Primary school students at Wuhan Experimental Foreign Languages School take part in a military training demonstration. Photo: Han You / CFP / Visual China.On September 14, China’s Defense Ministry announced that nearly 500,000 certified military instructors had trained almost 30 million students at more than 20,000 schools this year, and that the Ministry of Education and the Central Military Commission’s National Defense Mobilization Department are revising the student military training syllabus.The Chinese Communist Party is expanding military education for students while restricting the flow of information online.Together, school training requirements, national defense programs, and qualification rules for online presenters limit what citizens can learn and who can inform them.The combined effect is a population raised to accept Party narratives, identify the United States and Taiwan as enemies, and enter military service with little exposure to outside views that could weaken its willingness to fight.China’s National Defense Education Law, originally enacted in 2001 and amended in 2018, requires elementary and junior middle schools to integrate national defense education into their curricula and permits them to organize “juvenile military schools.”High schools and universities must hold formal national defense education courses, with military training organized by school military-training departments.The National People’s Congress Standing Committee adopted a further revision on September 13, 2024, effective September 21, 2024, after two rounds of deliberation.The amendments provide for branches of the People’s Liberation Army to be stationed in colleges, universities, and high schools nationwide. They also add provisions on students’ legal obligation to perform military service.Shan-Son Kung, an associate researcher at Taiwan’s Institute for National Defense and Security Research, told Radio Free Asia that the amendments are intended to give students “an awareness of who the enemy is, at a much younger age” and to increase the pool of available conscripts.In official CCP rhetoric, that enemy is the United States, Taiwan, and the West, referred to as “external forces,” “Western anti-China forces,” the “US-West,” “overseas anti-China hostile forces,” foreign “black hands,” and “Taiwan independence” separatist forces. Military education teaches students to identify these enemies early, preparing them to fight for the homeland.Separate opinions issued in 2021 and 2022 by the Ministry of Education and Central Military Commission established annual military training requirements of 21 days for college students and 14 days for high school students.Junior high schools, serving students aged 13 and older, were encouraged to adopt a seven-day version.A subsequent joint notice extended voluntary “pioneer program” military training to primary schools covering ages six to twelve. Provincial authorities could assign schools that did not volunteer.The Ministry of Education and the Central Military Commission’s Political Work Department have designated “National Defense Education Model Schools” in successive rounds.These included approximately 1,932 schools by 2017–2018, according to Project Arklight, and 2,687 schools as of a February 6, 2023 joint notice. An education official in Lipu, Guangxi, stated the operating principle as “national defense education should start in infancy,” according to the same report.Multiple outlets have documented this instruction at the school level. At an elementary school affiliated with Beijing Jiaotong University, students aged six and seven posed with replica handguns and rifles, wore mock police flak jackets and oversized helmets, practiced drills, and saluted visiting soldiers.At No. 10 Middle School in Liuyang, Hunan province, students in combat uniforms attended a national defense lecture discussing then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s 2022 visit to Taiwan and U.S.-China competition.Commercial youth camps, including the War Wolves Special Training Camp and a camp run by Huangpu Military Academy, offer children training in wilderness survival, martial arts, drone operation, military formations, and simulated counterterrorism operations.Military instruction operates alongside the political curriculum. Since 2021, students from primary school through university have been required to study Xi Jinping Thought.The Patriotic Education Law, effective January 1, 2024, made patriotic instruction a national legal requirement encompassing schools, families, workplaces, and online platforms.The law also extends patriotic education to religion and to Chinese people outside the mainland. Article 22 directs the state to support patriotic education in religious groups, religious schools, and places of worship, with the stated aim of “guiding religion to adapt to socialist society.”Article 23 requires education on “one country, two systems” for Hong Kong and Macau residents, so that they consciously preserve national sovereignty and territorial integrity.The same article calls for teaching all Chinese people, explicitly including Taiwan compatriots, that completing “the great undertaking of uniting the motherland” is a “sacred duty,” and directs the state to resolutely oppose “Taiwan independence.”For overseas Chinese, the state is to strengthen communication and provide services intended to enhance their patriotism.In Hong Kong, the Education Bureau introduced a mandatory Humanities subject for primary schools, replacing General Studies, beginning in the 2025/26 school year. The subject places increased focus on patriotic education.In an October 15, 2025 legislative reply, the bureau stated that it would provide no fewer than 1,000 teacher training places relating to national security education in the 2025/26 school year.The bureau’s guidelines for newly appointed teachers, beginning in the 2023/24 school year, require them to report breaches of law or regulations to school management, police, or other relevant departments.New teachers must also pass the Basic Law and National Security Law test as a condition of appointment, according to Radio Free Asia.In July 2021, China’s State Council issued the double reduction policy, barring for-profit tutoring in core curriculum subjects, including English.The government presented the policy as promoting equality between children from rich and poor families and reducing financial and academic burdens.Before the restrictions, Chinese students commonly attended after-school English academies. Most of those schools closed, leaving the bulk of the population dependent on the few hours of low-level, government-approved English instruction provided in public schools.Reduced opportunities to learn English make it harder for students to read foreign news and social media or communicate with people in other countries.Much of this online content is already blocked in China. The additional language barrier favors CCP propaganda by limiting exposure to outside information and views.Beyond formal education, China has imposed professional qualification requirements on online influencers. The National Radio and Television Administration and Ministry of Culture and Tourism issued the Code of Conduct for Online Presenters on June 8, 2022.Article 13 requires livestreamers who discuss medicine, law, finance, or education to hold relevant professional qualifications.Platforms including Douyin, Weibo, and Bilibili are responsible for verifying those qualifications before allowing accounts to post on those topics. Violators face content restrictions, account bans, or blacklisting.China’s social credit score system was launched under a 2014 State Council planning outline, and is one means of enforcing online restrictions.People who post content that violates the rules can have their social credit scores reduced. This can result in restrictions on high-speed rail travel, loss of access to online payment apps that are essential to life in China, and bans from social media. Serious violations can also result in the loss of scholarships, study opportunities, and, in some cases, employment.The CCP is increasing militarization and propaganda among schoolchildren while preventing new or conflicting information from entering public discourse and blocking dissenting opinions online.The CCP promotes photographs of Shanghai’s skyline as proof of how developed and modern China is. Culturally and politically, however, the country is reverting nearly 50 years to the days of Mao.The post How the CCP Militarizes Education and Controls the Flow of Online Information appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.