This month, China will conduct a rare joint military drill with its landlocked neighbor Laos as Beijing seeks to strengthen security relations with regional allies in order to offset a rising US footprint in Southeast Asia.
The People’s Liberation Army’s Southern Theater Command, one of five theater commands, will deploy soldiers to Laos for the “Friendship Shield 2023” joint exercise, the Chinese defense ministry announced in a short statement on Friday.
The drill, which will take place from May 9 to 28, will mimic assaults on transnational armed criminal gangs and will include over 900 soldiers, including more than 200 Chinese military, according to China’s official media.
The practice builds on past “Peace Train” combined humanitarian medical rescue drills in Laos between the Chinese and Laotian troops.
For the first time this year, China and Cambodia conducted maneuvers in Cambodian seas, which included the Southern Theater Command, whose operating area covers the South China Sea, which Beijing mostly claims. Other nations in the area, as well as international law, claim that China does not own those waterways.
According to Singapore’s defense ministry, China has just ended joint maneuvers with Singapore in the southern portions of the South China Sea, in international waters.
China’s defense ministry sent a working group to Laos, Vietnam, and Brunei in February for discussions on regional security problems, with an emphasis on “bilateral defence cooperation mechanisms.”
The strengthening of China’s military relations with its Southeast Asian allies coincides with Beijing’s diplomatic effort to enhance interaction with its southern neighbors.
On a visit to Beijing in November, Chinese President Xi Jinping reminded Laotian President Thongloun Sisoulith that the two nations must work together to “build a shared future between China and Laos.”
The exercise in Laos comes as the US expands military drills in the area, including yearly war games in Indonesia and Thailand, as well as the largest-ever annual drill with ally the Philippines last month, which included more than 17,000 people.
According to Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., providing the US access to Philippine military bases is a defensive measure that would be “useful” if China invaded democratically controlled Taiwan, which China claims as part of its territory.
