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Chinese milbloggers, however, have closely followed major defense and security developments both within China as well as abroad, from last summer's war between Israel and Hezbollah to China's anti-satellite missile test in January.Unlike their quarrelsome American counterparts, nearly all of China's milbloggers are in at least tacit agreement upon a central objective: the need for China to increase its national strength through the modernization of its armed forces, collectively known as the People's Liberation Army (PLA).
This consensus reflects a combination of sources: a well-documented groundswell in Chinese nationalism over the past decade, a system of online censorship that Chinese bloggers know restricts their opinions from criticizing the government, and a widely shared belief that the U.S.
and its regional allies seek to contain China's "peaceful development" through a program of military encirclement.
While these trends restrict debate about fundamental questions of politics, China's blogosphere has an active and energetic debate about questions of great import for the future direction of China-the development of the country's military capabilities, an area that Chinese milbloggers appear free to discuss relatively openly.
Although a large portion of the bloggers are boastful of China's military capabilities, a lesser number re...
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