In a statement that once again sets off alarm bells in the West, Xi Jinping He called on China’s military to comprehensively improve the combat readiness of troops.
Xi, also general secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and chairman of the Central Military Commission, He made these statements while inspecting the Army’s 78th battalion on Friday.
In his statement, he urged efforts to improve the level of combat readiness, reinforce the training of key subjects and create new combat capabilities.
He also stressed “the importance of strengthening Party construction, maintaining a high level of integrity and unity of the armed forces, and ensuring that the army remains stable and secure.”
Zhang Youxia and other senior military officers were present during the inspection.
The demands for greater preparation They are alarmed by the increase in tensions in the Indo-Pacific. The fact is that Xi Jinping’s regime has been demonstrating for months its willingness to take control of Taiwan, a self-governed island that – he assures – is part of his territory. As the days go by, these expressions of desire have ceased to be mere statements and have been translated with more force and frequency into facts.
Alarm over Chinese military expansion
This year, the regime China announced this Sunday the largest increase in its military budget since 2019. Modernization plans should be completed by 2035 and aim to transform the military into a “world-class” force rivaling those of the United States and other Western powers by 2050.
So far, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has more than two million trained men and women on active duty, according to the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), making it the largest force navy of the world.
Ground troops make up the bulk of the army, with 965,000 soldiers, while the navy has 260,000 members and the air force has 395,000. There is also a strategic missile force of 120,000 and a paramilitary arm of 500,000 soldiers.
The changes come from the hand of Greater concentration of power: Xi Jinping has strengthened his control over the army since abolishing term limits in 2018, allowing him to remain in power indefinitely.
In 2021, the National Defense Law was amended to give full responsibility for defense mobilization to the Central Military Commission (CMC) led by Xi. This means that the Council of State no longer has a say in decisions related to military deployment.
China also has a large arsenal of missilesWith stealth planes and bombers capable of carrying nuclear weaponsas well as nuclear powered submarines.
Beijing has some 350 nuclear warheadsmuch less than the 5,428 that the United States has or the 5,977 that Russia has, according to data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
China’s nuclear arsenal is expected to grow to about 1,500 warheads by 2035, the Pentagon stated last year.
Source-www.infobae.com