China, Russia and six other countries are conducting a 5-day military exercise in western Russia and the Central Asian region.
The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has dispatched more than 1,600 troops, aircraft, tanks, and military support equipment to a large-scale Russian military exercise, dubbed Center-2019 (Tsentr-2019), held from September 16 to 21 in Western Russia and in a number of Central Asian countries including Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.
The PLA’s Western Theater Command has dispatched an undisclosed number of Type 96A main battle tanks, H-6K strategic bombers, JH-7A fighter bombers, J-11 fighter jets, Il-76 and Y-9 transport aircraft, and Z-10 attack helicopters to participate in this year’s Center-2019 military exercise hosted by the Russian Armed Forces, according to Chinese media reports.
Next to China and Russia, the exercise will see the participation of military personnel from member states of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), as well as forces from the regional members of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO). These include India, Pakistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. […]
The main objectives of the strategic command post exercise are to verify readiness levels of the Russian military and to improve interoperability between Russian forces and their international partners, the Russian MoD stated. While the focus of the exercise is officially on “counter terrorist” operations, according to Russia’s defense minister, the exercise is also set to include repelling enemy air strikes and conducting combined conventional offensive air and ground operations. In other words, Center-2019 will feature an inter-state war component. Läs artikel