New Chinese aircraft will 'give the enemy nervous breakdowns'
Chinese state media calls plane 'weapon of mass persuasion'
Praise for a Chinese aircraft armed with psychological warfare capabilities emerged in state media on Tuesday, alongside claims the plane could “give the enemy nervous breakdowns” - a statement that attracted mass ridicule online.
These infiltrations would “limit the spread of enemy propaganda, affect the morale of the enemy’s army, sow seeds of rumour and confusion, and send all enemy troops from soldiers to officials into a state of nervous breakdown, achieving victory without soldiers even having to fight.”
“The capabilities of the [Gaoxin 7] psychological warfare aircraft…can be used to collapse the enemy propaganda dissemination mechanism,” the article reported. “After that, [dealing with] dropped enemy pamphlets and other propaganda items will be a piece of cake.”
The rest of the article did not elaborate on the Gaoxin 7. Instead, it explained that the Chinese military’s use of psychological warfare was nothing new. It added that “weapons of mass persuasion” were frequently used by the United States in Kosovo, Afghanistan and Iraq. One example cited was the United States’ Lockheed EC-130 aircrafts, which were used during both the Gulf War and Operation Iraqi Freedom to disrupt enemy communications.
China’s Sina Weibo users were largely unimpressed with the Gaoxin 7, and even less with the idea of Chinese state media referencing “enemy propaganda”.