I know who is replacing Xi Jinping!

I think I know who the next person replacing Xi Jinping is. His name is Hu Chunhua. Here is when his mentor Hu Jintao was escorted out in 2022 by Xi Jinping. He sat there looking angry, elbows crossed, grey-haired looking dude. This once sidelined, ready-to-retire-deposed crown prince-to-be is now returning to the spotlight. I know this sounds strange from the title, but I'm actually debating ChatGBT on whether or not Xi Jinping still has control of the CCP. And also, I made a poll recently that 44% of you said the feelings that Xi Jinping is not untouchable. I think that's quite high, especially given the fact that I put the fourth option, a Jet2 holiday. Maybe after he steps down, he does need a well-deserved Jet2 holiday. If you just want to learn about who Hu Chunhua is and why he might be the next leader, skip to this part of the video. Now, before we go to the debate, just for setting up the context and the storyline, this is a list of the people who didn't show up but were supposed to be there during Xi Jinping's recent trip to Tibet. First is Zhang Youxia, who went with him in 2021 for the first Tibetan trip, and he failed to make an appearance this time. The second person is Fang Yongsheng, Xi Jinping's director of Central Military General Office, which is his top secretary of the military. He also failed to show up. In fact, we don't really know where he is. This is now the third person in charge of that role that has essentially gone missing or been purged in the last two years, and these are obviously Xi's most trusted people in the military. So that's another sign that Xi has lost control of the military. The next person is Wang Kai, the Tibetan region PLA commander. He did not show up in the photo ops, and his deputy or his political commissar did show up instead. It's likely that these generals went to Beijing for the preparation for the military parade, but there's no reason for them to not be able to make a trip to Tibet when everybody else has done so. And here's the list of the people that did show up but are not supposed to be there. Hu Chunhua, which is our focus today. And we also have Hu Haifeng, who is the son of the leader Hu Jintao, who you just saw get carried out during the 20th Party Congress. He was also there. Zhang Shengmin, who is essentially like the prosecutor of the military. He showed up, but he's like the fifth-ranked official in the Central Military Commission. He has never represented a vice chair prior to this trip to Tibet. And last but not least, Xi Jinping himself, he wasn't supposed to be there either. So I asked ChatGBT to have a debate with me on whether or not the rumors of ouster of Xi Jinping is true. So here's my response to ChatGBT. We know that we listed all these people who didn't show up that were supposed to, like Zhang Youxia and Wang Kai, but we also saw people like Zhang Shengmin, who is an ally of Zhang Youxia. He did show up, so the right people didn't show up, the wrong people did. Now, on the political side of things, Hu Zhenhua made headlines by going to visit Xi's new pet project, the Meidok Hydropower Station, instead of Xi Jinping himself. Now, just for context here, Hydropower Station is situated in the Meidok County within Tibet's deeply carved Yarlang Tsangpo Grand Canyon. This project harnesses a steep 2,000-meter drop over a 50-kilometer stretch, or about 25 miles. One of the Earth's deepest canyon systems. And the dam is also called the And it's equivalent to about three of the Three Gorges Dams. So it's very powerful. It's a big project. And in fact, strangely, the person that was in charge of this, Vice Premier Zhang Guoqing, he was with Xi Jinping this time in Tibet, but he also didn't tour the project himself when he made the news of basically kickstarting the construction of it. He's 74, one of the oldest men in the PLA leadership, with rumored health issues. In a system where optics are scripted, keeping an aging general offstage doesn't necessarily mean he's in revolt. It might just mean they don't want him collapsing on camera. Same goes for Wang Kai. Military commanders don't always appear at political ceremonies. Their presence isn't as required as the Politburo Standing Committees. So after hearing the chat GPT reply, the point about how Zhang, there's no written rule that he has to accompany the chairman, which is Xi Jinping. Well, this is actually according to kind of the tradition and unspoken of rule, that whenever the chairman goes, one of the vice chair has to follow. Now, we know that one of the vice chair, Hou Yidong, he's nowhere to be found. He's probably sitting in a jail or something. So the other vice chair, Zhang Youxia, is supposed to go with him. And in recent times, a few months, we've seen Zhang has done this three times, where he basically abandoned the chair of the military to go do his own thing, while the chair of Xi Jinping has basically been left by himself. This time, Zhang did send Zhang Shenmin, who, like I mentioned, is the fifth-ranked official in the Central Military Commission. So he's not really supposed to be the one that goes. And before I continue, I just want to make an announcement on our upcoming trip to Malaysia. Dear China Insider viewers, this August, I'm heading to Forest City in Malaysia, a haunting symbol of China's real estate crisis. 