … and historic adversaries. China’s aggressive foreign policy targeting smaller states isn’t encouraging submission but resistance, as countries such as The Philippines and Vietnam ally with the United States, Japan and India.

China’s other neighbors are weak or failed states, such as Pakistan and North Korea. Their instability—or their outright collapse—could have serious security repercussions for China, and help explain why Beijing lavishes funds on its armed forces.

Order of battle

China has the world’s largest military, with no fewer than 2.3 million men and women in uniform. Another 800,000 people serve in China’s reserves and militias.

The PLA ground forces number 1.25 million men and women divided into 18 group armies, each similar to an American corps. Each army consists of three to five infantry and mechanized divisions—China has only one tank division.

These ground troops are mostly for homeland defense. For power projection outside its borders, China has three airborne divisions, two marine divisions and three marine brigades. Major equipment includes more than 7,000 tanks and 8,000 artillery pieces.

China’s navy commands 255,000 sailors and 10,000 marines. The People’s Liberation Army Navy is divided into the North, East and South Seas Fleets, together possessing one aircraft carrier, 23 destroyers, 52 frigates, 49 diesel attack submarines and five nuclear attack subs. China has at least three Jin-class ballistic missile submarines, representing Beijing’s nuclear deterrent at sea.

The People’s Liberation Army Air Force has 330,000 active personnel spread out over 150 air and naval aviation bases. The PLAAF and naval air arm of the PLAN together possess 1,321 fighter and attack aircraft—including hundreds of J-7s, pictured—plus 134 heavy bombers and tankers and 20 airborne early warning planes. China also operates more than 700 combat helicopters.

Unique to the PLA is the Second Artillery Corps, a separate branch of the military in charge of land-based conventional and nuclear missiles. The Second Artillery includes between 90,000 and 120,000 personnel divided into six missiles brigades.

The Second Artillery fields more than 1,100 conventional short-range ballistic missiles with ranges of 1,000 kilometers or less, another 300 or so conventional medium-range ballistic missiles and an estimated 120 long-range nuclear ballistic missiles.

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute estimated China’s 2013 defense budget at $188 billion dollars. That’s about nine percent of global military spending and just under half of all spending in Asia. The same year, the United States spent $640 billion on defense, Russia $88 billion, India $47 billion and Japan $48 billion.

Yes, China’s spending seems like a lot. But it’s not, really—especially considering how dangerous China’s corner of the world can be.

Unenviable position

It’s probably difficult to walk through Beijing’s most prosperous neighborhoods or Shanghai’s glittering streets and grasp that you are in a country that borders three of the most unstable places in the world—Pakistan, Afghanistan and North Korea.

After thousands of years of incursions and invasions, China has finally built up strong borders. Beijing is doing a good job of maintaining peace and relative prosperity in a rough, impoverished neighborhood.

“China’s land borders have never been more secure than they are today,” M. Taylor Fravel, an associate professor of political science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, told War is Boring.

“Although disputes with Bhutan and India remain, China no longer faces the prospect of a significant threat on land,” Fravel continued. “Clashes could occur on the border with India, but they would be contained by geography and unlikely to escalate into a wider war.”

This hasn’t always been the case. Invaded by the Mongols, the Russians, Western colonialists and most recently Japan, China suffered greatly at the hands of outsiders for millennia. Given this history, it makes sense that Beijing would want strong defenses.

Vietnam fought China in 1979 and killed 9,000 People’s Liberation Army troops in a single month. Japan’s occupation of China in the 1930s and ’40s killed millions of Chinese. India fought China as recently as 1962. China and Russia waged a short, undeclared war in 1969.

China borders 14 countries, tying Russia for the most neighbors. But while many of Russia’s neighbors are peaceful—Estonia, Finland, Norway and Latvia come to mind—China borders Afghanistan, North Korea, Myanmar and Pakistan. Two of these states have nuclear weapons.

