Taiwan looks on amid Xi’s war on his own army

Waging war on the high command of the People’s Liberation Army is hardly the ideal preparation for China’s invasion of Taiwan. But that is what Commander-in-Chief Xi Jinping has ordered in a military purge of the PLA’s top brass, with Zhang Youxia the latest casualty.

As China Factor reported this week, Zhang was considered a “war hero” and “childhood” friend of the Chinese president. He was one of few senior generals with battlefield experience after serving on the front line during the border conflicts with Vietnam in the late 1970s.

He was also second in command to Xi on the Central Military Commission of the Communist Party and a member of the Politburo, the top decision-making CCP committee. His fall from grace has generated “fevered speculation” amid China’s opaque political system.

It has also raised questions about the fighting capabilities of the PLA. “[This move] represents the total annihilation of the high command,” Christopher K Johnson, a former CIA analyst who follows Chinese elite politics, told The New York Times. 

How this will affect the escalating threats against Taiwan, which is considered a rogue province by Beijing, is impossible to predict. “Purges at this level usually signal doubt, not confidence,” China experts Nathan Attrill and Andrew Wilford pointed out today.

“[But] the purge does not [necessarily] signal de-escalation,” Attrill, of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, and Wilford, of the New Zealand Contemporary China Research Center, wrote in an ASPI commentary, adding that it probably reduces imminent war risks to Taiwan.

This has left the PLA in turmoil.

Behind the news:

• Over the weekend, Zhang and PLA Joint Operations’ commander, Liu Zhenli, were “removed” amid allegations questioning their “political loyalty.” 
• Up to six senior officers have been kicked off the powerful Central Military Commission since 2022. The year that President Xi began an unprecedented third term in office. 

Delve deeper: “[Xi] has completed one of the biggest purges of China’s military leadership in the history of the People’s Republic [of China],” Neil Thomas, a fellow at the Asia Society Policy Institute’s Center for China Analysis, said, as reported by the Associated Press.

Big picture: In turn, this has left the PLA in the sort of “turmoil” not seen since the dark days of the “Cultural Revolution” nearly 60 years ago. 

Bottom line: “[Still,] the risk of any action against Taiwan is now reduced in the near-to-medium term. But I would caution against overconfidence,” China expert Bill Bishop, the founder of the Sinocism newsletter, said, as reported by the Australian Financial Review.

China Factor comment: What is certain is that an amphibious invasion of the island democracy would be difficult enough without Xi’s never-ending purge of senior officers. It would involve the sort of challenges not seen since the D-Day Normandy landings in 1944.