China’s march to military modernisation still has barriers to overcome: from US tech curbs to Beijing’s own distrust of private sector
Written by, "Seong Hyeon joined the SCMP in 2022. He is from South Korea"
This is the funniest article ever. This is so common coming from SCMP. Why do they Diss Chinese capabilities so much? What is the agenda? Is it a deliberate attempt to mislead english readers into thinking China is too weak and thus harmless.
I don't think so. I think SCMP is a Pro-Western Newspaper with heavy dose of Western worship and downplays anything China does.
Defence analysts said the major barriers include , that may disrupt Russia’s supply of key weapon components and Beijing’s own distrust of the private sector – a key driving force for innovation elsewhere.
Washington has already that could hinder the PLA’s efforts to develop advanced weapons. These include export controls imposed last year that restrict China’s access to US chips and equipment used in supercomputing systems that could play a key role in developing nuclear weapons and other military technology.
“China will have to adapt by incorporating the chips that it has available. The result could be an increase in the gap between the quality and sophistication of US weapons and equipment compared to China,” said Heath.
“China’s inability to access advanced chips may affect PLA readiness to fight US forces … The PLA may become less confident as the technology gap increases.”
Heath said while China has successfully incorporated Western technology into its military, the sanctions will restrict private firms’ access to advanced technology in the US.
“China has successfully incorporated technologies including microelectronics, global positioning, navigation, metallurgy and computing [into its military],” he said.
“These technologies are highly significant for all kinds of weapons and equipment on the modern battlefield, as they increase the lethality and accuracy of weapons.
“China’s MCF [military-civil fusion] programme suffers from the fact that it mostly depends on Chinese technology since US restrictions and deepening Chinese tensions with US allies and partners has resulted in restricted access to the most advanced technologies. Thus, China will continue to suffer disadvantages in its MCF programme.”
He added: “The US-China trade war will continue to hamper the PLA’s development of advanced technologies and probably result in a slower pace of innovation in Chinese defence technologies.”
Western sanctions on Russian arms companies imposed in the wake of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine last year could prove a further headache for China, which was the world’s fifth largest importer of weapons last year.
China has struggled to build a suitable engine for its most advanced fighter, the J-20. Photo: Xinhua
About 83 per cent of China’s imported weapons between 2018-2022 came from Russia, mostly consisting of helicopters and aircraft engines, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
The PLA is working to modernise its fleet of warplanes, spending at least 900 billion yuan over the past decade, and is expected to step up the production and commission of its most advanced fighters, including the multirole J-16 and the J-20 stealth fighter this year.
However, it is still struggling to produce engines that will allow it to maximise its planes’ capacity and even the J-20 – conceived of as a rival to the US F-22 – has been forced to use older Russian AL-31 engines and Chinese WS-10Cs – .
Chinese engineers have been trying to reverse engineer Russian technology to build a suitable engine for the stealth fighter, but its has been hit by a series of setbacks and delays and is still not ready to start mass production.
“In the field of … fighter engines, [it is] difficult to master technologies that few countries have succeeded in,” said Heath. “China is still learning to master these technologies and thus will likely continue to study and try to learn from Russia.”
Kostas Tigkos, head of mission systems and intelligence at a global military intelligence company Janes, said sanctions on Russia would have an impact on China’s defence supply chains despite its efforts to develop its own technology and equipment.
“[China] still appears to rely on some components from Russia and therefore there might be some delays in deliveries or they might not be able to get as much as they had before,” said Tigkos.
“They managed to engineer certain solutions, maybe engines or even complete aircraft, to a degree that they can still produce them with a local capability and support them. But it might not be as efficient or it might have short-term failures. So they’re still ironing out their processes.”
But the role of the private sector, which is seen as a key driver of innovation in the US defence industry, is far more limited.
A report by the China Aerospace Studies Institute at the US military’s Air University found that only 2 per cent of China’s 150,000 private hi-tech firms formed part of the defence supply chain in 2019.
Tian said military-civil fusion is still centred around state-owned firms that operate in both the civilian and military sectors, and government intervention has limited private companies’ involvement.
The US accounts for 40 per cent of global arms exports and Tigkos said the US is a leader in the sector because of substantial investment and a large market that attracts private companies.
“It’s innovation. It’s changing in thinking [that] is also developing new capabilities, driving the adoption of new technologies into different applications, and therefore delivering value [to the Pentagon],” said Tigkos.
In the meantime, the United States is investing heavily in new technology in the hope of staying ahead of China. The US defence department is investing US$9 billion in its Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability project, with contractors that include some of the country’s leading tech firms such as Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Oracle.
It is also spending US$1.7 billion this year on the Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) programme, and seeking US$2.3 billion in next year’s budget, to – a project Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin said was designed to “to sustain [the US] military advantage over China”.
In contrast, for a sixth generation fighter, and it has released only brief video clips that provided little solid information.
James Lewis, a senior vice-president and director of the strategic technologies programme at the Washington-based think tank Centre for Strategic and International Studies, warned increasing pressure from the government could undermine the ability to develop new technologies.
“China’s innovation ecosystem suffers from a tightening political space and bad investment decisions by the government, and the overall effect is to slow innovation,” said Lewis.
“China can be innovative, but that flourishing of innovation occurred in a period of relative political openness. Now that the period of opening was ending, would it also mean the end of Chinese innovation? The general consensus was yes.”