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And we just can't thank you enough for sticking with us for the journey so far, and we hope to bring you all of the best stories around China, and this trip definitely will be one that's worth remembering. So join us on the journey and donate today. Second, Hu Chunhua. Yes, he popped up at Medog hydropower. But think about the signal chain. If Hu, who was sidelined at the 20th Party Congress, is now appearing at flagship projects, that's not necessarily a Xi is losing grip story. It could be the opposite, Xi redeploying him in the cut technocratic lane, using him to shore up economic or infrastructure messaging. Authoritarian rulers sometimes recycle sidelined officials precisely to show flexibility, not weakness. Now, the second point I said is that, you know, Hu Chunhua, who has been sidelined since 2022, he saw his mentor get carried out, escorted out by Xi Jinping. And so now he's essentially coming back into the spotlight. For somebody like Xi Jinping, who has done decades of power politics built on this idea of anti-corruption purging people, for him to suddenly want to bring back someone like an archenemy of his, of a different faction, that just doesn't make sense for him to be like, oh, yeah, I suddenly want to change my mind. It's time to elevate these people, right? That's not how he's been acting over the years. And let's zoom back to the Tibet trip itself. This was Xi's show. 20,000 people in the stands. His speeches broadcast. His image plastered everywhere. If the party center wanted to start shifting attention away from him, they wouldn't put him front and center in Lhasa. They'd make it a collective leadership event, with Li Cheng or Kai Qi in the headlines. Instead, it was the Xi Jinping show. That And also another point is during the Tibetan trip, Xi Jinping didn't give a speech during that major celebration event. Wang Huning did. So it's kind of awkward because Wang Huning is the head of the delegation to Tibet, but Xi Jinping is the paramount leader, right? In titles at least. So why wouldn't he go and give a speech, right? This is, again, against all of his decade long sort of craft of the image about himself, which is he's supposed to be the paramount leader, building his cult of personality. And so why is he not doing that this time? So my counter, the absences you cite are intriguing, but in a system as opaque as China's, we need to be cautious about reading them as mutiny instead of managed. Choreography. Your turn. How do you connect these absences into a pattern strong enough to say Xi's control is slipping? I also asked this, did it occur to you that Xi Jinping losing power and losing titles are two different things? There's two examples I can give. The first one is Hua Guofeng, who was named successor and paramount leader by Mao Zedong. And during this time, he was still in titles, the chairman of the party, chair of the military, as well as premier of China. But it took about two to three years when Deng Xiaoping hollowed his power structure out, stripped him of his power and essentially got rid of him. But during that three years, he appeared normal, right? Like nothing happened to him. It was until more closer to that date, then people started to realize, oh, wow, Hua Guofeng has been rendered powerless throughout this whole time without people really noticing. The second example is in 2009, Hu Jintao also was on top of Tiananmen Square or the Tiananmen Gate, and he was reviewing the troops like the military parade. But everybody knew at the time, Hu Jintao was not in control of the military. The military, the power was in the hands of two vice chairmen. We have first is Guo Boshong and the second one is Xu Caihou. So you could technically have a scenario where the Strong pushback. Let me take your points one by one and bring receipts. By CCP rules, a CMC vice chair must accompany Xi. Since he is gone, Zhang had to be there. I can't find any formal rule that a CMC vice