"China's PLA In The Miniature Business?" Topic

I ordered a GAZ "Tiger" 4x4 from a Chinese site on Ebay and the return address was as follows;

WEIQING
Rm 102, Unit 3, Building 1, No. 186
Jiushuidong Rd. PLA Hospital
Quingdao, Li Cang, Shandong
Chia, 266100

People's Liberation Army Hospital? ?

Sounds like apt. or a dormitory room.

I remember many years ago when there was a big scandal when someone found a note in their ROCO Minitank saying they were made with prison labor. When I saw the PLA Hospital address I had to wonder if this was in effect slave labor. These vehicles are diecast, have battery powered lights, great detail, are either 1/48 or 1/55 or 1/50 although the "Tigers" are huge for 1/48. They sell tanks and various trucks for $6.95 USD plus $6.95 USD postage. I worked for a tire and wheel company until 2007 and the company's China plant paid USD 43 cents per hour. My boss had toured it and brought back pictures. It had dirt floors and all the light came from tall windows on both walls of long work spaces. No heat or air conditioning. That said the new building I worked in here in the good old USA had no heat or air conditioning other than in the office. It still boggles the mind but seeing is believing. If the PLA has some sweat shop running in a hospital I need to do a re-think on ordering from China.

The PLA is in a lot of businesses in China, including running hospitals

Yea, they pretty much run, and/or oversee everthing, so…..

The line between gubermint and corporation gets pretty blurred in China.

Though to be fair, a lot of products in the west have prison labour as well, though I'm sure they have better conditions than in China.

Indeed Weasel. Now, GET BACK TO WORK MAKING ME GAMES!!

the seller must be a part time job model seller on ebay, and he works in the hospital.
nothing to do with pla or patient.

we have PLA hospital in every city, that's a common thing. only means the doctors served in PLA.

Your iPhones etc are made in sweatshops in China, probably run by the PLA. So are most of the toys you buy at Christmas for the chillun.

We sold tons of scrap iron to the Japanese before WWII. A lot of that was made into shells that sank our ships.
Think of that the next time you buy toys from China.
Or when you buy shoes at Walmart.

Haven't shopped at Walmart for years, though I;m sure the stores I go to are just as bad, to be honest.

Thank you for the info, and reply, Frank.

Winston Smith, you need to get out more. iPhones are made in state of the art, ISO certified factories, owned by Taiwanese actually. They utilize technologies than aren't available in the USA.

While not true sweat shops, the factory workers are forced to work 10 hour shifts, aren't allowed to talk and cannot leave.their stations except during regulated breaks. As for pay, they actually make more than average Chinese citizens. Apple has been very sensitive to complaints about how their contract manufacturers treat their workers and are present at the factories.

I know. Been there, worked there, seen them.

Also seen the products of PLA factories -anyone else seen knock-off BMWs?

I did a couple of contracts in China '99-'01. All of our construction contractors had numbers "17th Metal Bureau", "12th electrical installers". It turns out that these were actually part of the PLA which was sent out into the world and used to make money to pay for the PLA's upkeep.

Another buddy of mine worked on a hydroelectric plant in Nepal. The main construction contractor was Panda Engineering, a Chinese outfit obviously. Anyway, the project got behind time, about 3 months. The Panda guys solved their problem by calling across the border to the local army base. They had a regiment of infantry rail roaded up to the border, given single use passports, walked through Nepalese Immigration and put to work. 800 men with pick axes and shovels can clear a mountain quite effectively using nothing but muscle power. Got the project back on track in a month. They then walked back over the border and and went back to base.

This work practice may still be true. International construction – just when you think you've seen everything.

OK, here's some historical info about PLA and manufacturing.

In the late 1950's and early 1960's, China was concerned about nuclear war and as a result, de-centralized their military manufacturing to every single province of China. Provincial PLA set-up factories so that they could continue war efforts even if 80% of China got nuked. Every province of China became capable of manufacturing and equipping complete armies. This is why each province could manufacture rifles, shoes, uniforms, tanks, truck, bicycles, radios in addition to ovens and cooking kits, etc. Scale of manufacturing could supply millions at a time.

While this was a bold plan, it did cause problems in their tech. level as not all provinces could keep up with advances. This is why we see China armed with such old military tech until just recently. Poverty also led local PLA manufacturing to expand beyond military in order provide consumer staples.

Cue to late 1980's. Rapid modernization and corruption caused PLA leaders to divert factories to manufacturing more consumer products, and often counterfeit products to pad their pockets. (Yes, I have seen knock-off BMWs built on truck chasis, I'll dig up a pic).

Recently, China Central Comittee has been trying to reign-in this activity and banned PLA control over factories. This will take time.

IF PLA is still manufacturing consumer goods, they are doing so on a scale most people cant comprehend.

I sincerely doubt they are making and selling models out of a dorm room.

My original post certainly brought forth very interesting information on Chinese practices via the PLA. I only have the "GAZ Tigr" model which is a plastic diecast composite of considerable sophistication. Battery operated lights, doors and hood opens,very detailed plastic turret with missile launcher, urban grey, white, black paint job and decals in Chinese characters on doors and vehicle sides with large letters for "C.A.P.F". Underside is plastic with drive train and obligatory "Made In China" cast in the plastic as well as "GAZ Tigr" and "TEXHO" over "IIAPK" in a winged logo style box. Not sure about the "II" as it could be an "H" as the two characters are very close together. In white paint are the stylized letters "CCC" within a circle over a seven letter serial or model number over the date "0815". This is definitely not the product of some military model enthusiast or a "Mom and Pop" operation.

Of course the PLA makes minis – it's a classic staple of vehicle-recognition classes!

We had at Benning a bunch of what looked like Tamiya 1/35 scale models "rubberized" to use for vehicle ID training. And practice sighting with the M-47 Dragon, etc. … They were made by Training Aids on main post. They did the same with AKs, etc., …