China’s military aid: How have Chinese arms transfers evolved during the first ten years of Xi Jinping’s rule?

Lucie Béraud-Sudreau (), Meia Nouwens () and Veerle Nouwens ()
Additional contact information
Lucie Béraud-Sudreau: European Defence Agency,Brussels, Belgium
Meia Nouwens: International Institute for Strategic Studies, London, United Kingdom
Veerle Nouwens: International Institute for Strategic Studies, London, United Kingdom

Economics of Peace and Security Journal, 2025, vol. 20, issue 1, 22-41

Abstract: While Chinese arms export policy has been extensively covered in the literature, military aid (defined here as military equipment donations) has been less explored. Focusing on three regions, Asia, Russia-Eurasia, and Sub-Saharan Africa, this article identifies three drivers of Chinese military aid flows: Targeting recipient countries with limited defence budgets; providing a source of alternative military aid compared to the United States and Russia; and fulfilling strategic and political objectives. In all regions under consideration, the Chinese government under Xi Jinping has increasingly used military equipment donations as a tool of foreign and security policy. Notably Chinese military aid to the Indo-Pacific region appears to fill a gap, as it focuses on recipients who receive no or little U.S. donations of military equipment.

Keywords: Peoples Liberation Army; military aid; arms transfers; China (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F35 F5 F50 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.epsjournal.org.uk/index.php/EPSJ/article/view/430 (application/pdf)
Open access 24 months after original publication.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:epc:journl:v:20:y:2025:i:1:p:22-41

DOI: 10.15355/epsj.20.1.22

Access Statistics for this article

Economics of Peace and Security Journal is currently edited by Michael Brown and J Paul Dunne

More articles in Economics of Peace and Security Journal from EPS Publishing Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Michael Brown, Managing Editor, EPSJ ().