Special report | Peace disease
Xi Jinping worries that China’s troops are not ready to fight
Now the war in Ukraine has revealed new challenges for the PLA
The last time Chinese troops were caught in a major firefight, they learned a painful lesson. A PLA unit was in South Sudan in 2016 on UN peacekeeping duty, tasked with protecting two camps of civilians. When rebels and government forces clashed, the camps came under fire. As the Chinese troops took refuge, a rocket-propelled grenade hit one of their vehicles, killing two of them.
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This article appeared in the Special report section of the print edition under the headline “Peace disease”