To mark the 77th anniversary of the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN), Beijing has released a high-production-value promotional film titled 'To the Ocean' (向大洋). The video, which traces the development of the navy across four generations of service members, serves as both a celebration of military modernization and a pointed message of psychological warfare directed across the Taiwan Strait.
At the heart of the narrative is a compass, a literal and figurative heirloom passed from a veteran of the early 'Changjiang' vessel era to a modern submarine commander, and finally to a young officer on the destroyer Anshan. This 'soul' of the film is explicitly linked to the 'light' of the Communist Party, framing the navy’s rapid technological ascent not merely as a feat of engineering, but as an act of ideological succession. By showcasing the transition from 500-ton riverboats to blue-water carrier strike groups, the film underscores the PLAN's arrival as a global maritime force.
However, the film’s most significant weight lies in its closing 'Easter egg,' a scripted scene heavy with linguistic and political subtext. A submarine captain is shown picking up his son, nicknamed 'Xiao Wan' (a clear diminutive for Taiwan), at 'Tongyi Road' (Unification Road) Primary School. This overt geographic reference anchors the video’s strategic intent firmly in the cross-strait conflict, moving beyond abstract military drills to a domestic, humanized narrative.
The dialogue in this final scene contains a sharp jab at Taiwan’s current leadership. When the child says he 'doesn't want to go home,' the father warns him not to 'play the rascal' (shua lai pi), a phrase that Chinese commentators and military experts have identified as a pun on Taiwan President Lai Ching-te’s surname. The father’s subsequent line—'Mother is waiting for you at home'—is framed as a gesture of 'goodwill' by Beijing, albeit one backed by the 'hardcore' power of the carrier groups seen earlier in the film.
Military analyst Zhang Junshe suggests that the video is designed to show that while Beijing views Taiwan as part of the family, its patience has limits. The juxtaposition of a tender father-son moment with footage of anti-ship missile launches signals a shift in Chinese propaganda. It aims to normalize the concept of 'reunification' as a domestic inevitability while warning that the military remains the 'bottom line' should political rascals, in Beijing’s view, continue to drift away.