6 May 2022

Why the Chinese military wants thousands of ‘made-to-order’ noncommissioned officers

DAVID ROZA

Here in the good ol’ U.S. of A, the military likes to mold noncommissioned officers — the sergeants and petty officers who keep the armed forces running — in the jaded wisdom and disillusioned bitterness that comes from years of herding junior enlisted service members and officers in order to make things work kind-of-okay most of the time.

But for the past 10 years, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army has been trying something different: sending high school graduates to school for a few more years before getting them back as newly-minted noncommissioned officers to guide younger service members through the increasingly-technical equipment of its modernizing military.

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