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

since Hu’s address to the CMC, extensive assessments
of the armed forces’ responsibilities have occurred in
the military news media providing a reasonably solid
base for assessing PLA views. 3 Judging from these appraisals,
Hu Jintao’s speech directed the PLA to assume
a more expansive role in an increasingly complex
national security environment. 4 This environment required
the armed forces to prepare for the “diversified
military tasks” stemming from the emerging mix of
what were defined as traditional and nontraditional
security threats.
A December 2008 PLA Daily article described the
PLA’s responsibilities in this manner:
The pluralism of security threats brings about the pluralism
of military operations. Our Army’s historical
mission requires that we not only safeguard the national
survival interest, but also safeguard national development
interest; not only safeguard territorial land, territorial
waters and airspace security, but also safeguard
the oceans, space and electromagnetic space security,
as well as other aspects of national security. [We must]
not only safeguard national security, but also actively
participate in international and regional security cooperation,
the United Nations peacekeeping, international
counterterrorism, international humanitarian aid, and
other actions in order to contribute to the maintenance
of world peace. In other words, the army’s diversified
military tasks include both war operations and nonwar
operations. 5
Counterterrorism, United Nations Peacekeeping Operations
(UNPKO), international disaster relief operations,
regional security cooperation, and nonwar military
operations were not all missions freshly minted by
Hu Jintao. China’s contributions to UNPKO had been
increasing in the years before 2004, as had regional
security cooperation through such organizations as
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