The Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) concluded a military
exercise on Sunday in the coast of China's eastern Shandong Province with an aim to assess the
army's information warfare capabilities.
More than 8,000 personnel including the land force air unit,
electronic warfare troop, artillery troop and special troop took
part in the drill.
"The 12-day drill, dubbed "Vanguard-206B", aims to root out any
problems that exist among Chinese troops by exposing them to the
most difficult electromagnetic environment," said Commander Fan
Changlong of the Jinan Military Area Command, also the chief
director of the drill.
"These troops will take on important battle tasks in future so
it is essential to examine their techniques," he said.
"The application of information technology is the main purpose
of this drill," said Zeng Weihua, member of the directing team,
calling the electromagnetic environment the fifth dimension of
warfare and the basis of military actions in modern times.
"We want the troops participating in the drill to know that
defeat in information techniques means defeat in actual combat," he
said.
Although he admitted several strikes, both air and ground,
missed their targets, Chen Wenrong, head of the combat force, said
Vanguard-206B was "the most important and the most successful
drill" he had ever attended as a senior military official.
"The primary goal of a war game is to identify the problems,"
Chen said.
Bombarded roads, phony electronic signals, surprise attacks on
commanders' headquarters were all carefully designed to complicate
the combat conditions, military officials said.
China has intensified the number of military drills in recent
years, especially with the neighboring countries of the Shanghai
Cooperation Organization (SCO), a regional organization established
in June 2001 comprising China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia,
Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.
In August 2005, China and Russia held a high-profile joint war
game codenamed "Peaceful Mission - 2005", which involved 10,000
troops from the two countries.
(China.org.cn, Xinhua News Agency November 20, 2006)
