Beijing
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Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s decision to put China’s highest-ranking general under investigation is a surprising move that effectively leaves him alone at the top of the military hierarchy, raising deep questions about the impact on the world’s largest military and China’s ambitions to control Taiwan.
But this purge also made one thing clear. As Mr. Xi reorganizes his military to align with his vision, he believes no target is too big to defeat and is prioritizing loyalty above all else.
The investigation into Zhang Youxia, a veteran military commander and longtime ally of Mr. Xi, and Liu Zhenli, who heads the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) joint operation, was announced in a brief 30-second video released by the Defense Ministry on Saturday.
A subsequent editorial in the People’s Liberation Army Daily accused Zhang and Liu of having “seriously trampled on and weakened the system of ultimate responsibility vested in the Chairman of the Central Military Commission.” This terminology suggests that they are what matters most to Xi Jinping: a threat to his authority.
The allegations mark the apparent culmination of more than a decade of ruthless efforts by Mr. Xi to eliminate opponents and dispel corruption allegations. In recent years, this purge has drained the military’s upper echelons, with more than 20 senior military officials being investigated or expelled since 2023.
The investigation into Mr. Zhang further revealed the depth of these efforts.
The general has long been seen as a close and impregnable ally of Xi Jinping, but Mr. Xi is another “princely” son of a revolutionary whose relationship with the Chinese leader goes back a generation to his father, who fought alongside him in the Chinese civil war.
“This could be a seismic shift in Chinese politics under Mr. Xi and the way he governs. This really proves that no one is safe within that system,” said Jonathan Jin, a fellow at the Brooking Institution’s China Center.
Jin, a former CIA China analyst, said the purge “has now reached its climax and has reached the upper echelons of the party.” This suggests that Mr. Xi concluded that “corruption in the People’s Liberation Army is so deep and the mismanagement at the top is so terrible that we need to clean up the entire generation of leaders.”
And as for Mr. Zhang, Mr. Chin said, his fall has been “almost Shakespearean,” and will fit into a broader arc in which Mr. Xi started by going after enemies who profited from his position, targeted even those he appointed, and is now bringing down even those with whom he had long-standing relationships.
“It’s really surprising that Mr. Xi got rid of someone like this… because there is so little trust and the politics[in this system]are so bad that those kinds of relationships are even more valuable… They don’t take years to build, they can take decades, or in this case, a lifetime.”
The circumstances surrounding Mr. Zhang’s investigation likely remain unclear not only to outsiders but also to those inside the black box of China’s military, a vast and opaque entity even by normal Chinese standards.
The Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with high-level press conferences regarding the allegations, that Zhang is accused of leaking “core technical data about China’s nuclear weapons” to the United States and accepting bribes for official duties, “including promotion from officer to defense minister.” CNN has not verified these claims and has contacted China’s Ministry of Defense for comment.
But some experts question whether the allegations of secret sharing are not legitimate concerns, but merely part of the party’s efforts to shore up explanations to allay concerns within the party.
And rumors swirl in an information vacuum.
These include speculation that Mr. Xi is losing his grip on power, a theory that experts have largely rejected. Others are focused on whether Mr. Xi is quelling rival factions within the military, but some observers say he may believe the infighting is distracting senior officials, or that Mr. Zhang may be challenging his authority.
Neil Thomas, a researcher at the China Analysis Center at the Asian Social Policy Research Institute, said the official language used in the People’s Liberation Army Daily editorial “could suggest that Mr. Zhang has too much power for Mr. Xi’s liking.”
It could also mean “simply betraying[Xi’s]trust by helping the procurement bureaucracy become corrupt or by not doing everything in its power to create a cleaner fighting force,” he said.
Since coming to power in 2012, Mr. Xi has pushed ahead with a wide-ranging effort to restructure the military, not only to make it a modern force capable of countering rivals such as the United States and supporting China’s territorial claims, but more importantly, to protect the party and its leadership at all costs.
This goal is widely seen as being driven by Mr. Xi’s historical acumen, looking at authoritarian regimes that collapsed when their leaders lost control of the military. It is also closely linked to the Chinese military apparatus, which is controlled by the Party rather than the state.
Large-scale organizational restructuring and technological modernization go hand in hand with anti-corruption efforts. Dozens of senior military and defense officials have been killed in the latest wave of such efforts since 2023.
But experts say Mr. Xi’s efforts to purge even his own top officials is more likely a sign of his power than weakness.
“The fact that Xi Jinping has been able to control so many of the PLA elites since he took power clearly shows that his position within the regime is secure,” said James Cha, an assistant professor at Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam Institute for Defense and Strategic Studies.
This move effectively leaves Xi alone at the top of China’s military hierarchy.
The powerful Central Military Commission, which he chairs, had six uniformed members after a routine leadership change in 2022. Only one of them remains under investigation (but has not yet been formally expelled). That person is Zhang Shengmin, the military’s anti-corruption czar.
With the ouster of senior officials, the People’s Liberation Army leadership is “currently in turmoil,” Thomas said at the Asia Society.
“There are very few general-level officers left. I am sure there are talented people waiting, but they will all be in senior leadership positions for the first time,” he said, noting that Xi may use the 18-plus months before the next leadership change to vet new leadership candidates and “eliminate the influence of existing patronage relationships.”
But on the other hand, Mr. Xi has already tapped second-line officers from the People’s Liberation Army to fill roles vacated by his disgraced predecessors, both in the Central Military Commission and in the military, largely unofficially, according to Singapore’s Mr. Cha.
“Despite these purges, the day-to-day operations of the People’s Liberation Army continue as usual, as a younger and perhaps more professional officer corps is on standby to assume their responsibilities,” he said.
But what that means for Beijing’s broader ambitions, including its goal of seizing autonomous Taiwan, is less clear. China’s ruling Communist Party claims the island as its own territory, even though it has never ruled it.
At the heart of the issue is whether there will be an impact on the immediate operational viability of the military, the morale of the rank and file, or the Chinese government’s preparation schedule to achieve its goals, including the use of force.
Analysts say the investigation into Liu raises these questions especially given his role coordinating the People’s Liberation Army’s highest combat command.
But that may not be much of a concern for Mr. Xi at this point, said Mr. Jin of Brookings.
Instead, he said, China’s leaders may be calculating that now is a “safe time to do some housecleaning,” focusing on the U.S. administration, which does not seem to be “particularly interested” in the Taiwan issue, and the possibility of a change of government in Taiwan’s 2028 elections.
