PLA Ground Forces
Tactical Impressions of the PLA
Tactical Impressions of the People's Liberation Army
by LCol (Ret'd) W Yu
Final Notes
The MRR is a very robust organization centering heavily on the use of well-disciplined and well-trained troops supported by massive firepower. It minimizes PLA weaknesses while maximizing its strengths. The lack of an effective C3 experience, knowledge, and equipment makes a combined supporting arms operation hard to achieve. By effectively isolating the sub-ordinate units from support, the MRR bypasses this problem. Instead, the MRR aims to create chaos amongst enemy ranks while relying on a faster reacting commander sending in well-disciplined and well-drilled troops to outslug the opposition individual soldiers.
Much depends on the operational plan. While the battalions and companies are expected to fight their local actions without support, the problem remains have they been given the correct objectives? Penetration forces may easily be directed into killing zones or simply ending up where they would be of no use. At the tactical level, the only solution is to ensure a proper operational plan.
And that is the main problem with this, the PLA has not demonstrated that they can consistently come up with good operational plans. There is no doubt the PLA can perform an operation brilliantly but a poor plan would still result in poor results no matter how brilliant the execution.
Concluding Remarks
The PLA's MRR doctrine is obviously aimed at the PRC's southern neighbours. It currently lacks the responsiveness and the speed of its rear echelon units to overcome Western Task Forces/Battle Groups. The PLA might very well be able to seize the initiative but be very hard pressed to keep it. Western forces currently enjoy overwhelming mobility, precision firepower, and co-ordination capabilities the PLA currently does not have. Given such circumstances, the Western commander has more resources to react with then that of the PLA commander even though the PLA commander may react first.
However, the PRC's southern neighbours lacked such sophistication. The best force facing the PLA would be the Indian Army and that is still a traditional classic infantry army with very limited mobility and co-ordination, especially around the Himalayan terrain that both sides are saddled with. The doctrine does give the PLA somewhat better mobility to move small forces around. Whether that is enough to destroy an enemy's ability to wage war is open to question. An enemy army may be surrounded but it is far from dead and still capable of exacting extreme casualties. The besieged Paulis made the Red Army pay in blood at Stanligrad and Bastion was key to the Allied victory at the Battle of the Bulge.
As noted though, the PLA does not think in tactical terms but in the geo-political strategic sphere. Whatever the operational objectives and tactical performances were in China's victories, these did not stop the PLA from achieving several large strategic goals. In the Korean War, that's eviction of the Americans from North Korea and in the Sino-Vietnam Wars, Vietnamese and therefore, Soviet expansion in South East Asia was checked.
To the PLA thinking, the initiative is almost an operational goal in itself. In China's wars in Korea, India, and Vietnam, the Chinese kept the initiative no matter how bad the operational and tactical situation. That in itself is a formidable task, forcing the enemy to react to Chinese moves, instead of dictating the battle itself. This includes withdrawing and denying the enemy even a chance at a well-fought victory. Given such designs, it is hard to imagine the PLA being in life and death struggles such as Stalingrad but rather pitted against forces that would deny the PLA the initiative. If the PLA manages to get the initiative in the first place, then the MRR is designed to keep it, hitting the enemy before they can mount a successful counter-attack.
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