Xi takes down top generals Zhang Youxia and Liu Zhenli

An earthquake rocked Chinese politics over the weekend.

On January 24, the Ministry of Defense (MoD) announced that China’s two seniormost generals – Zhang Youxia and Liu Zhenli – are under investigation for “serious discipline violations.”

Their investigations are the latest in an ongoing purge of China’s top military brass.

• Along with He Weidong, Li Shangfu, and Miao Hua, Xi has now purged five of the six generals he promoted to the Central Military Commission (CMC) in 2022.
• Around two-thirds of the 42 generals promoted to the Central Committee in 2022 appear to be in some sort of trouble.
• High-ranking officials with ties to the defense industry have also been purged in recent years.

Zhang is a Politburo member and vice chairman of the CMC.

• Zhang and Xi are supposedly tight – so tight that Xi made a special dispensation for Zhang to keep serving on the Politburo even though he had reached the standard retirement age.

Liu is chief of staff of the PLA and a member of the CMC.

• He had been seen as the frontrunner to take one of two Politburo seats reserved for generals at the 21st Party Congress in 2027.

In a Sunday editorial, the PLA Daily said the two are being purged because:

• “[They] undermined the CMC Chairman Responsibility System.”
• “[They] seriously fueled political and corruption issues that…endanger the Party’s ruling foundation.”

In plain English: The two men are accused of undermining Xi Jinping's authority.

Top officers were told as much in a briefing on the investigations (WSJ):

• “People familiar with the briefing—which hasn’t been reported until now—said Zhang is under investigation for allegedly forming political cliques.”

It seems pretty clear that good old-fashioned corruption is also part of the story:

• “A source familiar with the situation…said Zhang was accused of corruption and of failing to rein in his close associates, family members and relatives” (SCMP).
• “Those familiar with the briefing said Zhang was alleged to have accepted huge sums of money in exchange for official promotions” (WSJ).

That’s not all (WSJ):

• “The most shocking allegation disclosed during the closed-door briefing…was that Zhang had leaked core technical data on China’s nuclear weapons to the U.S.”

Get smart: The Party apparatus will present these purges as proof of Xi’s zero-tolerance approach to corruption.

• That’s going to make senior officers (who came up through a notoriously corrupt system) nervous – but it could boost morale among upright junior officers who should now have a clear path to promotion.

Get smarter: All this turmoil in the armed forces' leadership undermines combat readiness.

• That will make Xi hesitant to take aggressive actions.