Exclusive | From misfire to big shot: how the military helped China open up and become a force to be reckoned with
- The PLA took a back seat to economic development in the first decades of the country’s determination to lie low and foster growth
- In expanding its military reach, China has raised suspicions about its regional and global intentions
When late paramount leader Deng Xiaoping gave the order for more than 300,000 People’s Liberation Army troops to cross from southwest China into Vietnam in February 1979, there was more than regional rivalry at stake.
Within a month, the PLA occupied more than a dozen cities in northern and southern Vietnam, overcoming the heavily outnumbered Vietnamese troops and militia. Then on March 16 China suddenly withdrew all of its troops, declaring that it had “successfully given Vietnam a lesson”.
On the surface, Beijing said it was punishing Hanoi for helping Moscow advance its political influence in the region at the expense of China.
But a Chinese military historian, who also served as a senior colonel in the PLA, said Deng’s real goal was to use the conflict to test the ragtag armed forces and cement his domestic agenda of reform and opening up.
“The PLA had not fought for nearly three decades and Deng wanted to use the attack against Vietnam to expose the PLA’s weaknesses in the aftermath of the Cultural Revolution,” the historian said.
While third-party estimates put the Vietnamese death toll at more than 80,000, China paid a great price for its apparent victory – the death of nearly 7,000 Chinese soldiers and the wounding of 15,000 others.
Those casualties gave Deng the justification to overhaul the military, cutting 1.5 million troops and streamlining the armed forces’ administration, the historian said.