North Korea is particularly dangerous. Not only does it practice diplomacy through spontaneous violence, it has nukes. Nobody knows when—or if—the North Korean government will collapse, but the idea of 24 million starving people suddenly finding themselves without a government is a frightening one for Beijing.

Last year we found out China has contingency plans to deal with a post-collapse North Korea. That would likely involve the PLA moving into North Korea to set up a buffer zone. Perhaps in reaction to this disclosure, Pyongyang described Beijing as a “turncoat and an enemy.”

China is experiencing a prolonged period of peace and prosperity unprecedented in its modern history. At the same time, its neighborhood headaches are as numerous as ever. That’s one good reason China’s military budget is $188 billion a year and rising.

All alone

At the same time, China is remarkably lacking in real, dependable allies. In the Pacific alone, the United States can count Japan, Taiwan, Australia, South Korea, New Zealand and The Philippines as close allies—and maintains cordial relations with others including Malaysia, Vietnam and Indonesia.

China’s list of allies in the Pacific, on the other hand, is a short one. Russia. Globally, China’s allies include Pakistan, Zimbabwe, Venezuela and the countries of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization—Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. All are despotic or near-despotic states, many are unstable and many have long records of human rights abuses.

Beijing embraces its worst neighbors in part to keep them in check. This worked with Pakistan, but failed with North Korea. In Myanmar, China cozied up with the oppressive military regime only for it to suddenly open up and seek ties with the West and Japan. China’s net gain was years of condemnation for supporting the junta—which is to say, a net loss.

Where China has really failed, however, is in simply getting along with nearby countries. Before the recent confrontation with The Philippines over the Ayungin Shoal, relations between Manila and Beijing had never been better. The same went for much of Southeast Asia before China declared sovereignty over 90 percent of the South China Sea.

Even relations with Japan, China’s historical enemy, were cordial if staid.

Sometime around 2010, Beijing decided to stop playing nice. China began pushing long-dormant territorial claims—and tried its hardest to split the alliance between Japan and the U.S. China’s relations with pretty much every country in East and Southeast Asia have chilled.

It’s hard to say what China really hoped to gain. Some argue that China is attempting to “Finlandize” smaller Asian states—that is, intimidate them into expressing neutrality in order to deny them to the Americans. Others argue that China wanted those disputed territories but also fundamentally has a problem with treating other countries as equals.

Whatever the case, China’s recent actions have left it largely friendless. Today its most important relationships with other countries are strictly economic in nature.

This has obvious implications for China’s military posture. While the U.S. Navy can sail across the Pacific and call on practically dozens of ports, China’s warships can sail just outside its territorial waters and, other than the Russian port of Vladivostok, have nowhere to go.

This places China at an enormous strategic disadvantage. Beijing has no allies to provide bases, share burdens, pool intelligence or lend moral support.

Race with inflation

Since 1990, China’s defense spending has swelled by at least 10 percent annually, resulting in a tenfold overall budget increase in just 24 years. Some observers point to China’s seemingly huge military outlays as evidence of sinister intent.

But the budget boosts aren’t nearly as big as they seem.

China’s economic growth over the past two and a half decades has been meteoric, and has allowed the country to spend more on a modern military. But as a proportion of its economy, China’s defense budget is in line with international norms.

And if you take into account inflation, China’s real increase in defense spending is actually in the single digits annually—hardly the massive influx of cash that alarmists decry.

It’s important to view China’s arms spending in historical context. A quarter-century ago, Beijing’s military was big and low-tech. In 1989, the PLA had 3.9 million people on its payroll—many of them leg infantry lacking vehicles and sophisticated weaponry. The army’s main tank was a version of the Soviet T-55, a design dating to the early 1950s.

The air force and navy were capable only of coastal defense. China had a single nuclear missile submarine, which was rumored to have caught fire and sunk in port.

China was a poor country. Its GDP was $451 billion. By comparison, the USA’s GDP in 1989 was $8.84 trillion. That year, Beijing spent $18.33 billion on defense. By comparison, the same year Japan spent $46.5 billion and tiny New Zealand, $1.8 billion.

