BEIJING - Hu Jintao said Thursday that China will strive to basically complete military mechanization and make major progress in full military IT application by 2020.

"We should unswervingly pursue full IT application as the goal in achieving military modernization and step up this effort," Hu told more than 2,200 delegates gathered in Beijing's Great Hall of the People for the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC).

China should strengthen the development of new- and high-technology weapons and equipment, speed up the complete development of modern logistics, train a new type of high-caliber military personnel in large numbers, intensively carry out military training under computerized conditions, and enhance integrated combat capability based on extensive IT application, Hu said.

Hu said China should implement the military strategy of active defense for the new period, and enhance military strategic guidance as the times so require.

"We should attach great importance to maritime, space and cyberspace security. We should make active planning for the use of military forces in peacetime, expand and intensify military preparedness, and enhance the capability to accomplish a wide range of military tasks, the most important of which is to win local war in an information age," he said.

Building strong national defense and powerful armed forces that are commensurate with China's international standing and meet the needs of its security and development interests is a strategic task of China's modernization drive, Hu said.

China should follow the guideline of strengthening national defense and the armed forces in a scientific way, take faster change of the way of raising military combat effectiveness as a major task, fully enhance the revolutionary nature of the armed forces and ensure that they are modern and standardized in all respects, Hu said.

"We must unwaveringly adhere to the principle of the Party's absolute leadership over the armed forces and continue to educate them in the system of theories of socialism with Chinese characteristics," he said.

Hu emphasized that China pursues a national defense policy that is defensive in nature.

"Our endeavors to strengthen national defense aim to safeguard China's sovereignty, security and territorial integrity and ensure its peaceful development," he said.

China's armed forces have always been a staunch force upholding world peace and will continue to increase cooperation and mutual trust with the armed forces of other countries, participate in regional and international security affairs, and thus play an active role in international political and security fields, he said.