Xinjiang Military Command

Under the PLAA, there are 5 TC army commands, the Xinjiang military command, and the Tibet military command. Military commands in Tibet and Xinjiang have always enjoyed special political status in the past. In May 2016, the PLA elevated the status of its western Tibet Military Command. Following the announcement of the large military reforms undertaken by China, most provincial military commands now fall under jurisdiction of the newly established National Defense Mobilization Department. Some sources reference the People's Liberation Army's (PLA) western command as Xinjiang Military Command, but this is incorrect.

Xinjiang Military Region (Headquarters in Urumqi, Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region) consistsf of 4 divisions, 1 brigade and 5 regiments organized into the 4th Motorized Infantry Division (Kucha), the 6th Mechanized Infantry Division (Kashgar), the 8th Motorized Infantry Division, and the 11th Motorized Infantry Division Chemical Infantry Division (Urumqi) 2nd Artillery Brigade (Urumqi County) (former Artillery 13th Division) Engineer 9th Regiment (Urumqi) Special Operations Brigade (Kashgar) Army Aviation 3rd Brigade, Independent 1st Regiment (Urumqi) and Independent 2nd Regiment. The 37th Aviation Division (Fighter Division) of the 9th Air Force is stationed at Xinjiang Urumqi Base

Greatly in disproportion to their population, more and more leadership positions are taken by talented individuals from the minorities of China. Even in the military, minority ethnic officers are increasing in number. Under the Xinjiang Military Command, for example, where middle and higher ranking minority officers are sent in turn to receive training in higher institutions, 35 per cent of the minority officers have undergone further advanced training, while 50 per cent have acquired a university or professional degree. At the army or division level, there are over 100 minority officers, including the youngest general in all the armed forces, who is a Uighur. The Xinjiang Military Command has laid down special guidelines in a policy document entitled Ideas on How to Strengthen the Ranks of Minority Cadres.

The commander of the Fifth Army, Lesken, a Belarusian nobleman, went into exile in Xinjiang, China after the October Revolution of the former Soviet Union. After participating in the revolution, he organized and led the "Yining Revolt." On April 8, 1945, Xinjiang’s "Three Districts" (Ili, Tacheng, and Altai) established a national army with more than 30,000 men. Lesken was the commander of the army. The backbone of the national army was mostly former Soviets. Lesken returned to the former Soviet Union in 1951, but his whereabouts are unknown.

In October 1949, General Wang Zhen asked Mao Zedong for an invitation and led his troops into Xinjiang. Before setting off, Mao Zedong met with General Wang Zhen at Xibaipo, Pingshan, Hebei, and used the matchmaker to describe his role in Xinjiang. Mao Zedong said: "You go to Xinjiang to play a matchmaker, you are both a supporting role and a protagonist. You must have a high level of art!" Mao Zedong's metaphor is both an account of Wang Zhen's task and a request for Wang Zhen.

On 09 October 1949, Wang Zhen gave a report entitled "On the Northwest Situation and the Characteristics and Tasks of the Struggle for the Liberation of Xinjiang" at the enlarged meeting of the Party Committee of the Second Army, which gave an important explanation of the work of reforming the uprising troops. He said that to transform the Kuomintang army into the People's Liberation Army, it must undergo arduous ideological education, follow the mass line, and adopt democratic methods of ideological struggle. He also said that to carry out revolutionary political work, it is necessary not only to unite the soldiers, but also to reform most of the officers.

After General Wang Zhen entered Xinjiang, he led his troops to the north and south of the Tianshan Mountains, governing Xinjiang by means of thunderbolt, in order to develop production and benefit the people, and basically stabilized the complex situation in Xinjiang. General Luo Yuanfa recalled that Wang Zhen’s attitude in governing Xinjiang was very clear: He said that for the bandits who were stubborn and evil-doing, we had to fight for what we could fight for, but we couldn’t fight for them. "We must use cannons to reason and bayonet to teach."

Under the command of Wang Zhen, the troops entering Xinjiang first battled Ganhezi, encircled and wiped out Hongliu Gorge, chased Beita Mountain, and fought fiercely at Ice Daban, crossing the Gobi five times. For more than a hundred battles, Wang Zhen came to command in person. The captives were headed by Usman, Janimukhan, Ulaziba, Sidik, Bulbujav, Shakai, etc. More than 80 tribes, including Aishan, Harik, Hu Saiyin, and Sher Duman, are expected to return. The establishment of the Xinjiang Construction Corps was also the initiative of General Wang Zhen.

