Chinese Communist Party (CCP) General Secretary Xi Jinping has expanded his military purge to loyalists, raising questions about the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) readiness, Xi’s grasp on power, and distrust between the party leader and PLA elites.
Beijing’s defense ministry announced in late November 2024 that PLA Navy Adm. Miao Hua was suspended pending an investigation into “serious violations of discipline,” which is shorthand for corruption allegations in the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Analysts say it can also refer to political disloyalty. Observers suggest Miao gained enough power as Xi’s protege to unnerve the party leader.
The suspension followed reports that CCP defense minister Dong Jun also is under investigation, although officials in Beijing denied the claim. Dong appeared publicly a week after the reports, but analysts said it was too early to assume he was safe from Xi’s purge, according to CNA, a Singapore-based news network.
He would be Xi’s third defense minister accused of corruption. Dong’s predecessors were both removed from office and denounced for graft and disloyalty to Xi. Li Shangfu was ousted in October 2023 after only months on the job. Wei Fenghe held the position from 2018 to 2023.
Miao, whom Xi promoted to the PLA’s top ranks, was a member of the Central Military Commission and head of the Political Work Department, which is responsible for ensuring party loyalty in the PLA.
Involving the “head of the political office of the armed wing of the Communist Party, this case is much more serious than if the target was the defense minister, who controls no budget and commands no troops,” Drew Thompson, a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, told The New York Times newspaper.
“But the top political commissar is a critical role, so this case is much more serious and has implications for morale,” he said.
Since 2023, Xi has intensified a campaign against purported corruption, decimating the leadership ranks of the PLA’s Rocket Force, which oversees nuclear and ballistic weapons, as well as sacking two defense ministers.
Miao was the seventh Central Military Commission member ousted during Xi’s tenure.
Since 2023, the CCP also has investigated at least 15 defense industry officials on allegations of corruption, including those from state-owned aviation, shipbuilding, ordnance and nuclear industries.
“Taken together, this is by far the largest shakeup of PLA leadership and state-owned enterprises involved in military procurement in recent memory,” Lyle Morris of the Asia Society Policy Institute said, according to Indian news agency ANI. “It suggests deep anxiety and dysfunction within the ranks of China’s military, and a failure of trust between Xi and the military.”
Purges that undermine PLA capabilities and military readiness are among the CCP’s weaknesses, according to Dr. Andrew Erickson and Capt. Chris Sharman of the China Maritime Studies Institute at the U.S. Naval War College.
Xi is dissatisfied with his military and willing to face upheaval in hopes of meeting his objectives, they wrote: Although he remains in charge, he is “a man in a hurry who is running short on time on a steepening treadmill, threatened by political enemies eager to push him off if he falters.”
