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  • Command of the Air - the view of the PLAAF

         Although the 2004 white paper is the first of the PRC’s defense white papers to note what it calls “command of the air,” identified in the Chinese version as  zhikongquan (制空权), the concept for the PLAAF dates back to the 1960s.  Although the 2015 Defense White Paper, which focused on PLA

  • China’s Navy Begins Fielding Newly Manufactured J-15 Carrier-Capable Fighters

    The People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) has likely received a new batch of J-15 carrier-based fighters. Recent video footage released on “Military Express” (军事快播) shows a J-15 with a tail number of “31” and another with either “33” or “35”. All previously known J-15 tail numbers fell within the

  • China's Space Narrative

         Both China and the United States have created separate parts of their military dedicated to space. Commercial, scientific, and military endeavors in space are all intimately linked, and one must understand how they are viewed to better understand how a nation might proceed in one or all of

  • A Case Study Of The PRC's Hypersonic Systems Development

         Great Power Competition necessitates understanding with whom one is competing. It also requires understanding the breadth and depth that competition and how your competitor is progressing. Hypersonic systems are an emerging area of military technology with potentially transformative effects.

  • Chinese Views of All-Domain Operations

    Joint All-Domain Operations (JADO), the joint operational concept that has evolved from Multi-Domain Battle (MDB) and then Multi-Domain Operations (MDO), is intended to cope with the military capabilities of Russia and China. Therefore, how Russia’s and China’s defense establishments perceive JADO

  • China and the Moon

    On January 4 2019, China became the first nation in the world to land a spacecraft on the far side of the Moon. The Chinese said that this accomplishment was not motivated by an imaginary “Asia space race,” or to obtain bragging rights in the international space community. The China Lunar

  • China’s Air Force Preparing for Contingencies in the Skies Over Ladakh

         Although current clashes along the Line of Actual Control between India and the People’s Republic of China (PRC) are contained to hand-to-hand fighting as of mid-June 2020, the death of several dozen soldiers on 15 June reveals the potential for the skirmish to escalate in scale. As Indian and

  • China Achieves Full Global Satellite Coverage

    On 23 June 2020, China launched the final satellite from its Xichang Satellite Launch Center (XSLC) to be part of the BeiDou-3 constellation. The liftoff took place at 09:43 local time using a Long March-3 rocket as the launch vehicle. This marks the final piece in China’s first true Global

  • Chinese Aerospace Along the Belt and Road

    One of Xi Jinping’s global projects to make the China Dream a reality is the “一带一路/ One-Belt One-Road” project, since rebranded in English as the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).  This initiative has evolved from a trade and infrastructure plan involving a handful of countries residing along ancient

  • China's Military-Civil Fusion Strategy

    Military-Civil Fusion (MCF), this term seems like a counterpart to the American term civil-military integration (CMI), but in reality it is far deeper and more complex. Whereas, according to the U.S. Congressional Office of Technology Assessment, America’s CMI is “cooperation between government

  • "Private" Chinese Aerospace Defense Companies

         As the United States continues it shift away from the Post 9-11 era toward the era of Great Power Strategic Competition, it is important to understand with whom we are competing and the manner in which they are competing with us. Too often, we view things only though our own

  • Chinese Aerospace Along the Belt and Road

         One of Xi Jinping’s global projects to make the China Dream a reality is the “一带一路/ One-Belt One-Road” project, since rebranded in English as the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). This initiative has evolved from a trade and infrastructure plan involving a handful of countries residing along

  • The People’s Liberation Army’s Academic Institutions

    The basis for any military is education and training. Without this foundation, we would just be armed groups of men, marauding our local areas. Education and training allow tactics, techniques, and procedures to be transmitted as lessons learned from one generation to the next. These eventually form

  • China's Aeroengine Industry

         As we move further into the era of 21st century great power competition, it is important to understand with whom we are competing. This report is our second in a series of studies by the China Aerospace Studies Institute that seeks to lay the foundation for better understanding the Aerospace

  • New Curriculum Improves Combat Readiness of Navy’s Rotary-Wing Units

    New Curriculum Improves Combat Readiness of Navy’s Rotary-Wing Units A cadet at the Naval Aviation University conducts a "solo" ship landing. Image Source: http://www.mod.gov.cn/topnews/2020-04/12/content_4863493.htmThroughout the week of April 12-18, 2020 the official news media of the Chinese

  • Parsing Chinese Perspectives on the U.S. Space Force

    On 20 December 2019, President Trump signed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal year 2020 and established a sixth branch of the armed forces – the United States Space Force (USSF). On 14 January 2020, General Jay Raymond was formally sworn in as the inaugural Chief of Space

  • Overview of the PLA Air Force’s Integrated Air & Space Strategy

    This paper examines the “integrated air and space capability” 1 (kongtian yiti / 空天一体) component of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Air Force’s (PLAAF) first ever service strategy, which was implemented to coincide with the PLAAF’s 10th Party Congress in May 2004 and represented a major milestone