Strategy Insights Ep 113: Xi Rebuilds China’s Military57 Generals Purged or Missing?

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to Professor Ming's Strategic Insights. In recent years, Xi Jinping, the Secretary General of the Chinese Communist Party, has purged many top brass in the military. And some of the posts, actually many of the posts are left vacant and unfilled. Now that the fifth plenum of the 20th Party Congress is in session, so some people are wondering whether he'll pick some junior members to fill up the vacancies. Or not what you do that or not and I'm sure some of you may still remember the the term the so-called Davidson's window namely Xi Jinping once asked make up your plan and make up your preparation now We're gonna invade Taiwan and we're gonna unify China in 2027. So that's what's called the Davidson's window Now that the again now that the fifth plenum is in session. Well, he filled up the vacancies And be capable of invading Taiwan, that's something to be seen. That's something we need to explore in details today. According to our accounting, maybe incomplete, but Xi Jinping has purged as many as 57 three-star generals. Yeah, you heard me right. 57 three-star generals from the military since 2022, namely since the convention of the 20th Party Congress. And then all of these 57 three-star journals, 32 are officially confirmed. Namely, they've been officially and publicly announced purged. And the other 25 are missing. They've been missing from the public scene for quite some time. So presumably, they're purged. So altogether, 57 people. I've done some calculation and categorization of these 32 people, 32 top press journals. In the Central Military Commission, there are altogether 10 generals being purged. Let me name them. The first two are the vice chairman of the Central Military Commission, next only to Xi Jinping himself. These two are generals Zhang Youxia and He Weidong. And the third one is Li Sangfu, the former minister of defense, and General Liu Zhenli, chief of staff. And the top commissar, General Miao Hua, of what they call the political work department. And also his deputy, General He Hongjun. Then comes the head of the Political and Legal Commission of the Central Military Commission. And let me read it out. Joint Operation Command Center, the deputy director of this center. And the last two are the minister of the Equipment Development and the Logistical Support Department. So altogether, 10 generals from the Central Military Commission. And on a branch level, we're looking at two commanders. And two commissars from the Army, and one commander and two commissars from the Navy, one commander and two commissars from the Air Force, and four commanders in a row from the Rocket Force. So that's a serious thing. And in terms of other branches, we're looking at one commander and one commissar from the Armed Police, and one commander from the Strategic Support Unit, and one commissar from the Information Support Unit. And then we're talking about one commander from the East Theater Command, and one commander and one commissar from the Western Theater Command. And we're looking at the commissar from the National Defense University. And there are 22 people from this group. So altogether we're looking at 32 three-star generals missing from these positions. I don't mean to bore you. But I have to read out the positions of those 25 missing from their posts. The first one we're looking at is from the Central Military Commission, who is the deputy chief of staff. He's missing from his job for many weeks. And then we're looking at one commander from the Navy, one commander from the Air Force, and two commissars from the Rocket Force, and one commissar from the Strategic Support Unit. And two commissars from the Eastern Theater Command. And we're looking at one commander and one commissar missing from the Western Theater Command. And two commanders and two commissars from the Southern Theater Command. And one commander, one commissar from the Northern Theater Command. And one commander, two commissars from the Central Theater Command, and one commander and one commissar from the Armed Police, and the principal, the president of the National Defense University, and also his commissar. And we're looking at the director and the commissar from the Academy of Military Science. So these are the 25 people, 25 top journalists missing from the post for quite some time. Some are missing about three or four weeks, and some have been missing for a month. So presumably, so like I said, presumably they've been purged. But they'll be publicly announced only when the investigation has been done completely. So we're looking at 57 top journalists missing from their posts. Some are officially announced, and some remain to be announced. According to the Chinese laws, All the members to the Central American commanders must be three-star generals, and also all the commanders and commissars to the theater commands and to all the military branches must be led by three-star generals. So altogether, we're looking at 26 of them, 26 positions must be led by three-star generals. But so far, there are only six of them remain intact, namely They're still safe up to this point. So we're looking at 20 vacancies to be filled, whether they'll be filled in this fifth plenum or they'll be filled until the next year and then until the 21st Party Congress, we don't know. But let me read them out so that you can get a whole picture of what the PLA command chain looks like. Those positions must be filled include one vice chairman of the Central Military Commission, Who's been responsible for military operations instead of military discipline. That's number one. And the second one, we're looking at the chief of staff in the so-called the Central Military Commission. And then the top commissars of the Central Military Commission. These are at the central level. And for the local levels, we're looking at... The commissars for the Eastern Theater Command, for the Southern Theater Command, for the Western Theater Command, also for the Northern and Central Theater Commands. And, uh... Oh yeah, we're looking at the commanders of the Southern, Western, and Northern Theater Commands, so three more. And then for both the Army and the Navy, we're looking at the command, both the commanders, And commissars to be filled. And also the commissars from the Air Force and commanders and commissars for the Rocket Force and commanders and commissars for the Armed Police. So altogether, 20 vacant positions. remain to be filled. The list may be tedious and boring, but you can tell I have spent some time to do the counting and And categorize. categorization. So you can tell that the command chain, the commanding chain, is incomplete. From the Central Military Commission all the way down to the branches of the military and even to the local theater commands, they are incomplete. They're not only incomplete, you can almost say they're fragmented and flawed. So that begs the question, with a commanding chain like this, can this military go to war, go to a serious war, beat their enemy, the American troops or the Japanese troops or even the Taiwanese troops? So I think that's a good question. That's a big question. And the second thing is, I'm sure that you have noticed that I have read out the... The incomplete of the Commissars in all the branches and all the way to the top to the Central Military Commission. In their military system, the Commissars are very important. They're responsible not only for discipline, not only for morale, but they have the mission of keeping an eye on his commander. So, it is said the commissars of the same level are... in power to Kim and I, all the commanders. If necessary, he could detain his commander or even execute his commander when it comes to a case of urgency. So the commissar system they learned from the Red Army of the Soviet Union is not only unique, but also very important. So in that sense, if so many commissars are missing, from various levels that will have a very serious So far today I've talked about what happened to the three-star generals in the PLA. I haven't talked about the situation of the purges to the two-star generals or the one-star generals or even lower ranks. And this is only one side of the coin, the military side. What about the civil servant side or the party cadre side? The situation is nothing better than this. So what I'm saying is the Chinese officialdom, be that military or civilian, we're looking at a state of mutual distrust between the superiors and the subordinates. With this kind of cadre systems, do you think that they can still invade Taiwan in 2027 or even 2028? Even if all these vacant positions are filled, are being filled up, either in the fifth plenum or in the 21st Party Congress coming up in 2027. Well, I'm not saying it's completely impossible, but what I'm saying is the chance is very slim. But that should not lessen our vigilance. But anyway, that's the kind of picture I want to show you and give you a rough idea of whether the Davidson's window of invading Taiwan in 2027 will come true or not. But anyway, that's the picture I want to show you and that's the information I want to share with you. I hope that you'll find this episode helpful in some way. So that's all I want to share with you today. I hope you liked today's program and do remember to click the icon bell. I'll see you next time.