Category: CCP

To understand the significance of the sweeping military purges in China and how Beijing is reacting to America’s war with Iran, I’m sitting down with eminent China scholar Robert Suettinger, a former CIA and State Department intelligence analyst, a senior advisor at The Stimson Center, and author of “The Conscience of the Party: Hu Yaobang, China’s Communist Reformer.” “There’s no question of the fact that Xi Jinping is now less of a dominant leader than he was six or eight months ago,” Suettinger says. Earlier this year, Xi purged two top generals from the CCP’s military brass, on the heels of earlier purges last year. Now, only two of the originally seven members of the Central Military Commission remain. One of them is Xi himself; the other one, General Zhang Shengmin, is a political commander and has, like Xi, no combat experience. After the January purges, Xi issued an order to the military demanding that everyone acknowledge him as the head of the military commission. “The silence from all those military commands has been deafening and has been noticed by everybody,” Suettinger says. In the Chinese Communist Party itself, Xi is also facing trouble. The CCP is not a monolithic party, he told me, but a complex entity with many competing factions: “There’s a Shanghai group, there’s a Shandong group, there’s a Shaanxi group, and they all don’t like each other,” Suettinger says. Suettinger believes that Xi’s many purges have unified opposition against him not only in the military but also within the Communist Party. “Xi is hated by almost everybody in China,” he said.

Source: Former CIA Analyst Explains Cracks in the Chinese System | Robert Suettinger

More than 115 million views on four Chinese-language recruitment videos released by the CIA have triggered intense discussion about loyalty inside the Chinese Communist Party. Who is watching these videos—and why? At the same time, Beijing is reportedly investigating a senior aide accused of being a double agent, while new internal orders require officials to report overseas family connections. Even the family of top ideologue Wang Huning has reportedly been moved under tight supervision. Is Xi Jinping launching a new loyalty purge? And does the surge in views signal growing uncertainty inside China’s political system? Tonight we examine whether Beijing is facing a quiet defection crisis.

Source: 115 Million Views Later: Is Beijing Facing a Defection Crisis?

The purge of two top Generals in China has been attributed to an ongoing anti-corruption drive ordered by the country’s President Xi Jinping. Gen Zhang Youxia & Gen Liu Zhenli are no ordinary names. Gen Youxia was the vice-chairman of the Central Military Commission, a powerful body that controls the military. Gen Liu Zhenli was the PLA’s Chief of Staff. That leaves the Commission with just two members—Xi Jinping and Gen Zhang Shengmin. All others, who were handpicked by Xi, have been booted out. “This is politics at the highest level, and politics in Communist China can be ruthless,” says China specialist Vijay Gokhale. In this interview with StratNews Global Editor-in-Chief Nitin A. Gokhale, the former Foreign Secretary shares his views on what may have led to such a drastic move.#china #xijinping #PLA #peoplesliberationarmy #chinesemilitary #anticorruptiondrive #chinesecommunistparty