China’s 1989 defense budget amounted to spending $4,615 per soldier. At the same time, the United States appropriated $246,000 per individual service member.

In the late ’80s, China’s military doctrine still emphasized “People’s War,” a defensive strategy for drawing an enemy deep into the Chinese interior and then destroying him with conventional and guerrilla warfare. It was based on China’s wartime experiences … and was totally inadequate.

In 1991, Beijing watched in shock and horror as a U.S.-led coalition easily smashed Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi army and ejected it from Kuwait. An air campaign lasting several weeks and a ground offensive just 100 hours in duration destroyed a numerically superior Iraqi force.

Suddenly, China’s large, impoverished military looked like a liability.

Beijing had a lot of work to do reforming its armed forces. That required money. The good news for China was that, thanks to a booming economy, it actually didn’t have to devote a larger share of national output to defense in order to invest more in competent troops and modern weaponry.

One way to look at defense spending is as a percentage of GDP. China’s major neighbors, with the exception of Japan, allocate more to their militaries as a percentage of their respective GDPs. India allocates 2.5 percent, South Korea 2.8 percent and Russia 4.1 percent. The United States, with the best-equipped military on the planet, spends 3.8 percent of its GDP on defense.

The paradox of China’s military budget is that spending has risen even as defense’s share of the economy has dropped. As a percentage of the economy, China’s arms spending has actually fallen by a little more than 20 percent. Beijing spent 2.6 percent of GDP on defense in 1989. Between 2002 and 2010, it appropriated an average of 2.1 percent. In 2013, China’s military budget accounted for just two percent of GDP.

The PLA’s slice of the economic pie has gotten smaller. It’s just that the pie itself is much, much bigger than it was 25 years ago.

Public security

By some calculations, in 2013 China spent more on “public security”—Internet censorship, law enforcement and the paramilitary People’s Armed Police—than it did on external defense. China’s internal security budget for 2014 is a secret, leading to speculation that once again, the Chinese Communist Party is spending more to defend itself from its own people than from other countries.

The Party knows what it’s doing. Many Chinese are unhappy living under a totalitarian regime. Environmental damage, labor abuses, corruption and land grabs can—and do—quickly escalate into riots.

On top of that, China must contend with low-level unrest in the far western province of Xinjiang—where ethnic Uighurs resent colonization by the rest of China—and in Tibet.

Under the status quo, China has no choice but to spend so heavily on public security. While that’s bad for the Chinese people, it’s actually a good thing for the region. Much of the military might that Beijing buys every year gets directed inward and never projects externally.

Matching U.S. military spending as a percentage of GDP would require China to spend 5.8 percent on internal and external defense. That’s just not a realistic prospect. Only three countries devote that much of their economy to their armies—Saudi Arabia, Oman and South Sudan.

Moreover, the dollars China does spend on external military force don’t stretch as far as most observers assume. “Throughout much of the post-1978 reform era, the real-world effects of China’s nominal defense spending have been mitigated heavily by rampant inflation,” wroteAndrew Erickson, a professor at the U.S. Naval War College.

In 2008, China’s spent 14.9 percent more on defense than it did in 2007. But that 14.9-percent increase coincided with 7.8-percent inflation, resulting in a net military-budget boost of only 7.1 percent. In 2010, defense spending rose 7.8 percent and was devoured by a 6.7-percent inflation rate, for a net gain of just 1.1 percent.

Adjusted for inflation, between 2004 and 2014, China’s defense spending increased by an average of 8.3 percent in real terms. That’s still a lot of money, particularly as defense spending has been falling in most of the West. But the PLA’s budget isn’t really growing by double digits, as many alarmists claim.

PLA, Inc. and the ‘rank factory’

Corruption is a huge and largely invisible problem for the PLA. Officials sell government property for their own profit. Contractors charge inflated fees for substandard work. Cronyism results in promotions for unqualified personnel.

