Operationalizing Intelligentized Warfare: Xi Replaces the Strategic Support Force with Three New “Arms”
- Carson Keller
- Jul 15
- 8 min read
In April of 2024, as part of a series of military reforms, Chinese President Xi Jinping made the unexpected decision to dismantle the Strategic Support Force, a service “branch” of the People’s Liberation Army he had established in 2015. In its place, Xi mandated the creation of three specialized “arms:” the Aerospace Force, Cyberspace Force, and Information Support Force. These services, carved out of the former Support Force departments, now report directly to the Central Military Commission. However, they are led by officers ranked below those commanding the traditional service “branches.” The arms support the larger, traditional “branch” services such as the People’s Liberation Army Air Force and Navy. Although the new “arms” are ranked lower in the Chinese military hierarchy than their older “branch” cousins, their specialization in cyber, space, and information operations makes them critical enablers of multi-domain operations.
This reorganization reflects the Central Military Commission’s dissatisfaction with the Support Force’s performance. The service struggled with fragmented command-and-control, difficulty integrating its disparate missions, and alleged corruption in its leadership. Rather than attempt reform, Xi dissolved the branch and redistributed its core functions to the newly created “arms,” embedding them more directly within the military’s theater commands.
The new services were furnished with facilities, equipment and personnel from the former Support Force, along with select assets from the traditional “branches.” For example, at some of its bases, the Aerospace Force assumed control of radar stations previously operated by the People’s Liberation Army Air Force. Each new “arm” now operates with a tailored mission, greater autonomy, and increased authority to coordinate with local units—key attributes for enabling joint, cross-service operations.
The Road of Reforms
The creation of the Aerospace, Cyberspace, and Information Support Forces is not simply a structural change; it also signals China’s shift toward “intelligentized” warfare. This concept emphasizes technological superiority, information dominance, and cross-domain integration to disrupt adversaries’ digital and cognitive systems. Much like U.S. multi-domain operations, the Chinese approach aims to dominate the space, cyberspace, and information environments. These new service “arms” are expected to be on the cutting edge of AI, autonomous systems, and quantum computing, leveraging these technologies to support faster decision-making and tighter operational coherence.
This transition also tightens the Chinese Communist Party’s control over the military. The Strategic Support Force failed to overcome the bureaucratic inertia common to the other services—rigid hierarchies, siloed operations, and weak inter-service coordination. The new “arms” enjoy greater latitude under the theater commands but remain under close oversight from the Central Military Commission, preventing the emergence of autonomous power centers within the People’s Liberation Army. Xi’s approach attempts to balance decentralization in wartime functioning with centralized top-down political authority.
These efforts are part of a broader campaign to modernize the People’s Liberation Army by 2027, coinciding with both the People’s Liberation Army’s centennial and Xi’s directive that the military “be ready” for a potential contingency with Taiwan. By 2035, the military is expected to achieve full “intelligentization” and reach “world-class” status by 2049. These deadlines reflect Xi’s strategic ambition and view that China remains unready for conflict against the U.S. His decade-long anti-corruption campaign, which has purged military and party leadership, reinforces this: only a loyal party-military bureaucracy can execute an armed “unification” scenario with Taiwan.
Three Arms, Three Missions
Formed from the Strategic Support Force’s former Space Systems Department, the Aerospace Force oversees civil and military satellite launches, space-based intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, counterspace operations, and telemetry, tracking, and command of Chinese civil/military satellites. Like the U.S. Space Force, it supports joint operations across the Chinese military. The service’s ground and space-based sensors track global military movements, monitor U.S. deployments to the Indo-Pacific, and provide early warning of ballistic missile launches.
Defensively, the Aerospace Force is responsible for safeguarding China’s space-based infrastructure, which the People's Liberation Army expects to be an early target in any conflict. To mitigate potential threats, the Aerospace Force may deploy maneuverable low-Earth orbit satellite constellations that are hard to detect, more survivable and easy to launch. Coordination with the Cyberspace Force, carried over from their time as Support Force departments, could support a layered system defense across the cyber and electromagnetic spectrum domains. Safeguarding Chinese space-based communications and the BeiDou navigation system—both launched from Aerospace Force bases—will be critical for maintaining the People’s Liberation Army’s command and control in contested environments.
