The United States, Japan and India are three countries that have been very concerned about the development of China's military power in recent years. The United States has always been worried that the strengthening of China's military power will prevent the U.S. military hegemony from becoming rampant in the Asia-Pacific region. Japan cares about China's military power because of the Sino-Japanese East China Sea issue. India cares about China's military power changes are relatively complicated, including the impact of the Sino-Indian border issue and the influence of India's mentality that has always wanted to be the "Indian hegemon". A recent report by the Indian media " Hindustan Times " shows the Indians' psychology well.
"Hindustan Times mainly focuses on the impact of China's military reform on the overall strength of the People's Liberation Army, but in this report, Indian media revealed a mixed feeling of arrogance and envy. The title of the article directly stated that the Chinese army is no longer the so-called "paper tiger". Indian media believes that over the past few decades, the PLA's equipment has mainly been based on various old-fashioned Soviet-style equipment and its Chinese derivative models. Due to the lack of technical weapons, the People's Liberation Army has been an army dominated by infantry for a long time. Therefore, Indian media called the People's Liberation Army at this stage "paper tiger".
However, in the past decade, the People's Liberation Army has developed rapidly and achieved amazing results. China not only built the world's most powerful navy, modernized the world's largest standing army, but also strengthened its own nuclear arsenal and intercontinental ballistic missile , which is fully capable of dealing with the challenges brought by any opponent.
With the rapid increase in China's military strength, the development of arms in the Asia-Pacific region has also begun to accelerate. South Korea has begun to actively build its own blue water navy , while Australia plans to purchase and equip nuclear submarine . According to data provided by , the overall military expenditure in the Asia-Pacific region exceeded US$1 trillion in the past year alone. Malcolm Davis of the Australian Institute of Strategic Policy believes: "All the major players in the Indo-Pacific region are responding to China's military modernization as quickly as possible."
Indian media believes that the reform of the People's Liberation Army can be traced back to the time of the Gulf War and the third Taiwan Strait crisis. Because of the stimulus of the US military, the People's Liberation Army is eager to achieve modernization. However, due to the influence of various factors such as the economy, the PLA's real large-scale modern military reform has not begun in the past decade. At present, China already has two active aircraft carriers , hundreds of ballistic missiles , thousands of fighter jets, and a maritime combat force that is completely comparable to the US Navy.
After the PLA live-fire training in August this year, a senior US military officer admitted that it is not easy for the United States to stop the PLA now. The Seventh Fleet of the US Navy Commander Carl Thomas told the media that mainland China has a very powerful maritime combat force and can do whatever they want in the Taiwan Strait. Of course, what the United States is most concerned about is China's nuclear arsenal. According to the prediction of the " Atomic Scientist Bulletin ", China currently has about 350 nuclear warheads . The US intelligence agency believes that by 2027, China's nuclear warheads should reach 700.
Indian media quoted a report from the US Pentagon saying that from the current situation, "China is the only competitor that can launch continuous challenges to a stable and open international system in combination with its economic, diplomatic, military and technological forces." At present, the PLA is already "the strongest in Asia". Even if you look at the world, only the US military can challenge the PLA.
Some of the reports of the People's Liberation Army are relatively close to reality. For example, our army did make up its mind to carry out modern military reform after the Gulf War, and further strengthened this belief after the third Taiwan Strait crisis. For the PLA, due to the particularity of the military struggle in the Taiwan Navy, the Navy and Air Force and the nuclear weapons and forces are indeed the key goals of the PLA's modern military reform.However, the PLA's modernization reform is not limited to the update of weapons and equipment. The withdrawal of the military region and the transformation of the war zone represent that our army's command structure has further flattened and its command efficiency is constantly improving.
As for the Indian media's belief that the PLA was a "paper tiger" in the past, it is a standard nonsense. If the PLA was considered a "paper tiger" in the eyes of the Indian media, then what is the Indian army that was defeated by the PLA in the 1962 Sino-Indian border conflict? "Paper mouse" or "paper rabbit"?
Although the PLA's weapons and equipment once lagged behind the world trend in the past few decades, this does not mean that the PLA's combat effectiveness and deterrence are weak. In Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea, Volunteer Army seriously lags behind the " United Nations Army " led by the United States, and still hits the "United Nations Army", forcing the United States to sign the armistice agreement, leaving a strong mark in the history of US overseas military operations. The Chinese military's deterrence against the US military was still very strong during the Vietnam War period. Under China's severe warning, the US ground forces did not dare to cross the 17th-degree north latitude of to fight, and they were afraid of ground wars with the Chinese army.
Judging from the current situation, the People's Liberation Army can indeed be called "the strongest in Asia". Whether it is Japan or India, its main combat equipment is heavily dependent on the supply of other countries such as the United States and Russia. If there is a head-on confrontation with the People's Liberation Army, the longer the time goes by, the more obvious their disadvantages in this regard will be.
Of course, we should not be overly proud either. After all, the US military is currently our main opponent and will remain an important opponent for a long time in the future. We still need to take the US military as the most important catch-up target and continue to work hard to develop and progress.
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