Landing drills conducted in coastal areas

The People's Liberation Army has conducted at least three landing exercises in China's southeastern coastal regions since the beginning of May, military media have reported.

The latest and largest one was carried out recently by a regiment under the PLA 31st Group Army, which is reportedly based in Fujian, a coastal province in Southeast China across the Straits from Taiwan.

The exercise aimed to demonstrate and test the joint landing operation capability of a "basic combat unit", featuring information warfare and the combined strike of new-type weapons, PLA Daily quoted Lieutenant Colonel Chen Xiaoming, commander of the regiment, as saying on Tuesday.

Video broadcast on China Central Television's military news channel showed that at the start of the drill, several WZ-10 attack helicopters, the most powerful armed helicopter of the PLA, fired missiles and rockets to destroy ground targets. Additionally, ZTD-05A amphibious assault armored vehicles were released from landing craft in the water and then bombarded the landing area as they sailed toward the beach.

As "enemies" on the beach were overpowered, transport helicopters airdropped soldiers, and other troops charged onto the beach aboard assault boats.

After the designated landing area was occupied, the regiment dispatched heavy-duty weapons including a group of Type-96 main battle tanks and several HJ-9 anti-tank missile launchers to eliminate the "enemy", according to the video.

In addition, the landing force used drones to conduct reconnaissance on the "enemy".

"It would be unimaginable several years ago that a regiment-level exercise would have support from military helicopters and tanks," a military expert with the PLA who asked not to be identified told China Daily. "The rapid development and modernization of the PLA now allow us to fulfill a landing operation using only a couple of hours and with few casualties."

On May 11, one of the PLA Navy's Marine Corps brigades conducted a landing exercise in a coastal region in Guangdong province, PLA Daily previously reported. Additionally, in early May, a landing vessel flotilla under the PLA Navy's South Sea Fleet used its Zubr-class hovercraft to stage a landing exercise, according to the military newspaper.

zhaolei@chinadaily.com.cn