Algeria and Egypt are the latest countries to receive China’s CH-5 and Pterosaur drones. amount of sales This underscores Beijing’s increasingly successful global marketing strategy after the United States has restricted the export of armed drones to closing allies since 2020.
Algeria recently publicly confirmed that it will deliver six CH-5 drones in March of this year. Meanwhile, US ally Egypt is in talks with China to receive more pterosaur drones for the Air Force.
The CH-5 drone Similar to the US MQ-9 Reaper, it has about the same dimensions and can stay in the air while carrying six missiles for more than 30 hours.
Chinese Pterosaur It is also a competitor of the USMQ-9, primarily for reconnaissance and surveillance purposes.In Egyptian service, the pterosaurs have already seen Fight against ISIS In the Sinai area.
China’s relatively cheap drones and often flexible payment options are particularly attractive to countries with limited defense budgets, giving Beijing a cost-competitive foothold in the global drone market.
But from a broader perspective, sales of Chinese drones and other advanced weapons are Strategic and foreign policy considerations for economic benefit.. These sales can also be interpreted as a sign of increased political, technical and military power over partners and rivals.
China is believed to have the three main benefits behind arms sales. First, because the procurement of high-tech weapons is necessarily a high-level intergovernmental transaction, sales often allow deeper political and military access to client countries.
When it comes to selling drones, China may withhold certain technologies and know-how from its clients and rely on technical support and maintenance. Chinese drones operating abroad may also be able to secretly relay information to Chinese intelligence agencies.
As a result, China can use drones as an effective foreign policy tool for client countries that have strategic resources and locations that are important to China’s interests, such as Myanmar, Iraq, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Myanmar and Pakistan are key nodes in China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) geo-strategic infrastructure building project, while Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have oil that supplies a significant proportion of China’s energy demand. It is a rich state.
These Chinese customers have financial or political constraints that prevent them from purchasing US weapons, or instead intentionally strengthen their strategic independence by diversifying weapons suppliers. I am aiming.
Second, China’s exports of high-tech weapons may help maintain a good military balance between client countries and rivals.
Recent sales in China J-10C fighter, Type 054 frigate When VT-4 main battle tank The threat to Pakistan intensifies the threat that the latter poses to India. As a result, India’s strategic attention, military assets and resources will move away from the border conflict with China in the Himalayas and return to Pakistan, which New Delhi considers a more pressing threat.
Chinese drones and rocket artillery Helped the Ethiopian government to do Rout the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), Powerful armed US proxy In the strategic war on terrorism in the Horn of Africa, which acts as a gateway to the Red Sea.
If the TPLF successfully occupied Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, and seized political power, it would probably be flexible in the interests of the United States and act as a further US offset against China’s influence in neighboring Eritrea.
Third, China’s arms sales aim to position itself as an alternative strategic partner to the United States, highlighting the shortcomings of the latter while increasing the growing international status, influence and influence of the United States.
The United States has been a longtime security guarantor for Saudi Arabia, but the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan and the strategic points from the Middle East to the Pacific question Riyadh about the U.S. military’s commitment to the security of the United States and other Persian Gulf allies. You may have thrown it.
Last year, China and Saudi Arabia discussed the latter relocating the equipment needed to build its own ballistic missiles, suggesting a shift away from US weapons dependence.