Yin Zhuo

Rear Admiral, People’s Liberation Army Navy

Date of Birth: 1945

Fears of an aggressive Chinese military build-up surfaced again after a People’s Liberation Army Navy Admiral advocated the establishment of an overseas base to fight Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden and wider Indian Ocean. Rear Admiral Yin Zhuo suggested that China’s anti-piracy operations would be well-served by a military base where its ships could refuel and resupply. China has sent four flotillas to patrol the waters off Somalia in the past year; the warships currently call at a French naval base for supplies.

Unspoken by Admiral Yin but on the minds of Chinese and foreign strategists is the Strait of Malacca, the narrow shipping lane between the Malaysian peninsula and Sumatra, through which much of China’s African and Middle Eastern oil imports must pass. The vulnerability of China’s energy supplies has long vexed security planners; Somali piracy provides a pretext for increasing China’s naval presence far from its territorial waters.

Yin’s remarks were made in an interview with state radio; a transcript then appeared on the Defence Ministry’s website on 30 December. Days later, through state newspaper China Daily, the Defence Ministry denied any present plans for an overseas base. Nonetheless, observers of the political and military elite see Yin’s statement as a sign of the PLA’s intentions.

Yin is no crank; he is a frequent military affairs commentator in the media. Born 1945, he was educated at the Université de Paris and France’s Naval Academy. Yin has been a director of the Navy Institute of Strategic Studies and is currently a senior researcher at the PLA Navy Equipment Research Center.