Offensively, the Aerospace Force continues to develop kinetic and non-kinetic counterspace capabilities. Publicly available testing indicates China is pursuing jamming, spoofing, and possibly dual-use satellites and ground-based anti-satellite weapons. While hard-kill assets such as the SC-19 anti-satellite missile remain in the inventory, Chinese military analyses of the Russian invasion of Ukraine suggest kinetic attacks on large satellite constellations like Starlink are impractical. As a result, the Aerospace Force appears to be focusing on directed-energy and electronic warfare tools to disrupt adversaries’ access to the Global Positioning System, surveillance, and communications satellites. Capabilities that could deny opponents key advantages in awareness and coordination.
In a future high-end conflict, the Aerospace Force would enable information dominance in orbit by conducting space-based reconnaissance and surveillance from hundreds of low-Earth orbit satellites. The force would also work to disable enemy satellite systems while defending friendly assets. These capabilities are vital for enabling synchronized strikes across the People’s Liberation Army and impairing any adversary’s ability to operate effectively in space.
The Cyberspace Force, formed from the Strategic Support Force’s former Network Systems Department, plays a parallel role in the cyber domain. The organization oversees the military’s cyberwarfare, electronic warfare, information operations and cyber espionage capabilities. The Cyberspace Force is expected to benefit most from China’s rapid progress in AI and quantum computing, which would allow for accelerated information collection, targeting, and operational planning.
China has long valued cyber operations, with campaigns dating to the early 2000s, including military espionage, commercial IP theft, and intrusions into classified U.S. government systems. These activities were often attributed to groups like the state-backed Advanced Persistent Threat 10 or PLA Unit 61398. With the Cyberspace Force, Xi has now centralized previously scattered civil-military cyber elements, thus improving coordination and standardization between units and enhancing the PLA’s ability to identify and exploit digital targets.
The Cyberspace Force’s portfolio includes electronic warfare systems, radar assets, and psychological warfare platforms. These tools reflect the formation’s broader mission of dominating the information environment. In a conflict, the force would execute operations aimed at disrupting enemy decision-making, degrading command and control infrastructure, and conducting misinformation campaigns to mislead, demoralize, or destabilize adversary civilian populations. Although its mission overlaps somewhat with the Aerospace Force, particularly in the space domain, the Cyberspace Force’s effectiveness depends on sustained access to satellite-based systems and data streams to operate.
Defensively, the Cyberspace Force is responsible for securing China’s digital infrastructure, monitoring foreign information operations and developing countermeasures against adversary intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance efforts. Its activities include signals intelligence collection, radar deception trials and cyber information technology support.
The service also oversees the force structure, planning and acquisition of units operating electromagnetic systems, working across the military to standardize capabilities and coordinate cross-spectrum operations. Real-time intelligence flows from its organic sensors, as well as from data shared by the Aerospace Force, to provide a unified operational picture to theater-level commands.
Through persistent signals-intelligence gathering, inter-service red teaming and adaptation, the Cyberspace Force acts as both a digital sword and shield for China. The organization’s transformation from disparate hacking units into a coordinated cyber force marks a key milestone in China’s military modernization and is indicative of its commitment to dominating the digital and cognitive domains of future warfare.
The Information Support Force, the most understated of the three “arms,” plays an indispensable role in maintaining the People’s Liberation Army’s information infrastructure. Derived from the Strategic Support Force’s Information and Communication Base, the Information Support Force is responsible for preserving the physical and digital backbone of Chinese command and control systems, ensuring the integrity and resilience of the military’s internal communications.
The critical nature of this mission was underscored in 2022 when the Chinese Communist Party stated during its 20th Party Congress that “the field of electronic information, as an important support for modern warfare, has become a key factor in determining victory or defeat.” This imperative was reinforced by the Congress’s report documenting the difficulties of interoperability between military units with incompatible software or hardware in their communication equipment and unclear dialogue protocols.
