China’s military goal is to stand neck and neck with the US: ex-PLA colonel Zhou Bo
Zhou Bo is a retired senior colonel in the People’s Liberation Army, a senior fellow at Tsinghua University’s Centre for International Security and Strategy, and the author of the book Should the World Fear China? This interview first appeared in SCMP Plus. For other interviews in the Open Questions series, click here. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is approaching its 2027 centenary, a major…
The retired PLA colonel, Zhou Bo, discusses China's military objectives and capabilities in an interview. China is approaching its 2027 centenary, with a focus on modernizing its national defense and armed forces by 2035. The ultimate goal is to build a world-class military by 2049, though China has not specified which countries are considered world-class militaries.
Comparing China's military to the United States and Russia, Zhou Bo notes that China has a larger armed force and navy, and is a leader in advanced military technologies. However, the United States has a larger defense budget, while China has a larger population to draw from for its military. The state-of-the-art fighter jets in China's arsenal outnumber Russia's by a significant margin.
Zhou Bo acknowledges the difficulty in assessing the effectiveness of Chinese soldiers in combat, as this cannot be easily judged outside of war. He also points out that the United States has the advantage of testing its systems in ongoing conflicts. However, he emphasizes that China's peaceful rise has allowed the country to develop into its current state, and that the PLA's combat capabilities should not be doubted.
Regarding corruption within the PLA, Zhou Bo acknowledges that cases of corruption occur, but stresses the Chinese government's zero-tolerance approach towards such behavior. He believes that exposing corruption demonstrates the government's commitment to improving the military's capabilities.
Written by urgent.news from Reuters Business via SCMP's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
