The Organizational Structure of the PLAAF

Kenneth W. Allen

Any examination of the People’s Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) must examine its organizational structure «ФФШФО, answer­ing three fundamental questions: What is the PLAAF’s current organizational structure and what are the historical, theoretical, bureaucratic, and other rea­sons for it?1 What are the implications of the current organizational structure for the PLAAF’s future development? Finally, how might the PLAAF’s organi­zational structure change in order to operate in a joint conflict?

Introduction

During the 1990s, the PLAAF began purchasing high-tech weapons from abroad, as well as developing and purchasing them domestically, includ­ing combat aircraft (such as the Russian Sukhoi Su-27), surface-to-air missiles (SAMs, such as the SA-10), and radar and electronic countermeasures (ECM) systems that now form the cornerstone of its table of organization and equip­ment (TOE). In order to support these systems, the PLAAF has also begun implementing significant organizational changes that have mirrored similar changes occurring in the rest of the PLA.

Starting in the early 2000s, PLAAF officers began to assume key joint bil­lets, including membership on the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) Central Military Commission (CMC), commandant of the Academy of Military Science, commandant and political commissar of the National Defense University, and deputy director billets in the General Staff Department (GSD), General Political Department (GPD), and General Logistics Department (GLD). Although these appointments are impressive, not all of them are permanent PLAAF billets. In addition, the army still dominates the majority of the leadership and working billets in all of these organizations, along with the General Armament Depart­ment (GAD), which has yet to have a PLAAF (or PLA Navy) deputy, and all seven of the Military Region (MR) Headquarters. There are no indications this pattern of army domination will change in the next decade.

Concerning the PLAAF’s branches, one of the most significant orga­nizational changes occurred within the last decade, when the PLAAF redes­ignated its radar branch as a specialty force. Even though the PLAAF’s ECM troops are also considered a specialty force, the PLAAF has consolidated their administrative structure into a PLAAF Electronic Countermeasures and Radar Department under the Headquarters Department and merged the research and development for the two forces into a single research institute under the Air Force Equipment Research Academy. Yet another significant change occurred in 1993, when the 15th Airborne Corps upgraded its three brigades to divisions, was designated the lead element for the PLA’s rapid reaction force, and changed from being subordinate to the Guangzhou Military Region Air Force (MRAF) to being directly subordinate to PLAAF Headquarters.2 Although the airborne corps still lacks sufficient airlift capabilities, since the early 1990s it has shifted from having primarily an internal security mission to a combined internal and external security mission.

Starting in the late 1990s, the PLAAF began to restructure its academic institution and equipment support structures. To help provide better education to its cadets and meet operational support requirements, the PLAAF consoli­dated several colleges into two universities—Air Force Engineering University (1999) and Air Force Aviation University (2004)—and restructured some of its other colleges—Xuzhou (Logistics) Air Force College, Guilin (Antiaircraft Artillery and Airborne) Air Force College, and flight colleges. At the same time, however, the PLAAF has increased the number of new officers who have grad­uated from the Defense Student (SK£) program at 18 civilian academic insti­tutions. This program is also called the Reserve Officer (^S^W) program. The goal for 2010 was to have 60 percent of all new officers come from civilian academic institutions, of which two-thirds would come from the Defense Stu­dent Program and one-third from directly recruited civilian college graduates with science and engineering degrees; however, a November 2009 Jiefangjun Bao article stated that the PLAs officer corps receives about 100,000 graduates per year, of which 70 percent come from military academic institutions and 30 percent from the Defense Student program.3 The number of pilot cadets who have been recruited from civilian college graduates and students rather than from high school graduates and enlisted personnel is also rising. These changes will continue to challenge the size and structure of the PLAAF’s academic insti­tutions and may necessitate further consolidation over the next decade.

Over the past decade, the PLAAF’s logistics support structure has mir­rored changes that have occurred in the GLD, which is roughly equivalent to the U. S. Joint Chiefs of Staff’s J-4 (Logistics) Directorate. One of the biggest changes occurred in 1998 when the PLAAF’s Logistics Department, which had been responsible for providing maintenance support for all nonaviation equip­ment and weapons systems (e. g., SAMs, AAA, radars), turned over support for all of this equipment, except vehicles, to the PLAAF’s restructured Equipment Department. In addition, during the 2000s, the GLD and PLAAF consolidated

their Quartermaster Department, Materials Department, and Petroleum, Oil, and Lubricants (POL) Department into a single Quartermaster, Materials, and POL Department. Even though these organizations have been merged at the top, they remain separated as individual branches at the regiment level.

Concerning the equipment support structure, two major changes have occurred since the late 1990s. The first occurred in 1998, when the PLA estab­lished the GAD and the PLAAF adjusted its existing equipment support struc­ture, so that the restructured Equipment Department took responsibility for developing and supporting all combat equipment and weapons systems, except vehicles, from birth to death. In 2004, the PLAAF also created a new Air Force Equipment Research Academy that became responsible for managing the research and development for all PLAAF combat equipment and weapons sys­tems. There are no indications the equipment support structure, which is fully integrated with the logistics support structure at the regiment and below levels, will change appreciably over the next decade.