Xi himself would stress the Information Support Force’s role during the unit’s inauguration in March of 2024, where he called upon personnel to “smooth information links, integrate information resources, strengthen information protection… and efficiently implement information support.” The inaugural speech reinforced the notion that the People’s Liberation Army cannot achieve multi-domain integration without reliable internal communications. People’s Liberation Army publications echo this by calling for standardized data classification, protocol codification, and greater inter-service interoperability.
Recent Information Support Force exercises reflect a literal interpretation of this mission, with personnel repairing optical data cables and power generators under simulated battlefield conditions. In another exercise, troops simulated emergency repairs in off-road conditions during a snowstorm. These seemingly basic activities develop the People’s Liberation Army’s ability to maintain operational connectivity under stress.
While it is still defining its full mission scope, the Information Support Force has already received substantial support from the Chinese commercial defense sector. Over 70 defense firms specializing in data storage, chipmaking and communications technologies have partnered with the new “arm” to address long-standing Chinese military weaknesses in data distribution and software interoperability.
Functionally, the Information Support Force serves as the connective tissue linking the Aero and Cyber forces to the broader Chinese military. The organization’s ability to guarantee seamless data flow across domains will be essential in any large-scale conflict and could prove decisive in determining whether China’s theory of information dominance translates into operational success.
Operationalizing Intelligentized Warfare
Together, these three new “arms” mark a significant step in China’s effort to institutionalize “intelligentized” warfare. This approach builds on the earlier concept of “informatized” warfare, which emphasized network integration and digital data fusion by incorporating emerging technologies to support decision-making, simulation, and autonomous operations. The legacy departments of the Strategic Support Force embodied the principles of “informatized” warfare, and the new formations created in its wake are intended to operationalize “intelligentized” doctrine.
One of the key frameworks guiding this shift is “system destruction warfare,” which views modern conflict not just as a clash between armies, but between opposing operational systems. Rather than seeking battlefield annihilation, the doctrine emphasizes the paralysis of an enemy’s ability to function through attacks on command and control “nodes” alongside the “links” binding them, such as logistics or communications. Chinese sources describe this as “three-dimensional, multi-dimensional, and precise acupuncture-type operations.”
In this model, the new arms operate cohesively. The Cyberspace Force identifies vulnerabilities through cyber reconnaissance and if conflict breaks out would aim to “cripple an adversary’s warfighting command systems,” as described by the U.S. Department of Defense in its 2024 annual report on China’s military. The Aerospace Force ensures freedom of action in space, preserving Chinese reconnaissance and targeting assets while degrading those of its opponents. The Information Support Force ensures that this complex web of operations remains connected, coherent and resilient, even under electromagnetic, cyber or conventional attack.
By aligning doctrine, technology, and structure, Xi and the Central Military Commission have created a new warfighting architecture rooted in speed, data fusion, and synchronized disruption. Each “arm” fills a critical role in this ecosystem that would likely have been impossible under the Strategic Support Force’s former centralized, dysfunctional structure.
Conclusion
The restructuring of the Strategic Support Force into the Aerospace Force, Cyberspace Force and Information Support Force marks a defining moment in the People’s Liberation Army’s ongoing modernization. It reflects Xi Jinping’s commitment to turning long theorized concepts into operational reality, even if it means dismantling institutions he previously built. The result is a more agile, specialized, and doctrinally aligned joint force more capable of advancing China’s strategic interests in a fast-evolving threat environment.
Despite this progress, the “arms” remain immature forces. Their personnel, command systems, and doctrinal cohesion are still developing. Real-world interoperability for these services under combat conditions remains untested. Without sustained changes to China’s military command culture and institutional habits, the transformational potential of these “arms” could be undermined by the very bureaucracy they were designed to circumvent.
For the United States and its partners, the message is simple: this is not just a reorganization, but a conceptual shift. Deterrence will no longer hinge on massed firepower alone, but on speed, integration, and the ability to withstand system-level disruptions. Keeping pace with China’s modernization is not enough, the United States must innovate and operationalize new concepts at a rapid pace if it wishes to retain a strategic position in the Indo-Pacific.
