Chinese General Secretary Xi Jinping’s regime has launched an anti-corruption initiative focused on the Chinese People’s Liberation Army, stoking speculation about internal regime tensions amid the ouster of multiple high-level officials.
“One of the reasons he's been trying to clean up the military is to ensure that it will be obedient to him and to his leadership,” the Heritage Foundation’s Michael Cunningham, a senior research fellow at the conservative think-tank’s Asian Studies Center, told the Washington Examiner. “But one of the other reasons is ... corruption is not good for when you're trying to have a combat-ready military.
That report coincides with widening speculation that Chinese Defense Minister Li Shangfu, who seems not to have made a public appearance since Aug. 29, has become entangled in the investigations. In parallel, Chinese state media has urged Chinese defense leaders to spend time with"grass-roots soldiers instead of relying on information collected from second-hand sources," as the SCMP put it.
Li’s seeming absence comes in the wake of then-Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang’s still-unexplained removal in July. Qin was tapped for the role just six months earlier. Qin’s removal was followed in short order by the ouster of the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force, a series of personnel moves that have left Beijing a target of speculation and even mockery.
Yet China’s defense ministers tend to make fewer public appearances than their diplomatic counterparts, leaving open the possibility that Li’s schedule is unfolding in regular order.
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