The PLA at Home and Abroad - Strategic Studies Institute - U.S. Army

lining government agency functions. The changes
wrought by the formation of Ministry of Industry and
Information Technology (MIIT [工业和信息化部]) appear
consistently so. On paper, this is a super-ministry
that brings together the former Ministry of Information
Industries, COSTIND, 24 the informatization responsibilities
under the National Development and
Reform Commission (NDRC), the State Council Informatization
Office, and the State Tobacco Monopoly
Administration. 25 Under this new ministry, COSTIND
is clearly demoted, at least in an administrative sense,
to the State Administration for Science, Technology,
and National Defense (SASTIND [国家国防科技工
业局]). COSTIND has been in power struggles with
several agencies including the NDRC and the Ministry
of Science and Technology (MoST [科学技术
部]). 26 The NDRC is the arch powerful decisionmaking
body over macro national economic and development
goals, while COSTIND has traditionally decided
defense industry economic planning, often leading
to duplication and confusion. 27 Its contest with MoST
was often manifested in implementing and allocating
R&D projects, which led to a phenomenon of “two
channels.” 28 But the principle turf battle has been with
GAD, which has long pushed for its abolition. GAD
would prefer to have all of COSTIND’s activities under
its control and turn its defense S&T management
system into something more akin to the U.S. model
of Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, a
smaller and military-dependent entity. 29 It is logical
that the demise of COSTIND was in part to break the
monopoly of the defense industry, a goal that could be
crucial to achieving CMI.
The anatomy of the new super-ministry suggests
there are larger strategic implications at play. MIIT
will bring together the majority of the nation’s indus-
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