China’s one-child policy creates wimpy military recruits, deserters | StratRisks

China’s one-child policy creates wimpy military recruits, deserters | StratRisks: But that no longer appears to be the case for those born in 1979, when China implemented its one-child policy, and in the years that followed. According to several military sources, things changed when those born under that policy began joining the military.

The ratio among all military personnel of only children rose from about 20 percent in 1996 to more than 70 percent in 2006.

These pampered children began quitting the military for all sorts of frivolous reasons. “I don’t want to get a tan” and “I hate military quarters with no air conditioning” were among excuses cited.

In March 2011, Xuexi Shibao (Study Times), the organ of the Central Party School that teaches party ideology, ran an article that said, “Soldiers from the one-child generation are wimps who have absolutely no fighting spirit.”