chair must accompany Xi on such trips. What I can find is precedent that big Tibet anniversaries are fronted by a central delegation led by the CPPCC chair who gives the keynote, e.g. in 2015, Yu Zhengsheng did the speech. In 2025, Wang Huning did the speech while Xi looked on. That pattern is documented by state and international outlets. So my response here is pretty simple. If Xi Jinping led the delegation to Tibet, was he just going as like a sideline character? No, obviously, if he's going to Tibet, he's the main guy. He's the main guest of this whole show. So he should be the one giving the speech. And yet he didn't. Zhang Yuesheng's absence equals Xi losing the army. Zhang's non-appearance is notable, but absence isn't mutiny. Context matters. Multiple reputable outlets report that the other CMC vice chair, He Weidong, was removed under investigation months ago, shrinking the CMC and tightening Xi's personal control after purges, not loosening it. If anything, that points to volatility inside the PLA, but not to Zhang seizing the wheel. Also, Xi met representatives of military personnel stationed in Lhasa during this trip. There was a PLA optic, even if Zhang wasn't on camera. What you failed to mention, chatbot here, is that He Weidong is, and also Maohua, who has also been missing. Both of these are Xi Jinping allies. And then Zhang Yuesheng and his own people in the form of Zhang Shenmin, like I mentioned. So I will repeat this. Five PLA theater commanding officers of Xi Jinping who have been purged or replaced. You have the military secretaries, like I mentioned, three of them have been all purged in less than two years or sidelined. You have the vice chairman of military, one is missing. The other one is 99.9% against Xi Jinping. Then you have the people's armed police director, who is not his allies of Xi. You have the chief of joint staff, who is not the ally of Xi. You have the military prosecutor, who is not an ally of Xi. Then you also have the military political commissar, who is nowhere to be found, that's Maohua. And then he's basically lost control of the military. Wang Kai, Tibet MD commander, didn't show. Proof of trouble. Commanders aren't always name-checked in public write-ups of mass political ceremonies. Wang Kai has been Tibet MD commander since 2021, but the Lhasa coverage simply doesn't list district-level brass at the dais. That's routine. Lack of mention is thin evidence of a split. Now, regarding the Tibetan commander Wang Kai, there's no reason for him to not be there. He's the commanding officer of the Tibetan troops. In the scenario where the chairman of the military is there to inspect the troops, you as the commanding officer should be there. But guess what? He wasn't because he's Zhang Yousha's ally and they're probably in Beijing doing some preparation or something. So they're willingly ignoring Xi Jinping. Hu Chunhua at Maidog instead of Xi. Sidelining Xi. I can't verify credible reports that Hu Chunhua inspected the Maidog-Yarlung-Changpo megadam around the Tibet festivities. State and major international outlets on the trip list, Wang Huning and Kai Qi with Xi, they don't list Hu. Independent coverage of the project confirms it's July 2025 groundbreaking in scale, but not the Huatmadog timing you're asserting. If you've got a solid link, I'll read it. But right now, it's an unconfirmed claim. Hu Chunhua has been reported by state media of going to the Maidog project, which is obviously Xi Jinping's big infrastructure project. And now that project is being toured by his arch enemy. This is no sign of reusing a deposed crown prince. You're trying to argue with the logic here. Losing power versus losing titles. Think Hua Guofeng. Think Hu Jintao and the CMC. Fair distinction, but today's structure is different. She has built a personalist system with A, overwhelming propaganda centrality. B, the CMC chairman responsibility system. And C, an ongoing leader-driven purge cycle. When the other CMC vice chair, He Weidong, disappears, purged reputable. Analyses read that as Xi tightening, not relinquishing grip over the PLA, even if it signals dysfunction and fear inside the ranks. If Xi were being hollowed out the way Hua was, we'd expect to see less Xi in propaganda, soft-peddled collective leadership language, and visible empowerment of alternates. Instead, the Tibet optics were drenched in Xi branding and people's. Daily, Xinhua framed the whole event under his guidance. Now there's actually plenty of evidence in the PLA as well of basically downplaying Xi's presence. For example, in the PLA pictorial, this is very prestigious in terms of the level of government involvement. It's like a top