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Chinese state television showed footage of armed commandos riding electric skateboards during a combat exercise.
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The naval special forces also deployed drones designed to flutter like an eagle and a sparrow.
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The live-fire exercise was held to commemorate the 97th anniversary of the People’s Liberation Army.
Chinese special forces displayed electric skateboards, jet surfboards and other gadgets during a televised combat demonstration on Thursday.
Chinese state television broadcast the exercise live. The exercise was held at the Nanchang Infantry Academy in Jiangxi to commemorate the 97th anniversary of the People’s Liberation Army.
The TV clip showed several soldiers from the Jiaolong Commandos, an elite amphibious unit of the Chinese Navy, riding jet planes on surfboards in a garden pond.
A commando launched a winged drone that resembled a sparrow.
Later, half a dozen commandos armed with assault rifles left a forest edge on electric skateboards. According to a narrator on state television, these skateboards were electric.
As they raced down a cobblestone road, a commando at the head of the group held a drone that looked like a giant eagle. The drone eventually fluttered away as he flung it into the air while controlling the skateboard.
As they entered a complex of fire targets, one of the troops launched a portable drone with four small propellers. The drone flew into a wall and exploded.
The commandos walked through a field on their skateboards, getting off to shoot at targets and throw flares.
Several individuals then demonstrated an explosive break-in into a plywood structure and pulled out a dummy, which they put in a pickup truck.
Then the entire team gathered and left in the pickup truck.
Other televised demonstrations included the use of a jetpack similar to one Gravity Industries tested for the British Royal Marines, a surveillance quadcopter and a remote-controlled drone that tore through a paper target.
Although not widely used by other major militaries, personal electric vehicles are beginning to appear in combat zones. Russian military bloggers recently reported that Russian troops in Ukraine are using electric scooters to move silently between positions.
In the Donbas, pro-Russian militias are also said to be using motorcycles to avoid being detected by drones.
The fighting in Ukraine has led to increased global interest in cheaper, more versatile weapons, such as first-person drones.
For example, the US military has requested $2.4 billion in its 2025 budget to develop low-cost drones.
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