Chinese Armed Forces: News & Discussion

[Rakesh]

China enhances A2/AD posture in Indo-Pacific with new anti-ship effectors
https://www.janes.com/osint-insights/de ... c-enhanced
02 Dec 2025

[Rakesh]

Chinese Forces Battle Dizzying Altitudes to Expand Military Footprint
https://www.wsj.com/world/china/chinese ... _permalink
05 Dec 2025

[drnayar]

https://www.eldiario24.com/en/china-dep ... ots/26270/

It’s for border security” — China deploys robot-army near to the Vietnam’s frontier . While China braces for this new development, experts have shared potential abilities for the humanoids in the near future. They propose that these machines would take on more surveillance roles. But most importantly, they hope the technology can explore and monitor regions that are beyond human reach or comprehension.

As the technology continues to improve, these robots will soon be able to take on additional tasks like environmental inspections or emergency response systems. However, it is important to note that the goal isn’t to replace human personnel in this field. But instead, it is to reduce risk and limitations associated with and improve overall efficiency.

[drnayar]

https://www.janes.com/osint-insights/de ... -exercises

Chinese bombers deployed to Hotan during recent Indian exercises

Synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imagery captured at 1342L on 7 November 2025 continued to show four Xi'an H-6 bombers at the Hotan civil-military airport located approximately 230 km from the Indian border. It is unclear if the aircraft were armed at the time of image capture.

The bombers were parked on the south apron in line with two airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) platforms, a Shaanxi KJ-200 and a Shaanxi KJ-500, and 18 Flanker series fighters. On the north apron, SAR showed 12 Chengdu J-20 stealth fighters and four Xi'an Y-20-series strategic transports of which one was previously identified in electro-optical imagery as a YY-20 tanker variant. Three additional KJ-500s were also parked near the main terminal.

More recently, a pair of H-6s was deployed to Woody Island in September 2025 in response to joint exercises by the Philippines, Japan, and the United States.

[Tanaji]

^^ Probably done on purpose as a show of strength. The Chinese have enough covered shelters to hide them if required.

[Rakesh]

Exposed Undersea: PLA Navy Officer Reflections on China’s Not-So-Silent Service
https://cimsec.org/exposed-undersea-pla ... t-service/
24 June 2025

[Rakesh]

Chinese Fighter Jet Exports Set To Grow Significantly
https://www.twz.com/air/chinese-fighter ... nificantly
24 Dec 2025

Pentagon report highlights how the trifecta of FC-31, J-10C, and JF-17 is helping China establish itself as an increasingly major player on the fighter market.

[Rakesh]

Chinese Cargo Ship Packed Full Of Modular Missile Launchers Emerges
https://www.twz.com/sea/chinese-cargo-s ... rs-emerges
25 Dec 2025

China has packed a deck of a medium-sized cargo ship with 60 containerized vertical launch cells, radar, and close-in weapons.

[Vayutuvan]

Very innovative. It is similar to Group Technology.

[Manish_P]

Chinese Cargo Ship Packed Full Of Modular Missile Launchers Emerges
https://www.twz.com/sea/chinese-cargo-s ... rs-emerges
25 Dec 2025

China has packed a deck of a medium-sized cargo ship with 60 containerized vertical launch cells, radar, and close-in weapons.

Image the number of moving targets their opponents now have to track and hit. This gives them a huge second-strike capability

[drnayar]

Chinese Cargo Ship Packed Full Of Modular Missile Launchers Emerges
https://www.twz.com/sea/chinese-cargo-s ... rs-emerges
25 Dec 2025

Image the number of moving targets their opponents now have to track and hit. This gives them a huge second-strike capability

They can take out that arsenal ship first.,

i think this is more aligned towards the Taiwan take over " first blow" if it comes to that., they could as well camouflage such ships as "vanilla merchant/cargo "

[Vayutuvan]

They can take out that arsenal ship first.,

i think this is more aligned towards the Taiwan take over " first blow" if it comes to that., they could as well camouflage such ships as "vanilla merchant/cargo "

IIRC, cargo ships will not be targeted in a full-fledged war, or could they? What are the international laws regarding this, post-WW II? Anybody know?

[drnayar]

Fwiw...

T800 humanoid kung fu kicks its way to mass production
https://newatlas.com/ai-humanoids/engin ... -humanoid/
23 Dec 2025

In fact, the demo looked so slick that the company had to release a behind-the-scenes video to counter online allegations that the demo was created using CGI. Even the EngineAI CEO, Zhao Tongyang – a veteran in the robotics field – posted an Instagram video where the T800 kicked him across the room. Extraordinary commitment to his product!

Matter of time, Chinese robots patrol the border. How would a border clash with Chinese robots look like ?!

EngineAI T800: Born to Disrupt!

[Rakesh]

YJ-20 hypersonic missile filmed launching from Type 055 large destroyer in Chinese media report
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202512/1351645.shtml
28 Dec 2025

[Manish_P]

...
They can take out that arsenal ship first.,
...

For that you need to know which is an arsenal ship and which is a regular container ship... so in effect your Recce systems now need to expand their scan to hundreds of ships, identify the arsenal ships and then keep them under watch.

[pravula]

...
They can take out that arsenal ship first.,
...

For that you need to know which is an arsenal ship and which is a regular container ship... so in effect your Recce systems now need to expand their scan to hundreds of ships, identify the arsenal ships and then keep them under watch.

No, they don't. If container ships are converted, then all container ships become legitimate targets. Even from the above article

Some will take major issue with this as it would supposedly ‘turn every ship into a target’ during a time of conflict, and certainly maritime lawyers would have insightful opinions on it, but the advantage of such a ready-to-go capability is clear.

[Manish_P]

...
No, they don't. If container ships are converted, then all container ships become legitimate targets. Even from the above article
...

That is the point

Instead of tracking 'x' military ships the op-for now has to track, and be ready to attack, x + y ships (where 'y' is much, much larger than x)

That means a much larger amount of op-for hardware and logistical support assets will need to be spread over a much wider geographical footprint thereby reducing their ability to station overwhelming concentration of force at any one point.

And here is the comparison of the chinese commercial shipping vs the US

https://www.twz.com/alarming-navy-intel ... g-capacity