military press, basically. The journal has not used the photo of Xi as a cover since March of this year. This is a huge signal of Xi's losing control. If Xi led the delegation, why didn't he give the speech? You're right, this looks odd. Historically, though, the Tibet anniversary has always featured the CPPCC chairman as the one delivering the central speech, even in 2015 when Yu Zhengsheng, not Xi, spoke. So in that narrow sense, Wang Huning giving the keynote is not unprecedented. What is new is Xi himself attending. That raises your question, why attend in person, yet not speak? The first one is just that Xi Jinping wasn't there in 2015. So obviously, he couldn't give a speech. So this is not like it's normal. The norm is what they did. What's not normal is Xi showing up. He Weidong, Miao Hua, Xi allies disappeared. Zhang Yuxia's allies rising. This is a strong point. He and Miao were widely seen as Xi's men, and their sudden erasure is eyebrow-raising. Zhang Shengmin appearing as the senior uniformed representative. And yes, he has long ties with Zhang Yuxia, does suggest internal balancing. Purges in the rocket force, navy, and eastern theater all hit Xi-linked appointees disproportionately. That does lend itself to the reading that someone, likely Zhang Yuxia, is consolidating space inside the PLA, or at least that Xi can no longer impose total loyalty. My counter, Xi himself has driven purge cycles for a decade, and it is possible he is sacrificing even his own, to send fear rippling across the ranks. In other words, Xi burning allies is a feature of his style, not necessarily a sign that Zhang is outmaneuvering him. But I'll concede, when the replacements have Zhang's fingerprints, it weakens the Xi is purging to tighten grip narrative. If you're going to do purge, it comes in different areas. You don't get all of your close allies removed in like a span of 1 or 2 years. Especially if those allies you put into place, you trusted them with the Taiwan invasion plans or otherwise. And now look at the people that are in place, they're Zhang Yuxia's allies. Even if Zhang Yuxia isn't against Xi Jinping, let's just say in the odd scenario, as a leader as paranoid as Xi Jinping, would he want Zhang to have so much influence in the form of having all these close allies of Zhang Yuxia instead of Xi Jinping be in the military positions? Obviously, it doesn't make sense. Hu Chunhua toured Meidouk Hydro Project, Xi's pet project. Good sourcing. Huang Guozheng Xie Fuzhuxi, Zhongyang Daibiao Tuanfu Tuanchang Hu Chunhua. That's a legit report. Hu Chunhua leading a sub-delegation to Xi's signature hydro project. That is symbolically humiliating if you take it literally. Xi sidelined, his longtime rival inspecting his legacy project. My counter, Hu went as deputy head of the central delegation, which by definition means he was assigned ceremonial duties. Could it be deliberate salt in the wound? Sure. But structurally, Xi chose the delegation leaders, Wang Huning as chief, Hu as deputy. If Xi were truly powerless, Hu wouldn't just be inspecting a project, Hu would be front-paging the whole event, not Wang Huning. So yes, symbolically awkward, but institutionally still within Xi's framing. Now, if you're front-paging a vice chair of the Central People's Political Consultative Conference without announcing his promotion, that's essentially the biggest elephant in the room, right? So if you're saying that they're going to start to dramatically talk about Hu Chunhua, that's something that they don't want because it signals instability within the party structure and it signals that something major had happened and they're not ready for that yet. So that's why they're not going to front-page Hu Chunhua, going to this MADOC power station. There's actually a lot of mention of Hu Chunhua in recent days. For example, this New People's Daily editorial commentary mentions Chunhua Qiushi, which is a homonym of Hu Chunhua's name, exact same characters actually. It's a poetic way of using Hu Chunhua's name. It signals the ushering in of spring and the harvest of fruits in the fall. And so you could kind of also read it as, in my opinion, this idea that maybe he will get his fruition in the fall in the form of becoming the next paramount leader. This is another article. This one's from Xinhua News. Again, it has that Chunhua Qiushi there. I think it's a pretty good debate in the sense that I give it 7 out of 10 because what the points chat GPT use are sources from the internet. And right now the internet does not want to believe or refuses to believe that Xi could lose power. So you see all of the arguments. I even see this with some China YouTubers as