For years, the PLA generated extra income—and food staples—by farming and raising its own livestock. As China’s economy took off, these survival efforts evolved into businesses. To farming and ranching, the PLA added hotels, theaters and bars—the profits from which as often as not ended up in top officers’ pockets.

In 1998, the Chinese Communist Party ordered the PLA to cut ties with commercial enterprises in order to improve military readiness. An infantry unit didn’t need to raise its own pork anymore—the defense budget could accommodate soldiers’ food needs. Units could get on with the business of soldiering.

But instead of ending them, corrupt military leaders simply obscured their profit ventures.

The business of illegally selling military license plates to wealthy civilians has been a particularly lucrative one. Plate bearers—who are often civilians with only tangential connections to the PLA—mount red lights and sirens on their cars to push through regular street traffic. Holders are often entitled to free gasoline.

The situation got so bad that in 2013, the PLA banned expensive imports—from Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Porsche and Bentley—from having military license plates.

Beijing has occasionally cracked down on corrupt officers. In 2007, a judge handed down a suspended death sentence to Vice Adm. Wang Shouye for embezzling $25 million in PLA funds.

As deputy director of the PLA’s General Logistics Department between 1997 and 2001, Wang was in a position to approve new military housing. The government accused Wang of receiving kickbacks from contractors.

Police arrested Wang in 2006 after the admiral refused blackmail demands from one of his many mistresses. Investigators found more than $8 million dollars stashed in microwave ovens and refrigerators in Wang’s homes in Beijing and Nanjing and another $2.5 million in a washing machine. There was evidence of an additional $8 million in pilfered funds in Wang’s bank accounts.

In March, police detained Xu Caihou, a retired general and former member of the powerful Central Military Commission, on allegations he made millions of dollars selling military ranks. Xu was in charge of high-level army promotions from 2004 to 2013.

We don’t know exactly how much money Xu made. However, the general’s subordinate Gu Junshan—who is also in custody and under investigation—gave Xu’s daughter a debit card worth $3.2 million as a wedding gift.

Gu reportedly sold “hundreds” of military ranks. “If a senior colonel [not in line for promotion] wanted to become a major general, he had to pay up to $4.8 million,” a source told Reuters.

That’s a lot of money. In most professional militaries, such bribes wouldn’t be worth it. But in the PLA, a payoff like that is an investment. The higher an officer’s rank, the greater the opportunities for self-enrichment.

Daniel Hartnett, a China analyst at CNA Corporation, told War Is Boringthat corruption could damage the PLA’s military capabilities, not the least by “hinder[ing] the PLA’s ability to develop its officer corps.”

“If officers are purchasing promotions, as recent allegations have claimed, it could mean that those who should be promoted due to merit might not be. And those that are being promoted, shouldn’t necessarily be,” Hartnett said.

Graft could hurt the PLA in other ways, Hartnett explained. “Although PLA procurement processes are often a black box, it’d be a plausible conclusion that some—maybe even many—procurement decisions are not necessarily made with the PLA’s best interests in mind. Purchase this item, and receive a kickback, even if that item is sub-quality or not necessarily need.”

Corruption could also open a rift between the Chinese people and the PLA. “If the military is seen as a corrupt institution, as it was during the early 1980s in China, overall support for the PLA could be undermined,” Hartnett said. “This would go heavily against the military’s narrative that it is the keeper of [Chinese] honor and integrity that it has worked so hard to develop over the past two-plus decades.”

Morale in the PLA officer corps has tanked in the wake of the Gu Junshan scandal, According to Reuters. “Many fear punishment. Those who are able but passed over for promotion are disgruntled.”

Since assuming office in 2013, Chinese president Xi Jinping has made the news several times urging the PLA to “prepare for combat.” That might sound bellicose, but in light of the PLA’s corruption problem, Xi could be telling officers to stop making money and just do their jobs.

“No country can defeat China,” a leading PLA commissar was quoted as saying in Foreign Policy. “Only our own corruption can destroy us and cause our armed forces to be defeated without fighting.”

