PLA General Logistics Department

The General Logistics Department (GLD) is the logistics headquarters of the PLA and directs the logistics supplies including production, supply, transportation, housing, pay, and medical services on behalf of the Central Military Commission (CMC). The department manages and commands the logistics system within the PLA, and also directly provides certain logistic support functions. The GLD was first established in 1949 as the People’s Revolution Military Commission General Logistics Department, and was renamed the PLA General Logistics Department in 1954. The GLD ranks the third among the four general headquarters in PLA’s protocol order.

The GLD is headed by a Department Head and a Political Commissar, who are assisted by four deputy heads and a deputy political commissar. The current Department Head is Gen. Liao Xilong (廖锡龙), who ranks No. 7 in the CMC. The current political commissar is Gen. Sun Dafa (孙大发).

Structure and Organisation

Headquarters Department (司令部) – Managing all administrative affairs of the GLD.

Political Department (政治部) – Managing all political affairs of the GLD, including cadre personnel, Party affair, security, discipline inspection, propaganda, and military-civilian relations.

Finance Department (财务部) – Planing, preparing, and administering the PLA’s budget.

Material and Fuel Department (军需物资油料部) – Managing and supplying materials as well as petroleum, oil and lubricants (POL) for the PLA.

Infrastructure Construction and Barracks Department (基建营房部) – Responsible for the planning, construction, and maintenance of airports, seaports, barracks, tunnels, roads, railways, bridges, and other facilities.

Military Transportations Department (军事交通运输部) – Planning, organising, and coordinating transportations by roads, railways, river, sea, and air.

Health Department (卫生部) – Managing all military hospitals, medical schools, and health services for PLA.

PLA Audit Agency (解放军审计署) – Internal financial audit organisation, subordinate to the CMC but managed by the GLD.

Joint Logistics

As an important step to reform the PLA’s logistics system, the GLD has introduced the “joint logistics” (联勤) concept, which aims to overhaul the existing logistics system of the PLA by bring together logistics resources in different service branches to improve the overall efficiency. Before this reform, military regions and service branches are responsible for their own logistics. In 2000, the logistics departments of the seven military regions were reorganised into “joint logistics departments (JLD) (联勤部)” to manage the logistics resources across all service branches within the military region. Under the ‘joint logistics’ scheme, military region air forces and naval fleets transferred their ‘general’ logistics support elements common to all services (such as hospital, fuel, motor vehicle maintenance, etc.) to the military region JLD , while only keeping ‘specialised’ logistics support elements unique to their own service branch.

In 2003, a further reform was initiated to bring the ‘great joint logistics’ (大联勤), where the Army-dominant military region JLD will be further reorganised into the Theatre Joint Logistic Department (TJLD), a joint logistic headquarters staffed by personnel from all three service branches. Joint logistics staff officers, who understand the needs of all services, will be assigned to the TJLD. The difference between ‘general’ and ‘specialised’ logistics will no longer exist. The PLAAF and PLAN will transfer the remaining specialised logistic support elements to the control of the TJLD, thus further simplifying the logistic support to the PLA in joint service operations.