One of the great questions I’ve always had about the communist military is whether or not the masses of troops on the ground would really fight in any scenario other than to stave off an invasion of their homeland. Reports of the attrocities toward their own troops in the Russian and Chinese revolutions, WW2, Korea, Vietnam, etc. would lead one to believe that only the threat of death from their rear makes them dedicated to waging war. The continuing purges of the officer corps would lend weight to that thought.
Well my uncle saw the waves in Korea and he said it was terrifying but they looked just as terrified.
Hard to read faces but he said it’s like they knew they were fodder and when they dropped it meant their gun would become available for another chinese soldier to come and die.
And even in modern times, a number of Russian soldiers said they had no desire at all to go into Crimea.
But I figured Chinese soldiers are so indoctrinated from so early on to believe in whatever cause they are fed, that they would be gung ho. That might not be the case.
Also the more Xi purges the PLA officer corp, the more political the corp becomes which makes the PLA more ineffective