Museum pieces

Despite a growing defense budget, China’s arsenals still overflow with outdated equipment. The PLA possesses 7,580 main battle tanks—more than the U.S. Army. But only 450 of those tanks—the Type 98As and Type 99s—are anywhere near modern, with 125-millimeter guns, composite armor, modern suspension and advanced fire control systems.

All of America’s roughly 5,000 M-1 tanks are modern.

The other 7,130 Chinese tanks—some of which are pictured here—are the same descendants of Soviet T-55s that comprised Beijing’s armored force in the late 1980s … and were obsolete even then.

China also has a lot of fighter planes. Between the People’s Liberation Army Air Force and the air arm of the People’s Liberation Army Navy, China boasts no fewer than 1,321 fighter aircraft, an aerial armada only slightly smaller than America’s.

But China’s air forces likewise maintain mostly obsolete jets. Of 1,321 fighters, only 502 are modern—296 variants of the Russian Su-27 and 206 J-10s of an indigenous design. The remaining 819 fighters—mostly J-7s, J-8s and Q-5s—are 1960s designs built in the 1970s. They wouldn’t last long in a shooting war.

The navy is in the best shape, but that’s not saying much. The PLAN’s destroyers and frigates are fairly new, but its first aircraft carrier Liaoning is a rebuilt Soviet ship from the 1980s. After a nine-year refit, Liaoning started sea trials in 2011.

Liaoning is half the size of an American Nimitz-class supercarrier and carries half as many planes. As Liaoning lacks a catapult, China’s J-15 naval fighters must use a ski ramp to take off—and that limits their payload and range. Liaoning lacks the radar and refueling planes that give American flattops their long-range striking power.

Submarines are another problem area for the PLAN. Just over half of China’s 54 submarines are modern—that is, built within the last 20 years. Beijing’s modern undersea fleet includes the Shang, Han, Yuan and Song classes. All four classes are Chinese-built. All are markedly inferior to Western designs.

The rest of China’s submarines, especially its 1980s-vintage Mings, are totally obsolete.

The PLAN halted production of the nuclear-powered Shang class after only building just three boats—an ominous sign. Moreover, Beijing has placed an order with Russia for up to four Kalina-class subs, signalling a lack of faith in local designs.

Unknown unknowns

One of the most visible signs of China’s military rise is all the new, locally-designed and -produced hardware. Beijing is building new ships, aircraft, drones and tanks that, on the outside, appear to be matches for Western weapons. But we know very little about China’s homemade weaponry. Specifically, we don’t know if any of it really works.

In an early effort to modernize the PLA, in the 1980s China strengthened ties with Western defense contractors. Beijing bought helicopters, aircraft, engines, naval electronics and munitions. Then, in 1989, the Chinese government massacred pro-democracy students near Tiananmen Square in the heart of Beijing. The U.S. and Europe promptly imposed an arms embargo.

China turned to Russia, but Russia would rather sell finished products to China than help its neighbor develop its own industry. Beijing realized it would have to develop weaponry all on its own.

That’s not easy. In all the world, only the United States still has the technology, expertise and industrial capacity to develop all of its own military hardware. It’s very, very expensive.

Many of China’s “new” weapons are actually foreign designs that Beijing’s state companies have licensed, stolen or painstakingly reverse-engineered. The Changhe Z-8 helicopter was originally the French Super Frelon. The Harbin Z-9 scout helicopter started life as the Eurocopter Dauphin. The Type 99 tank is an updated Soviet T-72.

To be sure, not all of the PLA’s new hardware is a knock-off. But “homemade” does not necessarily equal “good.” In many cases, we can only guess at the weapon’s quality. After all, China has no free press.

The J-20 stealth fighter prototype, for example, has flown scores of test flights since first appearing in late 2010. The large, angular plane appears to boast long range and a large payload, but its stealthiness is hard to gauge. Its avionics, aerodynamic controls, weapons and sensors—and especially its engines—are equally questionable.

