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In the last week of 2024, China Surprised the world by flying two new fighter planes at low altitude, from which their pictures were broadcast around the world. There is much speculation that both are prototypes of sixth generation fighters Which could be a major success for the People’s Liberation Army (PLA).
The next day, largely unnoticed by the media, China also launched a giant Type 076 amphibious assault ship that can serve as a light aircraft carrier. Around the same time, the Chinese also conducted a test flight of their new early warning aircraft, namely the KJ-3000, powered by a new and advanced jet engine – the WS-20.
Those developments were so new that they were not included in the 2024 edition of the US Department of Defense (or Pentagon) report – ‘Military and security developments related to the People’s Republic of China‘- On 18th December. This is just a confirmation of the huge efforts being made by China to become a world power, if not a world power, by 2049.
Military construction despite economic crisis
The Chinese achievement can be gauged from the fact that the sixth-generation fighter aircraft reportedly comes just four years after the US flew the first prototype of the Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighter aircraft in 2020. Note that the first fully Chinese-origin combat aircraft, the J-20 made its maiden flight in 2011 and entered service in 2017.
The Chinese economy is currently facing cyclical and structural weaknesses, but this has no impact on its continued military buildup. As part of this, the PLA has made a major effort towards modernization and reform to improve its war-fighting capabilities in all its domains through a joint force capable of land, air, sea, cyberspace and space operations.
According to a study by Robert Blackwill and Richard Fontaine, China has modernized its military with an “unprecedented increase in military spending”. Chinese defense expenditure increased by more than 800 percent between 1993 and 2018. Currently, China’s budget is about $200 billion compared to India’s $73 billion, according to International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) The Military Balance 2024. This is just a fraction of the US’s $905.5 billion, but unlike the US, China does not yet have global commitments.
Modernization of all segments of PLA
The Pentagon report said all four elements of the PLA – Army, Navy, Air Force and Rocket Force – are upgrading their equipment and training techniques at a rapid pace. PLA ground forces are on their way to mastering the U.S. “joint fires” capability, which involves the coordinated and integrated use of all elements of air, sea, land, cyberspace, and special forces.
pla navy Already numerically the largest navy in the world with over 370 ships and submarines. An example of its all-round development is seen in the launch of the Type 076 amphibious assault ship which features an electromagnetic catapult to launch advanced unmanned aircraft. About 70 percent of the PLA navy is modern, and in addition to warships, it is building its own supply ships to boost the ability of its growing fleet of aircraft carriers, frigates and submarines to operate away from home.
PLA Air ForceIt is also moving rapidly towards becoming equal to America. This is evident from the surprise fielding of prototypes of two sixth or near-sixth generation fighter aircraft last week.
It has deployed new UAVs, bombers and stealth aircraft in recent years. It already has about 200 J-20 fifth-generation fighter aircraft deployed and is rapidly expanding its production.
PLA Rocket Force Is developing its long range missile capability. This is linked to an ongoing project to build three giant missile silo fields near Mongolia, which could be used to hold about 300 missiles for both nuclear and conventionally armed missiles.
Moreover, the Chinese are working hard to reshape support structures for the PLA. A major development here is the dismantling of the Strategic Assistance Force established in 2015. It is divided into three components – Aerospace Force, Cyberspace Force and Information Support Force – all of which come directly under the Central Military Commission (CMC). Which is effectively the Defense Ministry of China.
Another supporting element is joint logistics support forceWhich is trying to break down civil-military silos to ensure that it can provide products and services to PLA components in quick time and through war and peace.
Can we expect a risky change in China’s nuclear policy?
Perhaps the most worrying aspect of the Pentagon report is its effective abandonment of its long-standing policy of minimal deterrence. This could be a prelude to a change in its No First Use (NFU) policy.
China added 100 nuclear warheads to its 500-strong arsenal last year and is on track to deploy more than 1,000 warheads by 2030, the Pentagon reports. The Chinese are possibly aiming for a 1,500-warhead arsenal by 2035 which would bring them on par with the US and Russia which deploy 1,550 strategic nuclear warheads as per the treaty.
But, apart from expanding its nuclear arsenal, the PLA is also developing advanced nuclear delivery systems such as hypersonic glide vehicles and fractional orbital bombardment (FOB) systems. The developed ground- and space-based missile early warning systems suggest that China no longer adopts the NFU posture.
According to the Pentagon report, another area of focus for the PLA is the space segment. Unlike India, China’s space program is run by the PLA which is now rapidly expanding its intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, navigation and communications satellites. As of 2022, it is operating a space station. An important and worrying feature of this is the counter-space program aimed at attacking space-based communications, imaging and navigation satellites.
But these are just the nuts and bolts of PLA. The heart of the new and modernized army is the “intelligent warfare” concept it is working on.
It is designed by integrating advanced technologies, especially Artificial Intelligence (AI), along with big data analytics and autonomous systems into military operations. An important and not very well understood part of this is cognitive warfare aimed at influencing the thought processes of the enemy’s decision makers and the public. The concept relies on big data analytics and algorithms to inform military strategies and provide real-time analysis of battlefield developments.
All these have special significance for India which is in adversarial relations with China. In almost every field we lag behind China which sees itself as America’s closest counterpart.
Although we have the capability to defend our northern border, the outcome of a major conflict could be problematic, especially since our air force numbers are rapidly declining. On the nuclear front, we had earlier shared the concept of Minimum Deterrence and NFU with China. But now that Beijing is moving away from this – expanding its arsenal and developing new delivery systems – it creates a major weakness for India.
(The author is a distinguished fellow of the Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi. This is an opinion piece, and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint Neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)
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