[Epoch Times, 01 dicembre 2022](Reported by Epoch Times reporter Song Tang) On November 29, the US Department of Defense released the 2022 “China (CPC) Military and Security Situation Development Report” (Military and Security Developments Involving the Republic of China population), commonly known as “CCP military report”。
last month,PentagonA confidential”CCP military report“, the report released this month is a non-confidential report for the public. New content such as Taiwan’s deterrence and the 2021 dynamics of the various theaters of the Chinese Communist Army, a brief mention of the Russo-Ukrainian war and Nancy’s visit Pelosi in Taiwan in August and more content in 2022.
The report also provides an assessment of the Chinese military, citing its weapons and operational weaknesses.
1. The so-called “strategic deterrence” of the CCP
At the 20th CPC Congress, Xi retained the seven-member Military Commission, with new members providing policy continuity, technical expertise in military modernization and space matters, and combat experience against Taiwan, the report said.
The core of the report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, in addition to reiterating the acceleration of military modernization in the next five years, also proposed the term “strategic deterrence system”.
The report warns the US Congress that China is seeking to “build national power” to change geopolitics to better serve Beijing’s national interests, including strengthening what it calls “strategic deterrence” by boosting its nuclear capabilities.
To strengthen its ambition for “strategic deterrence”, the CCP continues to accelerate the modernization, diversification and expansion of its nuclear forces. At the same time, the reluctance to discuss the Chinese military’s ability to develop nuclear, space and cyberspace capabilities has a negative impact on global stability.
According to the report, Beijing will continue to accelerate the pace of nuclear expansion in 2021. The US Department of Defense estimates that its stockpile of operational nuclear warheads has exceeded 400. If the expansion continues, by 2035 it could have around 1,500 warheads.
And Beijing has not declared an end goal, has failed to acknowledge the scale of its nuclear expansion, and has refused to engage in substantive arms control discussions.
The CCP still believes that the United States, which represents the free world, is the biggest obstacle to its goals and regards the United States as a “strong enemy”. In 2021, the Chinese military began discussing a new “basic operational concept”: a “multi-domain precision warfare” (MDPW), which combines big data and artificial intelligence for precise attacks, targeting systems of US Army combat.
In the past 10 years, China’s defense budget has almost doubled, and in 2021, the growth trend of more than 20 years will continue: the military budget will increase by 6.8%, reaching 209 billion US dollars. However, the US Department of Defense estimates that the budget omits several major categories of spending, including research and development and foreign weapons procurement, and actual military spending is much higher than the officially announced defense budget.
In 2021, China will increasingly use the military as a national policy tool, taking more coercive and aggressive actions in the Indo-Pacific region.
In 2021, the Chinese Rocket Force launched about 135 ballistic missiles for testing and training, which is more than the rest of the world combined (excluding the use of ballistic missiles in conflict zones).
The Chinese military has also changed its recruitment strategy, implementing a six-month conscription and placing greater emphasis on recruiting university students majoring in science and engineering.
The CCP has stepped up diplomatic, economic, political and military pressure on Taiwan in 2021. Throughout 2021, the Chinese military has increased its provocative and destabilizing actions in and around the Taiwan Strait, including increasing flights into the Taiwan’s declared air defense identification zone and conducting island seizure exercises.
2. Biological weapons
The outbreak of the COVID-19 virus pandemic in Wuhan, China in 2019 heightened US suspicions that the Communist Party of China may be engaged in the development of biological and chemical weapons, and this year’s report continues that topic.
The report said that the Communist Party of China’s chemical and biotechnological infrastructure is sufficient to research, develop and produce some chemical and biological agents or toxins on a large scale.
The United States cannot demonstrate that Beijing has complied with its obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), amid concerns over its research on pharmaceutical agents (PBAs) and potential dual-use toxins.
China continues to engage in dual-use biological assets that raise concerns about its compliance with the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC), including research by China’s military medical institutions into potent dual-use toxins.
3. Three Weaknesses of the Chinese Communist Army
PentagonThe “China Military Strength Report” is largely descriptive, but there are some assessments of the strength of China’s military.
For example, despite China’s military ambitions to become a highly modern land force, they still make extensive use of obsolete tanks and armored fighting vehicles.
Although the Chinese military has undergone military reforms to facilitate joint operations capabilities, the Chinese military’s ability to operate beyond the first island chain in support of counter-intervention or joint operations is still in its infancy. Most of the Communist Army’s overseas activities are carried out by a single branch of the Army.
Although China is the fifth largest arms exporter, quality defects and unreliability of some exported weapons persist, inhibiting Beijing’s ability to expand the arms export market. Many developing countries buy Chinese weapons systems simply because they are cheaper than other similar weapons. At the same time, Chinese arms dealers are also using donations and flexible payment methods to attract buyers.
4. Development strategy of military-civilian integration
The CCP acquires advanced military-civilian technology through the military-civilian fusion (MCF) development strategy. The Biden administration’s sweeping ban on the CCP’s advanced chips is to impede the flow of military-civilian technology to the CCP.
Of particular concern to China are emerging dual-use technologies, including artificial intelligence, autonomous systems, quantum technologies, biotechnology and advanced materials and manufacturing, the report said.
The CCP designates artificial intelligence as one of its priority areas of technological development and sees advances in artificial intelligence and autonomy as central to intelligent warfare, Beijing’s concept of future warfare.
Beijing sees the combination of military and civilian agencies as central to the development of military AI capabilities, and has established military-civilian R&D centers that purchase commercially developed AI and robotics technologies to develop AI technologies for the chinese army.
5. Espionage
The CCP has mobilized substantial resources to support its defense modernization involving espionage in addition to its military-civilian fusion development strategy.
Since 2015, the United States has prosecuted multiple Chinese military espionage counts, including China’s procurement and export of controlled items including radiation-resistant integrated circuits, monolithic microwave integrated circuits, accelerometers, gyroscopes, naval and marine technology and synthetic foam trade Secret, space communication, military communications jamming equipment, dynamic random access memory, aviation technology and anti-submarine weapons, etc.
2021 cases include: In July 2021, a Chinese citizen was sentenced to 42 months in prison for conspiring to export maritime assault boats and engines to China. Ships and multi-fuel engines can function after being launched from an underwater submarine or dropped into the ocean from an aircraft, which China does not produce.
In April 2021, a Chinese citizen residing in the United States pleaded guilty to conspiring to export military-use equipment to the Chinese government and military. The Chinese citizen has been mandated by the Chinese military to acquire dual-use technology for anti-satellite weapons and other advanced military capabilities, including remote-operated side-scan sonar systems, hydrophones, robotic vessels, unmanned submarines, and unmanned ground vehicles.
Chinese cyber-espionage also poses a sophisticated and persistent threat of cyber-espionage and attacks on military and critical infrastructure systems in order to acquire military technology, and US targets primarily include proprietary commercial and military technology companies and defense-related research, energy and other sectoral mechanisms.
Responsible editor: Lin Yan#