The J-20’s designers appear to be waiting on new, Chinese-developed engines to replace the prototype’s Russian-made AL-31Ns. China has been working on those engines, without visible success, since the early 1990s.

It’s important to remember that America’s latest F-35 Joint Strike Fighter first flew in 2006 and won’t be ready for combat until 2016. The United States has experience developing stealth fighters; China does not. If we allow China 10 years from first flight to combat readiness, the J-20 won’t be a front-line fighter until 2021. At the earliest.

The specifications of the PLAN’s Type 052C/D air-defense destroyers make them seem very similar to Western warships, such as the U.K.’s Darings or the American Arleigh Burkes. But we don’t know how difficult the ships were to build, how well their air-defense system works with the associated phased-array radar or how accurate and reliable the ships’ missiles are.

When it comes to developing arms, China is starting out far behind Russia and the West and is struggling to catch up. And we must not forget that the very government developing all this hardware is also the only source of information about the new gear. For now, it’s wise to be skeptical of Chinese weaponry.

Neighborhood watch

China’s aggressive behavior, in the East and South China Seas has prompted many of its neighbors to band together or seek the support of larger, more powerful allies. Japan is the hub for many of these of these cooperative agreements.

Politically and constitutionally limited in what kind of direct action it can take to counter China, Japan is building relationships with China’s other disgruntled neighbors and with Western powers. Tokyo is currently in talks with Australia, the U.K., India, Indonesia, The Philippines, Vietnam, Canadaand the U.S.

Logistics cooperation, co-development of military equipment, intelligence sharing, joint exercises and security-related aid are all on the table.

Vietnam, a historical enemy of China, has begun building a military specifically tailored to counter the PLA. It has procured Russian Su-27 and Su-30 fighters and four Gepard frigates. Vietnam has even bought its first submarines—six Improved Kilo diesel-electrics from Russia that are more advanced than the Chinese navy’s own Kilos.

Hanoi is strengthening foreign ties. India will train Vietnam’s submariners. Vietnam has also hinted at letting foreign fleets use the harbor at Cam Ranh Bay, but is likely holding back as that would be a serious provocation to China.

The Philippines, locked in a standoff with China over the Ayungin Shoal, has begun rebuilding its navy and air force, purchasing retired U.S. Coast Guard cutters for its navy and a dozen South Korean TA-50 light fighters for the air force. Manila has agreed to host American facilities—and American troops—on its military bases.

Asia probably won’t assemble a new NATO-like alliance in the near future. China’s opponents aren’t willing to accept such close military integration. Most are unwilling to fight for someone else. Many of these countries, despite being wary of Chinese aggression, still have strong economic ties to Beijing.

Still, the level of cooperation would complicate any military moves by China. Not that Beijing necessarily intends to invade … anyone. Ever. Military, diplomatic and economic power are intertwined forces that enable a government to shape its environment—peacefully and against a rival’s will.

The big question is, when does China catch up to America militarily?

Never.

“China will grow old before it gets rich” is, by now, a cliche among China-watchers. But it’s true. The same demographic wave that has gifted China with an abundance of labor will soon also transform the country into the world’s biggest retirement home.

Beijing’s “one-child” policy has sharpened the trend. Today China has 16 retirees per 100 workers. Projections see that increasing to 64 retirees per 100 workers by 2050, resulting a much grayer population than in America.

This has indirect—but serious—implications for China’s defense. Most Chinese do not have retirement benefits and in their old age must rely on personal savings or family … a difficult proposition when there is only one child to take care of two parents.

If Beijing wants to preserve household savings and productivity, it will have to build some kind of social welfare system. And that means making some difficult choices.

China’s borders are secure. The U.S., Japan and India cannot bring down the Chinese government. But tens of millions of desperate Chinese families could do so—and just might, if Beijing can’t find some way to care for them as they age.

