China's military threats seen as futile
from CHINA NEWS, 18 August 1999Western military experts in Beijing said yesterday that China would try to intimidate Taiwan with the choice of weapons it would display during an October 1 parade to mark its 50th anniversary.
But they said equipment featured in the dress rehearsal for the parade held late on Monday and early yesterday was unlikely to have alarmed Taipei's leaders.
Hundreds of tanks, armoured personnel carriers and missiles of the People's Liberation Army rumbled along the broad avenues of central Beijing as part of the rehearsal.
"The military is visibly looking to make an impression by exhibiting large-calibre weapons and strategic missiles," a military expert who watched the parade said.
"The Chinese army has shown the weapons that it considers modern, but it would be better to avoid using them on a battlefield against Western nations," he said, pointing to their obsolete technology.
He said there was "little chance" Taiwan President Lee Teng-hui would have been intimidated by the parade.
Ministry of National Defense (MND) spokesman Kung Fan-ding also confirmed yesterday that China's Nanhai Fleet launched missile exercises and virtual cannon firing training east of Leizhou Peninsula in Guangdong Province on August 10.
The military drills did not affect the security of Taiwan's national defense, Kung told a news conference on the military's M41D tank display at the Yuekang Military Base in Chichi Township in Nantou County.
He said no unusual mobilization of troops was discovered during the period of August 10 to 16. China's ground troops conducted their military exercises as scheduled, he said.
Kung said the MND will keep an eye on the latest moves and developments in China and report to the people at the appropriate time.
Lee has enraged Beijing by calling for relations between Taipei and Beijing to be reappraised and put on a "special state-to-state" footing.
Beijing saw the comments as a step toward a formal declaration of independence.
"Taiwanese weapons are made in the West and are clearly more modern," said the expert.
The more than 30 trucks seen carrying long-range strategic missiles would nonetheless make an impression on local viewers, he said.
Another western expert said: "These missiles could conceivably carry nuclear warheads."
But he stressed that the particular missiles shown had a range of several thousand kilometers and would more likely be used to target other continents, not Taiwan.
Though the military experts were not willing to disclose the type of missiles they saw in the rehearsal, they said the long-range Dongfeng-31 would be present on October 1.
China announced on August 2 that it had successfully tested the Dongfeng-31, a ground-to-ground missile with a range of 8,000 kilometers.
Some other weapons on exhibit were medium-range ground-to-ground missiles similar to the ones test-fired by the PLA off Taiwan in a show of force during the 1996 crisis.
In a further sign the mainland hopes to link its National Day parade with Taiwan, the official Xinhua news agency issued a dispatch trumpeting the PLA's ability to intervene in the Taiwan issue just as the rehearsal parade began moving down Beijing's main thoroughfare.
PLA soldiers and marines are presently honing "landing skills" in drills in the South China Seas, Xinhua said, "demonstrating their determination to defend the country's territorial integrity, as well as displaying their military strength."
The mainland has consistently refused to renounce the use of force in reuniting the territory if Taiwan should declare independence.
The two sides have been separated since the Nationalist Army fled to Taiwan after the end of a civil war that led to the establishment of the communist government.
Apart from the PLA crackdown on the 1989 Tiananmen Square democracy protests, the Chinese army has not displayed weaponry in such force since the military parade on the 35th anniversary of the People's Republic in 1984.
"There is a clear technological jump ahead (since 1984)," one of the military experts said, but he underlined that all the armaments displayed had already been seen in specialized magazines.
Half a million civilians and soldiers are expected to be assembled for the October 1 parade, which will pass before the Tiananmen gate where Mao Zedong proclaimed the establishment of the People's Republic in 1949.
An air display, which was not rehearsed Monday, is also expected.Copyright 1999 China News
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