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Minnie Chan

They were a smashing success but the days of People's Liberation Army soldiers chopping tiles and timber blocks barehanded in stunts put on during leaders' inspections and open days appear to be numbered.
Training for the shows will no longer count towards some soldiers' performance reviews, according to a mainland report.
The PLA Daily said yesterday that Communist Party leaders in the navy's marine corps had decided to scrap training in a dozen stunt areas - including various forms of kung fu and team motorcycle riding - replacing them with other activities such as live-fire drills.
The military mouthpiece said the decision was welcomed by the troops.
"[I am] finally released," the daily quoted marine Wang Xiaohui as saying.
Wang was a kung fu exponent before he joined the military, specialising in breaking planks with his head, the paper said.
But his military training had suffered because he had spent most of his time in the marines training to do stunts for shows.
The report said marines would now spend more time working on long-range sniper firing, helicopter drills, base jumping, machine-gun training and other high-risk activities.
It said some of the more dangerous exercises had been cancelled in previous years because of the high number of casualties but those activities had since resumed.
Professor Arthur Ding Shu-fan, from the Taipei-based Chinese Council of Advanced Policy Studies, said the change would probably be rolled out across all military divisions.
"The new measures will help turn the PLA into a normal battle force," Ding said.
"The stunts might look quite cool but they are outdated in terms of today's modern warfare." 
The report comes just days after President Xi Jinping, who is also the chairman of the Central Military Commission, ordered combat officers and those in charge of political training at the grass-roots level to swap posts to improve both fighting capability and political loyalty to the Communist Party.


Kung fu stunts get the chop at PLA Navy unit

Militia practise a motorcycle stunt during training in Taiyuan, Shanxi province. Photo: Reuters

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China

The show seems to be over for displays of martial arts might in China's marine corps


Kung fu stunts get the chop at PLA Navy unit

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}The show seems to be over for displays of martial arts might in China's marine corps

The show seems to be over for displays of martial arts might in China's marine corps