Since the reform and opening up, the PLA military schools have been dynamically carrying out cooperation and exchanges with foreign countries in terms of military personnel cultivation, which has not only met the demands of serving the national political and foreign policies and presenting the impressive images of China and the Chinese armed forces as an open country and military, but has also widened the breath of international horizon in the training of military personnel.

　　By exploiting contacts and exchanges we acquire a broad vision, and in the effort of discovering and making use of the strong points of all others we pinpoint our own weak ones. By means of inviting foreigners in and sending Chinese military personnel out, the Chinese military schools have incubated and developed an entirely new idea and angle of view in school running.

　　Exchange activities are on the rise

　　In as early as January 1986, the just one-month old NDU held a reception for foreign military attachés to China, at which the first President Zhang Zhen and the first Political Commissar Li Desheng proclaimed to the world that the NDU was open to the entire world and would be run in an open way. To show they meant what they said, General Zhang Zhen took the lead to set his feet that once carried him through the Long March in China on the land of the other side of the Pacific Ocean.

　　From then on, the contacts and exchanges between the NDU and foreign military schools have never stopped. The PLA general headquarters/departments once marshaled the presidents and commandants of all the military schools of China abroad to have zero-distance contacts with and make on-the-spot survey in more than 30 military schools in the U.S., Ukraine, Russia, Germany and Turkey. Based on the data made available by the PLA general headquarters/departments, the Chinese armed forces have so far organized 45 delegations or groups from 30 odd military schools, 130 leaders of the schools or directors of departments as well as over 200 experts and professors to go to foreign military schools to visit or learn on the spot. In return, leaders and teachers from 25 foreign military schools in 14 countries came to China for the same purpose.

　　Chinese students make outstanding achievements in their tour of study

　　The Chinese armed forces began to select students from military schools and sent them abroad to study in 1996. So far, Chinese students and scholars who wear the "August 1" army emblem can be seen in the military institutes of high learning in the U.S., Russia and Pakistan. That will help them to understand the world better, have a good command of the update trend of the world revolution in military affairs, learn the advanced combat experience from foreign armed forces and broaden their vision.

　　Currently, the Chinese military has sent students to more than 40 countries. The annual number of Chinese military students being sent abroad to study has swelled from about 10 at the onset to the present 300 plus. Totally, 1,677 students have returned back to China after finishing their study, and among them, more than 400 have assumed the office at the division level or above.

　　Foreign students training work has achieved great success

　　In answering to the needs of the overall national foreign policy, the PLA military schools have also established a foreign students training system in line with the international professional military education. Since the "Tenth Five-year Plan" period, these military schools have trained 9,000-odd military personnel for over 150 countries and held nine seminars on international issues for high-rank military officers or civil officials from over 50 countries. At the seminars, China's stand and policies on international issues were given wide publicity to, the understanding about the regional security situations was deepened and new ways of mixed training for Chinese and foreign military officers were identified.

　　By going global and getting integrated into the world, the Chinese military schools have been making improvements by drawing on the experience of foreign military schools and upgrading the education level through improvements. Thanks to it, their educational capacity and level of running the military schools have witnessed progressive enhancement, which in turn will help them to display more vigor on the stage of opening-up.

　　By Zhang Changwei and Shen Yi

　　(Oct 22, PLA Daily)                                         Editor: Ouyang Dongmei