Xi’s ominous purge of his top general
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It shows just how opaque Chinese politics is that even close watchers differ widely over both the cause and the implications of Xi Jinping’s recent purge of his top general, Zhang Youxia. Some see the toppling of Zhang, vice-chair of China’s Central Military Commission, as a signal of unexpected vulnerability for Xi. A more common view is that it is another step in the autocratic president’s expertly orchestrated drive to increase his personal power. Reality may be somewhere in between. But whichever interpretation is closer to the truth, the purge is a worrying development in the world’s number-two military and economic power.
Those who detect weakness can cite the suddenness of the announcement on January 24 that Zhang and General Liu Zhenli, chief of the People’s Liberation Army’s joint staff, were under investigation. There have long been rumours of military discontent at Xi’s leadership and even talk of a possible coup. Official media has made clear Zhang and Liu’s problems are primarily political, accusing them of undermining Xi’s authority and even threatening the Communist Party’s “absolute leadership” over the military.
The party has always been nervous of losing control of the PLA, with an overwhelming emphasis on loyalty in its propaganda work and political education of the troops. Nor is Zhang the first top military leader to fall from favour: Mao Zedong’s defence minister and chosen successor Lin Biao died in an aircraft crash while fleeing China after what Beijing said was a coup attempt in 1971. And in 1989, a Chinese general, Xu Qinxian, shocked party leaders by refusing to lead his troops into Beijing to crush the protests in Tiananmen Square.
Yet many experts see Zhang’s defenestration — which caps a sweeping purge of senior officers across the PLA in recent years — more as a calculated demonstration of Xi’s strength. China’s president has used the ousting of officials accused of corruption or misconduct as a central weapon in his campaign to accumulate power since becoming party chief in 2012. Some analysts saw Zhang, a veteran of China’s 1979 invasion of Vietnam who had personal and family ties with Xi, as a potential impediment to his likely effort to extend his term or to engineer a succession that allows him to continue calling the political shots indefinitely.
However carefully planned, Xi’s PLA purge is likely, in the short term, to weaken the capacity to undertake the hugely complex military challenges of an invasion or blockade of Taiwan. Yet Taipei and its friends in the US and the region should not be complacent. If Xi promotes a cohort of officers not only more loyal but also more professional and less corrupt than those culled, the PLA will end up stronger yet.
It is also clear that more concentration of power in Xi’s hands could have dangerous consequences in China and beyond. Cowed underlings are less likely to pass on unwelcome truths. A younger, more nationalistic officer class with no institutional memory of major conflict may find it easier to embrace what Xi, 72, sees as the historic mission of bringing Taiwan under Beijing’s control. The desire to make a mark on history could prove particularly perilous in an isolated leader.
It is not reassuring at this time of geopolitical instability that Xi’s crackdown on the PLA has parallels in the US. President Donald Trump has carried out his own purges, firing top military officers and defence officials including the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, chief of naval operations and the directors of the National Security Agency and Defense Intelligence Agency. Such purges may help Xi and Trump pursue their personal agendas. But one-man rule tends to be bad for everybody else.
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