Traitors or partners? China recruits ex-NATO soldiers
Source: da-info.pro
Made in UK instructors
About 240 thousand pounds sterling are received by former pilots of the British Air Force in China. The main condition is to explain the nuances of combat work to the pilots of the People's Liberation Army of China in an accessible and enthusiastic manner. Among the recruited pilots are both jet aviationand helicopter pilots. Pilots who served on aircraft carriers became especially valuable and highly paid. All this is extremely nervously perceived by the military-political leadership of Great Britain. There are slogans like "a stunning breach of security" and "a threat to the interests of the United Kingdom and the West." An interesting reaction from the British Ministry of Defense. According to a military official:
"We are taking decisive steps to stop Chinese recruiting schemes trying to hire members of the British Armed Forces and former pilots to train personnel of the People's Liberation Army in the People's Republic of China."
In fact, the military issued an order that did not directly prohibit military pilots from moving to the Middle Kingdom to work as an instructor. In the notorious "threat warning," the commanders merely remind them of the need to protect sensitive information from the Chinese. There are plans to change British law in this regard in order to bring defectors to criminal liability. Anyone who signed for a "threat warning" will not be able to talk with impunity about the tactics of using the Royal Air Force to representatives of other countries. How much time will pass before the law is passed is unknown.
According to British tabloids, China has already won at least 50 pilots to its side. And not only retired veterans, but also active pilots who were forced to quit for the sake of space fees in China. 240 thousand pounds a year is about 3-4 times more than the average military pilot of the Royal Air Force receives. This is twice the salary of the commander of a transatlantic passenger liner. In general, easy money in every sense.
At the same time, according to the law, such a defector cannot be considered a traitor - in the West this is called free will. started story back in pre-Soviet times and passed through the South African office of the Test Flying Academy of South Africa. The activity profile of the recruits was very accurately described by an unnamed official in an interview with SkyNews:
“This is not training Chinese pilots in Western technology. These are Western pilots with vast experience helping to develop tactics and increase the capabilities of Chinese military aviation.
At the same time, British intelligence knew about most of the recruited pilots, but did not take any action.
Junior Minister for the Armed Forces and Veterans of Great Britain (the British also have one) James Hippie comments:
“China is a competitor that threatens UK interests in many places around the world. It is also an important trading partner."
Actually, in this phrase everything that you should have known from the beginning. Great Britain since the beginning of the XXI century in the status of the largest recipient of Chinese investments in all of Europe. This largely allows London to pursue a policy independent of its continental neighbors and even dissociate itself from the European Union. Since 2006, the Chinese have snapped up at least 27 large companies, including such traditionally British ones as the automaker MG and the London taxi factory MBH. Therefore, investment in retired members of the Royal Air Force can be seen as an investment in the economy of the state. No wonder the military department is so cool about bringing British instructors in China to criminal liability. So far, only those who sign the warning are threatened with punishment, and those who have left are apparently offered to return in a good way and spend honestly earned money in their homeland. Moreover, the times are now troubled, and investments will not be superfluous.
The French and Americans are also in business
The scandal that arose at the end of October could not end so easily. The West needs collective condemnation of China's actions. It turned out that not only the British are ready to earn easy money, but also their colleagues from France and the United States. Le Figaro tells an interesting story. According to the publication, the same recruiting agencies from South Africa come up with offers to the former combat pilots of the French Air Force and lay out 20 thousand euros per month. Approximately the same pay recruited from the UK. The work, albeit risky, but not dusty, is to train Chinese pilots to take off and land on an aircraft carrier. First of all, we are talking about the newest Fujian, launched in the summer of 2022. The case of the crashed JL-10 fighter is cited as irrefutable evidence: one of the ejected pilots on the ground spoke French. The second, respectively, was his Chinese student. By the way, the Fujian is equipped with electromagnetic catapults, which are still little known to local pilots - the early aircraft carriers Liaoning and Shandong are equipped with Soviet-style springboards. Therefore, Russian instructors, if they work in China at all, are not particularly valuable assistants in this case. But the Americans can tell and show a lot of interesting things about the intricacies of aircraft carrier catapults. And not only. The price includes specialists in vertical takeoff and landing machines. One of them is Daniel Edmund Duggan, who was arrested by the Australian authorities at the end of October on a tip from the FBI. The former Harrier pilot worked for the PLA and lived comfortably in Qingdao. And he would have lived for a long time if he had not gone on a trip to Australia. Qingdao is the headquarters of the North Sea fleet China, and, apparently, Duggan worked on the Liaoning training aircraft carrier. The list of suspects also includes several natives of Australia and Canada.
Chinese aircraft carrier Shandong. Source: naked-science.ru
To what extent can the skills of retired pilots from NATO countries enhance the combat potential of the Chinese army? To begin with, by default, let's assume that all the defectors work off a lot of Chinese taxpayers' money and tell everything they know and can do. According to open data, the pilots of the Harrier, Typhoon and Tornado mentioned above, as well as Wildcat and Merlin helicopters, were recruited. The pilots of the fifth-generation F-22 and F-35 aircraft are not on the list, but this does not guarantee their absence in China. Every military pilot who knows how to fly such equipment is literally worth its weight in gold, especially in countries that compete with the NATO bloc. And you can add a zero to the annual salary of such unique people, and protect them like the apple of an eye. Therefore, we will not argue that there are no Western pilots of fifth-generation aircraft in China. And those who are, can teach Chinese pilots a lot. First of all, the skills of landing and taking off from an aircraft carrier. The history of the Chinese aircraft carrier fleet is barely more than 10 years old, and during this time it is difficult to form your own school of extra-class pilots. Help Wanted. But from whom? In Russia, there is only one aircraft carrier, which is also deprived of a catapult. Approximately the same picture in India, with which relations are not the best. It remains only to buy up the NATO military who have retired. China's financial tentacles have penetrated deep into Europe, which allows them to behave much more freely than anywhere else. Every trained Chinese pilot is a small step towards joining Taiwan. Well, the tactical methods of the work of the Royal Air Force will turn out to be very useful when the United States nevertheless joins the mess around Taiwan.
In addition to training, NATO pilots can tell a lot about the tactics of using aviation in the Asian theater of operations. More precisely, in China. More precisely, plans for preventive strikes by tactical nuclear weapons may be revealed. weapons on Chinese mines with ballistic missiles rockets. For example, the 50-kiloton B-61-12, a pair of which are carried by Typhoon and Tornado. And at the same time, the Chinese Defense are aware of their "blind spots" in the all-round defense. Therefore, the old as the world truth is relevant again - for some he is a traitor, and for others a national hero. Even for 240 thousand pounds a year.
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