China has made public a white paper titled "China's National Defense in 2008." For the first time, China has acknowledged its policy of improving the operational capabilities of its navy on the open seas, although its move in this direction has been obvious in recent years. Recent examples of this move include China's deployment of naval ships off Somalia to counter piracy and its reported plan to build two medium-size aircraft carriers by 2015.

In response to an international call for transparency in China's basic concept of security and military policy and posture, China published its first defense white paper in 1998. Since then Beijing has published a white paper roughly every two years. And, in an apparent move to publicize China's efforts to bring transparency to its military policy and posture, the Chinese Defense Ministry held a news conference for the first time in conjunction with the issuing of the white paper.

In an attempt to help increase China's political influence abroad and make the international community aware of its growing military power, the white paper says that "since the beginning of the new century, the Navy has been striving to improve in an all-around way its capabilities of integrated offshore operations, strategic deterrence and strategic counterattacks, and to gradually develop its capabilities of conducting cooperation in distant waters and countering non-traditional security threats."