China's Liugong Island hosts national security training base
Liugong Island, in the waters of Weihai City in east China's Shandong Province, was the core battlefield of the First Sino-Japanese War and preserves a range of historical relic buildings, including the ruins of a cannon fort. Drawing on these relics and sites, Weihai has set up the country's first education and training base centred on a holistic approach to national security, integrating 28 on-site teaching locations and 11 theme parks. Xinhua reported visitors and college students touring the war museum on September 7.
Source
Xinhua / People's Daily (China) · read the original report ↗
Desk check · compared with the source
What the desk checked (4)
- Liugong Island lies in the waters of Weihai City, Shandong Province, and was the core battlefield of the First Sino-Japanese War. — Stated in the Xinhua photo captions; attributed to the agency, not independently verified.
- Weihai has set up the country's first education and training base centred on a holistic approach to national security. — A 'first in the country' claim made by Xinhua without supporting documentation; editors should note it is agency-sourced.
- The base integrates 28 on-site teaching locations and 11 theme parks. — Both figures appear repeatedly in the source captions; no other source cited.
- Photos were taken on Sept. 7, 2026, showing visitors, a war museum and cannon fort ruins. — Date and scenes are specified in every caption, credited to Xinhua/Zhu Zheng.
Analysts’ view opinion
On the surface this is a heritage-tourism story; strategically, it is about embedding national security in everyday public consciousness. By turning the core battlefield of the First Sino-Japanese War and its cannon-fort ruins into a teaching platform for a "holistic approach to national security", Weihai is using a site of historical defeat as a lesson about the costs of weakness. With 28 on-site teaching locations and 11 theme parks, and described as the country's first such base, it reads as a template that could be replicated elsewhere.
- Linking security education to a historic battlefield frames security as a broad societal matter rather than a purely military one.
- The presence of college students signals that young people are a primary target audience for this kind of civic-security instruction.
- Weihai's coastal location on Shandong's seaward edge gives the site symbolic geographic weight, though the story does not describe it as a military facility.
- Historical memory tied to Japan remains sensitive in East Asia, and neighbours may read memorial-based education programmes through the lens of competing historical narratives.
- The "country's first" label suggests a pilot character — if judged successful, similar bases in other provinces would be a logical next step.
What to watch — Watch whether this model is replicated in other provinces and how deeply it becomes tied into formal school and university programmes.
This is essentially a photo feature: it does not establish the base's curriculum, its operating authority, funding, any military linkage, or any foreign reaction.
Deep dive
Research brief · 8 facts · 4 dates · exam-readyThe brief
Context
Liugong Island lies in the waters off Weihai City in Shandong province, on China's eastern coast. It was the core battlefield of the First Sino-Japanese War and still preserves historical relic buildings, including the ruins of a cannon fort and a museum devoted to that war. Weihai has used these relics and sites to create what Xinhua describes as China's first education and training base centred on a "holistic approach to national security", formally named the Liugong Island Education and Training Base of Holistic View of National Security. Xinhua's photo report, datelined September 23, 2026, carries images shot on September 7, 2026 of tourists, college students and visitors touring the island, museum and themed film screenings.
Key facts
- Liugong Island is located in the waters of Weihai City, east China's Shandong Province.
- The island was the core battlefield of the First Sino-Japanese War and preserves a range of historical relic buildings.
- Relics on the island include the ruins of a cannon fort, shown in aerial drone photos.
- Weihai City has set up the country's first education and training base centred on a holistic approach to national security.
- The base integrates 28 on-site teaching locations and 11 theme parks.
- The facility is named the Liugong Island Education and Training Base of Holistic View of National Security.
- Photographs by Xinhua's Zhu Zheng were taken on September 7, 2026; the report was published on September 23, 2026 at 09:40.
- Activities documented include college student visits, a museum for the First Sino-Japanese War, an instructive film themed on national security and an immersive interactive movie.
Timeline
- First Sino-Japanese War (date not stated in the source)Liugong Island serves as the core battlefield of the war; fortifications such as the cannon fort later survive as relics.
