Making a recruitment ad for military service is probably one of the hardest sells around. It’s easy to make someone want to buy a cookie. In fact, I want to buy a cookie just after typing that sentence, but motivating someone to put their life on the line takes a whole lot of finesse.

And finesse is what this new recruitment video for the Chinese communist party’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has in spades. Clearly intended for a younger audience, some of the hipper aspects of military service such as flying helicopters backwards, firing missiles and ensemble dancing are highlighted in this high-adrenaline three-minute promo video.

http://youtu.be/VXfX_rvrXjM

The video is basically China’s hit song “Little Apple” by the Chopstick Brothers played against a montage of sped-up clips featuring the training and skills new recruits might receive such as:

Flying jets

The Electric Slide

The Hulk

The Please Baby I Don’t Wanna Hear It (PBIDWHI)

The Gangnam Style Hop

The Batoosie

Raising the roof

Marksmanship

Ceremonial procedures

Anti-aircraft weaponry

Missile systems

Skydiving

The Blooming Starfish

The PBIDWHI with one leg variation

Stripper dancing

The Michael Stipe

Martial arts firefighting

Personal firearm management

And of course Jazz Hands

It all flies by pretty fast so I probably missed a few training regimens and dance steps along the way. They really make it look like an exciting career, but it probably doesn’t matter anyway. Even though they have a volunteer military, it seems unlikely that China has to worry about a shortage of available people. Even if their enlistment rate is far below that of other countries, they’re still way ahead of the game.

Source/screenshots: YouTube – CHINESE NEWS, via Karapaia (Japanese)