well, that it's very normal academic thinking of how things go. I mean, it does make sense. But if you can read between the lines of how things go here, then you start to see the big troubles heading the ways of Xi Jinping. And now I want to make another disclaimer, right? Whoever comes next, they have to make this journey about getting rid of the CCP. If they don't, the same things will happen again. The ultimate goal is for the CCP to collapse. And if they hold on to that, that means they're not really sincere in the ways they want to reform. So I mean, it could also happen another Xi Jinping is birthed in the process. So now I mentioned that Hu Chunhua is going to be the next leader of the CCP, or at least I think it will be. I think there's about a 70% chance right now, depending on how things go. So of all the officials that weren't supposed to be in Tibet too, both last named Hu actually are there. First is Hu Chunhua, the second is Hu Haifeng, is the son of Hu Jintao, the guy that got carried out. This is also an important signal that the Youth League faction is resurging after 2022 when they've been completely wiped out. So recently, I covered an official from the Inner Mongolia area named Wang Lixiao, the Queen of Disguises. And the way we covered it first was there was a rumor that her and Xi Jinping, they had an affair, which didn't make sense because she's like 50 by the time Xi Jinping became leader. But what does make sense is that if you go back to her promotion to an official in the Inner Mongolia region, precisely lined up with Xi Jinping's call in 2020 to go back 20 years to find corruption in that region. And guess who was an official for four to five years in the region of Inner Mongolia? Well, it was Hu Chunhua. So you can see that this was a direct order to target to find dirt on Hu Chunhua. Now, in the end, they didn't find much on him. That's why he survived. But you can see that Xi Jinping really viewed Hu Chunhua as dangerous because in the party, Hu was viewed as the next leader or leader to be, right? But he was deposed in 2022. So it became like the deposed crown prince, basically, because she wasn't going to let somebody from the Youth League faction be the next leader. He wanted to maintain control of power. And guess what happened now to Wang Lixia? Xi is facing investigation. So the official that was in charge of investigating Hu Chunhua has now been investigated. That's another big signal that the power structure is shifting. The other two editorial, which I mentioned, one from Xinhua, one from People's Daily, the two premier CCP state outlets using similar titles on August 24th. Again, if Xi was not in control, these type of things can fly. But if he was, for the last three or four years, he has not allowed any kind of this messaging to take place. Don't underestimate word plates in CCP politics. I'll give you a great example. This elder named Yang Wenbin, a propaganda director during Mao Zedong's time, sent to CCP jail, kept reading People's Daily. And then he, through reading it every day, he got a whiff of Lin Biao, the former vice chair of the party, his demise in between the lines. So what happened was later they announced that Lin Biao tried to escape and his plane was shot down. But he got whiffed of it because they stopped mentioning vice chair Lin Biao about a month or two beforehand. So in jail, he said that he knew something was happening. He even later got questioned by the CCP for like, how did he know that this was happening if somebody told him about it? And he said, no, he just knew that the wordings in between the lines were changing. And that's how he knew that something big was happening. So for somebody like Hu Chunhua, who goes from being in an exiled retirement role of being the second vice chair of the CPPCC, which everybody knows is where you go to retire, get washed away from the main power source, to now resurging to touring the big major project of the Xi Jinping era. He also didn't just tour one. He toured also the, this one is called the Xiaojia Mountain Tunnel of the Sichuan-Tibet Railway, which again is another key national infrastructure project. He didn't send Wang Huning, who is the leader of the delegation on this tour. They didn't send Xi Jinping himself. They sent Hu Chunhua. That's in my opinion, the clearest evidence we have so far of Hu Chunhua being a candidate as the next leader of the CCP. All right, let me know your thoughts in the comments. I'd love to hear this time and also check out our Zephyr link as we head to Malaysia, support our trip and thank you again for your donations. We'll have major announcement for the upcoming trip coming very soon.