- Recent yearsWeihai City leverages its historical relics and sites to establish the country's first national security education and training base, with 28 teaching locations and 11 theme parks.
- September 7, 2026Xinhua photographs visitors, tourists on sightseeing boats and college students touring the island, the war museum and national security film screenings.
- September 23, 2026, 09:40Xinhua publishes the photo report on Liugong Island and the training base.
Who has a stake
- Weihai City authorities, Shandong Province — Have converted local war relics and sites into the country's first holistic national security education and training base.
- College students and visiting groups — Primary audience for the on-site teaching locations, museum tours and national security themed films.
- General tourists — Reach the island by sightseeing boat and visit the museum, cannon fort ruins, theme parks and scenic spots.
- Xinhua (state news agency) — Documents and publicises the base through a photo feature by photographer Zhu Zheng.
- Heritage and museum managers on Liugong Island — Responsible for preserving the relic buildings and the First Sino-Japanese War museum now used for security education.
Why it matters
The initiative shows how a state uses battlefield heritage as infrastructure for mass civic and security education, turning relics of a nineteenth-century naval defeat into teaching material for a contemporary "holistic" security doctrine. For Indian readers, it is an example of the deliberate fusion of memory politics, tourism and national security messaging aimed particularly at young people. It also signals the institutional weight China attaches to spreading its national security concept beyond the armed forces and officialdom.
UPSC angle
Prelims pointers
- Liugong Island lies off Weihai City, Shandong Province, east China.
- It was the core battlefield of the First Sino-Japanese War.
- Weihai hosts China's first education and training base on a holistic approach to national security.
- The base integrates 28 on-site teaching locations and 11 theme parks.
- Full name: Liugong Island Education and Training Base of Holistic View of National Security.
- Xinhua photo report dated September 23, 2026; photographs taken September 7, 2026 by Zhu Zheng.
Mains framing
The Liugong Island project illustrates how historical memory is institutionalised as a tool of national security socialisation. The island's status as the core battlefield of the First Sino-Japanese War, with surviving relic buildings and cannon fort ruins, gives Weihai a ready-made physical setting; the city has layered onto it 28 on-site teaching locations and 11 theme parks to form what Xinhua calls the country's first education and training base centred on a holistic approach to national security. The implication is a shift of security education from closed official settings to open, experiential and tourism-linked spaces, using museums, immersive and interactive films and themed installations to reach college students and ordinary visitors together. Causally, this reflects a state interest in building a broad public constituency for security policy by anchoring it in a narrative of past vulnerability at sea. The way forward, as the source suggests, lies in combining heritage conservation with pedagogy: keeping relic authenticity intact while designing content that informs rather than merely commemorates. The source does not state visitor numbers, funding, curriculum details or governing legislation, so evaluation of effectiveness remains open.
Key terms
- Liugong Island
- Island in the waters of Weihai City, Shandong, that was the core battlefield of the First Sino-Japanese War and preserves relic buildings.
- First Sino-Japanese War
- Conflict whose core battlefield was Liugong Island; a museum on the island is devoted to it. Further details not stated in the source.
- Holistic approach to national security
- The concept around which Weihai's education and training base is centred, taught through on-site locations, theme parks and films.
- Liugong Island Education and Training Base of Holistic View of National Security
- Name of the facility visited by college students, described as the country's first such base.
- Weihai City
- Coastal city in east China's Shandong Province that developed the base using its historical relics and sites.
Practice questions
- Examine how states convert battlefield heritage into instruments of civic and security education, using the Liugong Island base in Weihai as an illustration.
- What does China's creation of its first education and training base on a holistic approach to national security suggest about the widening scope of the term 'national security'?
- Discuss the tensions between heritage conservation and the commercial-cum-pedagogic use of war relics, with reference to the 28 teaching locations and 11 theme parks on Liugong Island.
Grounded only in the source report — figures and dates are the source's, not inferred.