Photo: World Affairs Board
Paul Dibb, National Interest: Not So Scary: This Is Why China's Military Is a Paper Tiger
It’s becoming commonplace to drum up the military threat from China and belittle America’s military capabilities. Much of this commentary reminds me of statements in the mid-1980s that the former Soviet Union was poised to outstrip the U.S. in military power. This isn’t to argue that China is in the final stages of disintegration like the USSR, but it is to assert that the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) demonstrates all the brittleness and paper-thin professionalism of a military that has never fought a modern war and whose much-vaunted military equipment has never been tested in combat.
With a slowing economy, and with structural economic and social tensions becoming worse rather than better, China is a large but fragile power ruled by a vulnerable party that can’t afford any economic or foreign policy disasters, let alone war with the U.S. Its economy is fundamentally interdependent with that of free international trade and global supply chains. War for China would be an economic and social disaster.
WNU editor: This debate on the strength (or weakness) of the Chinese military has been making the rounds this year .... Doubts Are Being Raised On The Effectiveness Of The Chinese Military
8 comments:
Given the US military's tendency towards losing wars, and the world has seen lots of that, it is a moot point whether China's military are any better and will remain so until they become embroiled in a war and show their worth.
The mere presence of the Chinese military enabled the planning and execution of the Tet offensive.
There is a value for an "Army in being". Most people underrate or don't get this concept. Its mere presence creates uncertainty that precludes enemies from taking certain actions. It has been better for armies to shadow or harass an enemy rather than engage in pitched battle (Late Roman Empire & Medieval ages).
China affected the course of the Vietnamese - French by merely handing over 24 capture American howitzers to the Viet Minh. These howitzers outranged the French ones and coupled with the fact that the Vietnamese had the high ground sealed the defender's fate at Bien Dien Phu.
The 'inferior' Chinese army still got an acceptable outcome for Chinese Rulers in Korea and a better one in Vietnam. American's see Vietnam as a struggle solely against the Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese and flippantly use the word quagmire. They rejected the the War's larger context at the time and now have forgotten that rejection.
A good many of those officers will follow that "irrelevant Communist dogma" to the end just like they're forebearers did when they crossed the Yalu in 1950.
Even Xi.
Nuclear deterent? Please!
The US wouldnt last more than a week or two tops without electrical power.
They'd eat each other alive. Canada too.
All this buffoonish trash talk is one of the reasons why the Russians and Chinese have so little respect for people over here these days.
There's a big switch between the daily Disney adventure that is life over here and dark, violent, death and anarchy. The up position is labelled "Party On", the down position is labelled "Party Off". The Chinese know it, and how to throw it. Someone else does too. You get one guess.
Hint: It ain't the people pushing these godawful columnists. They run only two things, Jack and shit. And Jack left town.
He currently resides in Moscow
U.s military tends to win the war but lose the peace.
Win the war but lose the peace? Nice way to say that they think they won the war but it never really ended.
The Chinese do not have a lot of experience in fighting wars. The Korean War was a draw and the Vietnamese did a ioce job on them in the 70's and that's about it.
Stephen,
I heard the Chinese took heavy losses. My information is kind of dated and my memory might not be good. I thought they had use many second rate troops. It lead me believe that maybe that was one way of getting rid of "bare twigs".
Probably more importantly the Russians were at the Vietnamese HQ and feeding them satellite data. The Chinese were lured into a pocket (sort of like Cannae but on the operational level; forget the city) and mauled.
Tradition plays a part in reinforcing belief in elan/cohesiveness or it can delude. the Chinese personnel are for the most part were not in the service during 1979. It has been 36 years. I would recommend rating Chinese division per the WW1 German rule of thumb. They rated reserve or active division with a number form 1 to 4. That was its effectiveness. They found that foolish to believe that an division made of regulars was necessarily better than a reserve division.
You would have to see these division on maneuvers, look at their training manual, see if they actually "do what they say they do", etc. Maybe a military attache can do that to a limited extent (probably not).
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