The People's Liberation Army would continue to play the role of the "three teams" (i.e. combat team, production team, and work team). The Xinjiang Military Region decided in principle that one division of the incoming troops would be responsible for arranging political cadres from one division of the uprising troops. The 4th Division of the Second Army is in charge of the 8th Cavalry Division, the Fifth Division is in charge of the 27th Division, and the Sixth Division is in charge of the 25th Division; the Sixteenth Division of the Sixth Army is in charge of the 26th Division and the 17th Division. Responsible for the 7th Cavalry Division.

On 07 December 1949, according to the order of the Chinese People's Revolutionary Military Commission, the Kuomintang Xinjiang Garrison Command was reorganized into the 22nd Corps of the Chinese People's Liberation Army. The 22nd Corps governs the Ninth Army, the Seventh Cavalry Division, and the Eighth Cavalry Division. The Ninth Army governs the 25th, 26th, and 27th Infantry Divisions. The Corps Command is stationed in Dihua, commander Tao Zhiyue, political commissar Wang Zhen (concurrently).

General Wang Zhen ruled Xinjiang by means of thunderbolt, and effectively wiped out the forces of Xinjiang independence in the bud. In April 1951, Yili, Xinjiang, held a "Fifty-one Intellectuals Symposium", at which the issue of the Republic of Uyghurstan was openly raised. Some senior cadres including the commander of the Fifth Army of the Chinese People's Liberation Army, which was adapted by the Xinjiang National Army, attended the meeting.

General Wang Zhen was furious when he heard the thunder, and immediately called an emergency enlarged meeting of the Xinjiang Branch of the Communist Party of China. The theme of the meeting was to criticize the "problems concerning the Republic of Uyghurstan" raised by the forum. The former Chief of Staff of the Xinjiang Military Region Geerxia dictated the "Memoirs of Geerxia". At this meeting, Wang Zhen first discussed the fundamental difference between the former Soviet Union’s federal system and China’s ethnic regional autonomy policy, and then pointedly pointed out: "What republic issue is being raised? It is actually an extremely wrong act of splitting the motherland and undermining national unity."

Wang Zhen called for "rooting in the frontier. The officers and soldiers grumbled: "Without a wife, you can't be at ease, without a child, you can't take root." General Wang Zhen was sad when he heard that, and ordered the Corps to go to Hunan to call a group of female soldiers into Xinjiang. In order to solve the "bachelor" problem. According to the cloud, in 1951, 3862 women from Hunan were recruited into Xinjiang; in 1952, more than 4,000 women from Hunan were recruited into Xinjiang. As a result, a tragicomedy of "eight thousand women from Hunan went to Tianshan" was staged.

In 1956, General Wang Zhen was appointed Minister of Agricultural Reclamation. In October 1976, General Wang Zhen contributed to the smashing of the "Gang of Four". Wang Zhen once served as Ye Jianying's "liaison staff" and secretly contacted Chen Yun and other veteran officials to oppose the "Gang of Four."

On August 6, 2003, a joint counter-terrorism military exercise by the armed forces of the member states of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization was held in Kazakhstan. This is the first multilateral joint anti-terrorism military exercise held within the framework of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. The exercise was divided into two stages, which were successively held in Kazakhstan and China. More than 1,000 armed forces from China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Tajikistan participated in the exercise.

The background of the exercise code-named "United-2003" was: an international terrorist hijacked a passenger plane in a certain country, took hostages, and violated Kazakhstan's airspace; at the same time, another international terrorist secretly sneaked into the Yili region of Xinjiang, China, and established Armed camps, looking for opportunities to create terrorist violence. In view of the fact that terrorist activities have seriously endangered regional security and stability, the member states of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization have negotiated through diplomatic channels and high-level military meetings to decide to take joint actions to jointly combat terrorists. The joint command headquarters of the exercise consisted of the headquarters of the Eastern Military Region of Kazakhstan and the headquarters of the Xinjiang Military Region of China, and other participating countries sent command and staff officers. Participating countries sent some troops to participate in live-fire exercises.

On 15 August 2014, the Xinjiang Military Command’s Direct Work Office issued a notice, naming the two directly affiliated units and 4 cadres whose practice style, training style, and examination style were false. Criticized and ordered rectification within a time limit. This action set off a "brainstorm" in the headquarters and the directly affiliated units. They used this as a lesson to rectify their training styles. 26 training practices that were inconsistent with actual combat requirements were corrected one by one. "Whoever cheats in the training ground will have their 'rice bowl' destroyed."

