Insurgents in the locality have attacked port and transport projects that Islamabad is working on.

The joint Chinese anti-terrorism exercises in Pakistan, which began on November 20, are a stark example of a new strategic reality.

The Communist Party leaders have many reasons for strengthening the People’s Liberation Army, including protecting their investments.

The joint exercise aims to defend Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative, a $70 billion project that has been the target of a number of deadly attacks in Pakistan’s Balochistan Province by insurgents.

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The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor is under threat. This massive infrastructure project includes upgrading Pakistan’s north to south roads and the Karakoram Highway. The project would connect Kashgar, in China’s landlocked Xinjiang Province, directly to Pakistan’s hammerhead shaped peninsula and Gwadar on the Arabian Sea near the Persian Gulf.

The CPEC, using Chinese investment funds through the Belt and Road Initiative has expanded Gwadar’s deep-water ports so that Chinese vessels have a shorter route to ship petroleum from the Persian Gulf into the oil-ravaged domestic market.

Ships carrying oil bound for China leave the Middle East via the Persian Gulf and enter the Arabian Sea, then head south through India to Singapore. The Malacca Strait is a congested waterway that must be crossed by ships to reach China’s eastern coast ports. Singapore, a U.S. ally, monitors the narrow waters.

The ships will have to sail through the South China Sea before docking in China. This is the site of increasing tensions between the United States and China as well as competing claims by China and its neighbors for control over strategic islands, shipping lanes and underwater resources.

The Pakistan corridor will allow oil vessels to remain in the Arabian Sea, unloading their cargo at Gwadar before continuing northwards to China’s Xinjiang Region.

This has led to tensions between China and the United States. The United States has developed ties with Pakistan, and is concerned about China’s growing security footprint and investment.

In an analysis released on November 14, the New Lines Institute for Strategy and Policy (a Washington-based nonpartisan think tank) said that “the deepening relationship” between China and Pakistan via CPEC, could strain U.S. Pakistani relations and drive Islamabad towards Beijing.

Roads, airports, plants, and ports

The CPEC project at Gwadar includes a sleek 1,860-mile road and an upgraded port. It also includes a new Gwadar international airport, a desalination station, a coal fired power plant, container berths and terminals for grain, oil, and liquefied gas.

China’s People’s Liberation Army has sent 300 troops, including special operations, aviation, and logistical support, from its Western Theater Command, to the Pakistan-China Joint Exercise, Warrior VIII. The exercise is scheduled to last until Dec. 11. China’s troops are also being hailed as a force that can help Pakistan deal with the jihadi and secessionist threats it faces within its borders.

Lin Jian, a spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, said that on November 20, when the exercises began, “China strongly supports Pakistan’s efforts to fight terrorism”. The 300 Chinese soldiers joined Special Service Group forces of the Pakistani Army’s Special Service Group.

“The exercise will focus on joint counter-terrorism cleanup and strike operations,” Chinese-government-controlled Xinhua News Agency reported. The two sides will conduct mixed and multi-level training in various specialties, and live troop drills that are in line with actual combat processes.

The Chinese Defense Ministry stated that the exercise “aims at consolidating and deepening practical exchanges and collaboration between the two militaries as well as strengthening their joint antiterrorism capabilities.”

Radio Pakistan reported that the drills started at Pakistan’s National Counter-Terrorism Center (NCTC) in Pabbi, in the mountainous northwest Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province, near the Khyber Pass Canyon, in the bordering Afghanistan province.

In online videos, the Chinese soldiers and their equipment were seen marching onto Pakistan’s tarmac wearing desert camouflage and steel helmets topped by what appeared to be cameras and telescopic lens.

The bearded Pakistani soldiers, who were uniformed in the same way, joined them at a joint ceremony to raise the flag before deploying, conducting field surveys, and setting up command posts.

The subtext of the exercises is that Chinese workers and their projects are the targets of an aggressive separatist force which has been at war with the government central in Islamabad for a long time.

The magazine Raksha Anirveda, which tracks the defense and aerospace industry in India, said that the drills were significant because they took place amid reports of China pressuring Pakistan to allow its forces to provide protection for hundreds Chinese workers working on the $70 billion China Pakistan Economic Corridor.

The magazine reported that “the Baluch Liberation Army, along with the Islamic militant Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan group (TTP), increased attacks against Chinese nationals as well as the Pakistani military in Baluchistan.

Since decades, ethnic insurgents are fighting for the autonomy or independence of Balochistan. They claim that Pakistan has committed extrajudicial killings and forced disappearances to quell the Balochistan rebellion, and to exploit the province’s resources.

Insurgents have grown increasingly anti-Chinese in the last 10 years, amid claims that Gwadar and the province will benefit Beijing and Islamabad while not Balochistan. Gwadar port is operated by China Overseas Ports Holding Co. and administered by Pakistan’s maritime secretary.

Balochistan is arid and hot, bordering similar dry, barren, undeveloped areas in Afghanistan’s southeast and Iran’s southeast. That Muslim-dominated triangle forms a Pakistan-Afghanistan-Iran tinderbox of competing feuds by tribes and governments.

Officials in Pakistan claim that China’s Belt and Road investment will benefit regions who are trying to undermine it.

The CPEC Secretariat of the Pakistani government stated on its website that “CPEC is not only beneficial to China and Pakistan, but it will also have a positive effect on Iran, Afghanistan and Central Asian republics.”

Beijing has reportedly pressed Islamabad for Chinese security forces to be on the ground in order to protect Pakistan.