Chinese purge might slow PLA, experts say

GENERALS GONE: Although losing top generals is not likely to harm the PLA’s ability to conduct routine military affairs, the loss of experience will hurt, a researcher said

• By Jonathan Chin / Staff writer, with CNA

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) removal of senior military leaders might disrupt the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) capability to wage war against Taiwan in the immediate future, Taiwanese defense experts said yesterday.

The Chinese Ministry of National Defense on Saturday announced that Zhang Youxia (張又俠), a member of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) politburo and vice chairman of the Central Military Commission, and Liu Zhenli (劉振立), chief of the commission’s Joint Staff Department, are under investigation for suspected disciplinary and legal violations.

With the removal of Zhang and Liu, five of the seven members of the 20th Central Military Commission formed in 2022 have now been removed, leaving only its chairman, Xi, and its vice chairman, Zhang Shengmin (張升民).

Tsai Wen-hsuan (蔡文宣), a research fellow in Academia Sinica’s Institute of Political Science, said that the negative effect on military capabilities stemming from the dismissals would benefit Taiwan in the short run.

Weakening the PLA’s war potential is an acceptable risk to Xi, as he likely does not have any plans to take action against Taiwan until he secures a fourth presidential term at the 21st National Congress of the CCP next year, Tsai said.

Chieh Chung (揭仲), an associate research fellow at the state-run Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said that frequent purges dilute the experience of China’s top generals, impeding the modernization of its military.

Although turnover of top generals is not likely to adversely affect the PLA’s ability to conduct routine military affairs, the loss of experience is sure to create a bottleneck in Chinese efforts to develop new military capabilities, Chieh said.

There would be a significant downside for the PLA capabilities if Xi’s purges spread to lower-ranking generals, he added.

Chaos in the Chinese military’s upper echelons also increases the risks of miscalculation by removing leaders capable of handling large-scale crises, he said, adding that major generals do not have training or experience regarding strategic matters.

As Xi hollows out the commission, fear of contradicting the Chinese leader could stifle the honest exchange of opinions necessary for Beijing to manage contingencies, Chieh said.

The dismissals would have little to no effect on the frequency of China’s provocative military drills around Taiwan proper, which are conducted by the PLA Eastern Theater Command as a matter of routine, he said.

Tristan Tang (湯廣正), an associate fellow at the Taoyuan-based Secure Taiwan Associate, said that military indicators show Zhang and Liu lost influence as their war preparation efforts failed to meet expectations.

Official briefings accused the two generals of causing “severe damage to combat capability development,” a charge not seen in an earlier case involving former commission vice chairman He Weidong (何衛東), Tang said.

Publicly available information suggests that Zhang and Liu might not have met Xi’s “requirements for force building related to a Taiwan invasion, and may even have engaged in open disagreement or defiance within the PLA,” he said.

Although China’s military is unlikely to attack Taiwan in the near term, training activities and military drills might become more aggressive and frequent under successors willing to implement Xi’s military blueprint, he added.

Neil Thomas, a fellow at the Washington-based Asia Society Policy Institute’s Center for China Analysis, said the latest purge “makes China’s threat toward Taiwan weaker in the short term, but stronger in the long term.”

It would make a military escalation riskier in the immediate term because of “a high command in disarray,” but in the long term would mean the army has a more loyal and less corrupt leadership with more military capabilities, Thomas said.

Additional reporting by AP