06 November 2019
- RSIS
- Media Mentions
- China Army Exercise Puts Drone Defence Capability to the Test ‘After Years Spent Studying US Tactics’
China Army Exercise Puts Drone Defence Capability to the Test ‘After Years Spent Studying US Tactics’
China has enhanced its ground-based air defence capability to better counter drone fleets, according to China’s state broadcaster.
CCTV reported on Monday that an air defence brigade had shot down all drone targets during a recent exercise carried out in both daylight and at night, under “real war” conditions that included bad weather.
The brigade, under the Northern Theatre Command’s 79th group army, travelled through heavy fog from the northeastern province of Liaoning to reach the drill location north of Weifang city in Shandong province, northern China.
… Collin Koh, a research fellow at the Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies from Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University, agreed that the exercise had shown the PLA was increasingly capable of repelling enemy air attacks.
Koh said the PLA had intensively studied US military tactics in previous contemporary conflicts, including the Gulf war, Kosovo war, and the Iraq war, and concluded its forces would have to learn how to fight in all weather and highly complex electronic warfare environments.
The PLA had long been preparing for the current spate of modernisation efforts, Koh said.
IDSS / Online
Last updated on 06/11/2019
