China’s Strategic Support Force: What Do We Know About Its High-Tech Military Branch?

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“It will integrate land, navy, air and rocket forces from the beginning to the end of the operation,” a Communist Party spokesman told the People’s Daily in 2015. This is the key to winning battles.

The Strategic Support Force can provide accurate global positioning, satellite location tracking, and ensure that communications are sent and received safely.

It also conducts research on how intelligence, information and new technologies can be used in combat to expand the military’s cyber, electronic and psychological warfare capabilities.

These technologies include self-managing, automated facilities that reduce the PLA’s reliance on personnel, in line with Xi’s calls for the military to be ready for warfare that uses artificial intelligence, cloud computing, quantum computing and the Internet of Things.

The force also includes war games to train it to fight in “new domains” such as cyberspace and outer space, China’s 2019 National Defense White Paper laid out Xi’s vision for the military.

Chinese state media reported that the Strategic Support Force also collects information.

Why was the Strategic Support Force created?

The force was established in It is part of a plan to centralize the PLA’s operational command on New Year’s Eve 2015. Before the overhaul, each service branch – Army, Navy and Air Force – had their own support units.

As part of the shake-up, the CMC took over the roles of the PLA General Staff and General Political Departments. Those departments’ responsibilities for cyber warfare, space, electronic warfare and psychological operations have been transferred to the Strategic Support Force.

The Strategic Support Force operates two military academies, one for aerospace engineering and the other for information engineering.

According to the PLA Information Engineering University’s 2022 prospectus, majors include cryptography, cyber security, big data, AI, navigation and positioning, remote sensing and drone detection and control.

The PLA Space Engineering University prospect includes departments on intelligence analysis, remote sensing, radar engineering, early warning systems and weapon launch engineering.

How is the strategic support force structured?

The force has two main functions.

The Department of Space Systems operates intelligence and communications satellites and conducts remote sensing operations. It also operates several satellite launch centers and training sites in China at Jiuquan, Taiyuan and Wenchang.

The Network Systems Department is the “cyber force” responsible for protecting and attacking computer networks, electromagnetic defense, and intercepting signals for destruction and intelligence gathering.

The Strategic Support Force is an umbrella base of Base 311, headquartered in Fujian Province.

The two operational departments are of the same rank as the staff department and are headed by lieutenant generals. In other service branches, operational departments are headed by lower-ranking major generals and report to the staff.

This implies that the Network Systems Department and the Space Systems Department have more autonomy in their operations than their counterparts in the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Rocket Force.

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Who leads the Strategic Support Force?

The force is commanded by General Ju Qiansheng. In the year From June 2021, he became the commander of the army after attaining the rank of full general. Previously, he was the head of the Network Systems Department.

He will be assisted by Lieutenant General Hao Weihong, Deputy Chief of Staff and Chief of Staff. Hao has a space background, having been stationed at the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center for more than a decade, becoming the center’s commander around 2015.

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