RUSSIAN ARMY LATEST MILITARY EXERCISES 2020
Chinese and Russian forces will take part in joint military exercises in southern Russia later this month along with troops from Armenia, Belarus, Iran, Myanmar, Pakistan and others, China's defense ministry announced Thursday.
The "Caucus 2020" drills will deploy wheeled vehicles and light weaponry to be flown to the drill location by China's latest version transport aircraft, the ministry said in a news release.
The exercises running September 21-26 will focus on defensive tactics, encirclement and battlefield control and command, the ministry said
The exercises have special meaning for China-Russia ties "at this important moment when the whole world is fighting the pandemic," the ministry said. China has seen no new domestic coronavirus cases in weeks, while Russia is continuing to see new cases and has reported more than 1 million people infected.
Since establishing a "comprehensive strategic partnership" two decades ago, China and Russia have cooperated increasingly closely on military matters and diplomacy, largely to counter U.S. influence. Their militaries regularly hold joint exercises and they regularly back each other in the United Nations over issues including Syria and North Korea.
War games in tense times
The long-planned exercises will take place this month amid escalating animosity between the U.S. and both Beijing and Moscow.
Russia is under mounting pressure from the U.S. government over the alleged poisoning of prominent Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny, along with a litany of other points of contention including the war in Syria and ongoing Russian meddling in U.S. politics.
The U.S. has intercepted Russian military aircraft on numerous occasions in recent months, drawing accusations from the U.S. military of reckless behavior.
China, meanwhile, has been accused by Washington of bullying its smaller neighbors, exerting full control over the recently-semi-autonomous region of Hong Kong and forcing about 1 million minority Muslims into labor camps in the country's Xinjiang region.
Relations have become so tense that a widely respected Chinese newspaper published a story Wednesday saying there was discussion in the upper echelons of the ruling Communist Party over whether Beijing should use the "nuclear option" of cutting off the United States' vital supply of medicines.
India had also planned to take part in the Caucasus 2020 military exercises in Russia, but cancelled its participation as tension mounted between Delhi and Beijing.
In a tweet on August 29, India's Ministry of Defense confirmed that it would no longer deploy forces to take part in the drills. The decision was attributed to logistical "difficulties" related to the coronavirus pandemic, but it came after a long-simmering border standoff between the two Asian giants turned deadly for the first time in decades, with at least 20 Indian forces killed in a clash in June.
Just a week before India announced the cancellation of its participation, Delhi and Beijing accused each other's troops of violating border rules again, leading to warning shots being fired for the first time in many years. The deadly clash in June did not involve gunfire, but hand-to-hand fighting with clubs and other rudimentary weapons.
China will participate in the Kavkaz-2020 strategic military drills to be held later this month in Russia, with troops attached to the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) Western Theater Command joining militaries from Russia and other participating countries in elimination, joint strike and battlefield control exercises, the Chinese Defense Ministry announced on Thursday.
The PLA's participation in the drills highlights the military ties between China and Russia, Chinese experts said on Thursday, as China has had frequent interactions with the Russian military in recent years, including in multiple large-scale drills, a joint strategic bomber patrol, and Russian military parades.
India, which also has close military ties with Russia, has withdrawn from the upcoming drills amid border tensions with China, a move that showed its childishness, experts said.
According to the consensus reached by China and Russia, the Chinese military will send troops to Russia's Astrakhan Region and participate in the Kavkaz-2020 strategic military drills from September 21 to 26, said a statement released by China's Ministry of National Defense on Thursday.
The Chinese forces will mainly consist of troops from the PLA Western Theater Command, which will carry wheeled equipment and light arms and arrive in Russia via China's latest transport aircraft, the Defense Ministry said.
They will join exercises including mobilized defensive elimination, joint live-fire strike, multidimensional assault elimination and battlefield situation control, and militaries from countries including Armenia, Belarus, Iran, Myanmar and Pakistan will also participate, the statement said.