China and the revolution in military affairs

In April 1996, the Army War College's Strategic Studies Institute held its Seventh Annual Strategy Conference. This year's theme was, "China Into the 21st Century: Strategic Partner and ... or Peer Competitor." Dr. Bates Gill of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), on a panel entitled, "Seizing the RMA: China's Prospects," argued that there is more to participating in the RMA than securing or producing high-tech weaponry. A revolution is an all-encompassing phenomenon with socio-cultural as well as purely technological aspects. China's prospects for seizing the RMA lie not so much in the development of technology as in the restructuring of concepts and organizations. History, culture, and philosophical values will make it difficult for China to participate in the RMA. On the other hand, Dr. Gill believes that China may be able to develop an "RMA with Chinese characteristics" much as it took Marxism-Leninism, a Germanic-Russian innovation devised for proletarian revolution, and modified its tenets to be relevant within a peasant revolutionary context. Through sheer determination and by optimizing technology and expertise available from outside sources, China might approximate a less sophisticated RMA entirely suited to its own needs. Army Lieutenant Colonel Lonnie Henley argues that, over the next 20 years, China will deploy a dozen or so divisions possessing relatively advanced systems, but that overall, the PLA will remain about a generation behind the U.S. Army in terms of its ability to participate in a fully-developed RMA. Furthermore, capabilities within the air and sea forces of the PLA will be even more limited with relatively small infusions of advanced aircraft like the SU-27 and naval vessels such as the KILO class submarines. These modern weapons will make up only a fraction of what will be otherwise dated forces.