China has nuclear weapons. It’s ruled by a deeply nationalistic, authoritarian regime with a history of brutality towards its own citizens. It has territorial claims that clash with those of other countries—and a defense budget rising by eight percent annually. It’s wise to keep a watchful eye on China.

Yet China is a hobbled giant with many deep, systemic problems. Some of these problems—particularly the technological ones—are solvable. The demographic issue is not. And it’s the biggest reason the paper dragon does not pose a major threat to the rest of the world over the long term.

Image: Reuters

Source: https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/all-reasons-chinas-military-paper-tiger-54537

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The post All of the Reasons China’s Military Is a Paper Tiger first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

]]> Be ready for war, crisis: Chinese President Xi Jinping tells army https://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/be-ready-for-war-crisis-chinese-president-xi-jinping-tells-army/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=be-ready-for-war-crisis-chinese-president-xi-jinping-tells-army Mon, 07 Jan 2019 18:16:36 +0000 http://www.garnertedarmstrong.org/?p=8655 China’s armed forces should be ready for combat and be prepared for unexpected crisis and war, President Xi Jinping said on Friday in his first meeting with the military top brass in Beijing in 2019. The massive and rapidly modernizing, People’s Liberation Army (PLA) should have enhanced awareness of danger, crisis and war, Xi told a...

The post Be ready for war, crisis: Chinese President Xi Jinping tells army first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

]]> China’s armed forces should be ready for combat and be prepared for unexpected crisis and war, President Xi Jinping said on Friday in his first meeting with the military top brass in Beijing in 2019.

The massive and rapidly modernizing, People’s Liberation Army (PLA) should have enhanced awareness of danger, crisis and war, Xi told a meeting of the central military commission (CMC), the top military organization in the country of which he is the chairperson.

It is effectively being seen as Xi’s first order to the military in 2019 where he also signed a mobilization command for the training of the armed forces through the year.

Besides the festering land border problem with India, Xi’s command comes against the background of continuing maritime territorial disputes with multiple countries in the South China Sea and growing tension with the US over Beijing’s aim to reunify Taiwan, which it considers a breakaway nation.

Xi, in fact, said on Wednesday that China reserved the right to use force to achieve “reunification” with Taiwan, which is an independent and democratically-run country.

He brought up Taiwan days after US President Donald Trump signed the Asia Reassurance Initiative Act into lae, reaffirming the US commitment to the island’s security.

“The entire armed forces should have a correct understanding of China’s security and development trends, enhance their awareness of danger, crisis and war, and make solid efforts on combat preparations in order to accomplish the tasks assigned by the Party (the ruling Communist Party of China) and the people,” Xi said.

“The world is facing a period of major changes never seen in a century, and China is still in an important period of strategic opportunity for development,” Xi was quoted as saying by the official news agency, Xinhua, warning that various risks and challenges were on the rise.

The Chinese President stressed the armed forces’ ability to respond quickly and effectively to contingencies, asking them to upgrade commanding capability of joint operations, foster new combat forces, and improve military training under combat conditions.

China and India, in fact, had come close to a military clash in 2017 when border troops from the two countries had a 73-day standoff near the Sikkim border at Doklam.

Diplomatic negotiations finally separated the troops and defused the situation, which had threatened to trigger a border clash.

Interestingly, Chinese state media made an international splash this week by publicizing the testing of the “mother of all bombs” or MOAB, the most powerful non-nuclear bomb in the PLA’s arsenal.

The new bomb’s destructive powers were publicized in a short video this week for the first time, the Xinhua news agency reported on Wednesday on its mobile application.

The report said it is China’s most powerful non-nuclear bomb, and that the H-6K bomber could only carry one at a time due to its size.

Source:  https://americanmilitarynews.com/2019/01/be-ready-for-war-crisis-chinese-president-xi-jinping-tells-army/?utm_campaign=DailyEmails&utm_source=AM_Email&utm_medium=email

[Disclaimer]

The post Be ready for war, crisis: Chinese President Xi Jinping tells army first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

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