Xi’s purge has created a vacuum in the PLA’s top leadership and significantly weakened its capabilities and his own control of the military, analysts said.
The Chinese communist regime on Jan. 28 provided its first official response to the ousting of two top generals after days of unusual silence.
Zhang Han, spokeswoman for the CCP’s Taiwan Affairs Office, said the case once again demonstrates that the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) and the Central Military Commission are committed to “combating corruption without restrictions, comprehensively, and with zero tolerance,” adding that it is an important manifestation of the CCP and its military’s “determination and strength.”
The spokeswoman was responding to a question at a news conference of the Taiwan Affairs Office of the CCP’s State Council four days after Zhang Youxia, vice chairman of the CCP’s Central Military Commission, and Liu Zhenli, a member of the Central Military Commission and chief of the Joint Staff Department, had been removed from their positions and placed under investigation.
Analysts told The Epoch Times that the regime spokesperson’s vague response shows the impact of the purge on the Chinese military’s capabilities and the ongoing infighting within the ruling CCP’s top echelon.
At the news conference, a reporter asked the spokeswoman how the removals of Zhang and Liu and the turmoil at the top of the People’s Liberation Army will affect cross-strait relations.
Zhang Han kept her head down while flipping through documents before providing a generic answer, repeating the CCP’s stance on Taiwan, saying it was “striving for peaceful reunification,“ but ”never promising to renounce the use of force.”
After the news conference, the transcript on the Taiwan Affairs Office’s official website was scrubbed of references to Zhang Youxia and Liu, and the only mention was a reference to “personnel changes among high-ranking military officials on the mainland.”
The Chinese regime’s official media has been unusually quiet about the incident, after the PLA Daily, the official mouthpiece of the People’s Liberation Army, published an editorial on Jan. 24 criticizing Zhang Youxia and Liu for “seriously violating and undermining the system of responsibility under the Chairman of the Central Military Commission, and endangering the foundation of the CCP’s rule.”
By Alex Wu