When the Party Committee of the Xinjiang Military Region Command supervised the direct-affiliated troops to strengthen the work style, it did not look at how wonderful the words were and how many lists were listed, but focused on which weak links were improved and which styles of stubborn illnesses were eliminated, and promoted the problem clear with the spirit of "nailing nails". "The key to maintaining a style of work is perseverance. Regardless of whether the team or the individual is rectified, the military order will depend on the result. Always insist that the channel is not changed, the intensity is not reduced, and the standard is not lowered." Yang Xiaobing, the party secretary of the brigade warned everyone.

Wherever the officers and soldiers go, they send the warmth of the party. The northern foot of the Tianshan Mountains is called the "Death Valley" by the local people. The climate is bad. The snow-free period is only 4 months. Civil power lines are often eroded by snow and malfunction. An engineering maintenance team affiliated to the ministry voluntarily signed a voluntary assistance agreement with the local government. Officers and soldiers of the line inspection unit responsible for overhauling the power supply lines of national defense projects carefully overhauled this section of civilian lines every time they passed here to ensure the safety of electricity use.

Soldiers of the People's Liberation Army Xinjiang military command patrol the region centered by Pisiling Mountain in Tashkurgan, northwest China’s Xinjiang Autonomous Region between June 13 and 15, 2016. The mountain is 5,316 meters above sea level and its name means a place where snow leopard cannot reach in the language of the Tajiks. It is also known as the death valley among soldiers for its high altitude and severe coldness as well as thin oxygen.

In the firsxt half of 2014 the troops under the Xinjiang Military Region Command have dispatched more than 100 convenient service teams to give full play to their professional expertise and talent advantages to improve people's livelihood and benefit the people, and make positive contributions to maintaining social stability and long-term stability in Xinjiang.

A new-type self-powered thermal insulation cabin is used in a border defense company under the PLA Xinjiang Military Command. Developed by the PLA Army Engineering University, the thermal insulation device is mainly designed for troops stationed in plateau and alpine regions with inconvenient transportation and insufficient logistics support. Though icy and snowy outside, the indoor temperature is still in a comfortable range. Service members wear shirts or short-sleeved physical training suits.

The cabin does not rely on the air conditioning or furnace. Instead, its heating system is powered by solar energy. During the day, the solar houses stores energy, and the solar energy equipment on the roof collects the heat. It heats the room if the cabin’s windows next to the solar house are open. In this way, energy self-sufficiency and recycling is realized, without diesel or electricity, and thus reducing the dependence on long-distance fuel distribution. After repeated tests, the thermal insulation materials of the device help keep indoor temperature higher than 15°C in a cold weather of -40°C outdoors.

The use of toilets has been a persistent problem for border defense duty and field training in plateau and alpine regions. The new thermal insulation cabin uses biodegradable dry self-cleaning toilets and the traditional water flushing method is replaced by biological flora decomposition technology. Not only will it be blocked by freezing, it does not require routine maintenance and has no peculiar smell.

Three women serving in military organs were honored August 2, 2020 with the title of the "Most Beautiful Soldiers in the New Era" at an award ceremony ahead of the 93rd anniversary of the founding of the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA). Among the honorees is Mahepali, a political instructor for a tank company in a division of the Xinjiang Military Command who also serves as a deputy to the 13th National People's Congress.

The post-1990s woman keeps pace with the times by exploring innovative theoretical learning methods, using a popular "mobile phone plus" platform to spread the CPC's theories. She is also known for her efforts to create a positive atmosphere in her team. During her tenure in the PLA, she has learned how to drive armored vehicles and mastered a dozen types of military equipment. She has also taken responsibility for training soldiers and cultivated a combat force that was rated a "first-grade military training company."

The Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) Xinjiang Military Command recently received delivery of and commissioned its first batch of China's newly developed Type 15 light tanks, which excels at rapid reaction combat in plateau regions, a Chinese expert said on 01 February 2021. With the commissioning, both Xinjiang and Tibet military commands safeguarding China's western borders are now operating these advanced tanks specializing in plateau combat, analysts said.

In January 2021, a regiment attached to the PLA Xinjiang Military Command received the delivery of a batch of Type 15 light tanks while stationed in a plateau region, China Central Television (CCTV) reported on 31 January 2021. Immediately after the commissioning, the regiment sent the tanks to a freezing region at 4,300 meters altitude for adaptation exercise s, so they can rapidly form combat capability, CCTV reported. The report did not mention the number of tanks delivered. Compared with the PLA's Type 96 and Type 99 tanks, the Type 15 is of lighter weight, boasts better mobility in high altitude regions with low oxygen levels, and is more suitable for plateau combat.