The removal of Zhang, the 75-year-old son of a famous revolutionary general who has known Xi since childhood, elevates the purge into one of the biggest reshuffles imposed on the Chinese military since the Tiananmen Square crackdown of 1989.
Control over the military is widely considered the key determinant of Chinese leaders’ power and their political survival.
Historical power struggles within the Chinese Communist Party were often won by whoever commanded authority over the armed forces.
After the death in 1976 of Mao Zedong, the founder of modern China, strongman leader Deng Xiaoping used chairmanship of the CMC to unseat rivals and install himself as the country’s de facto leader – despite not holding other official titles.
Zhang’s ouster suggests Xi wants to ensure complete authority.
“Technically, Zhang was the only one who controlled the kind of military authority that gave him the power to challenge Xi in a real manner,” said Yun Sun, director of the China programme at the Stimson Centre think-tank in Washington DC. “Xi now has all the power and authority concentrated.”
As first-ranked vice chairman – a position that combines elements of the secretary of defence, chairman of the Joint Chiefs and national security adviser in the United States – Zhang had broad strategy authority over everything from promotions and budgets to strategy and operations and answered only to Xi.
Outside analysts had widely considered Zhang – a decorated veteran of the 1979 China-Vietnam border war – to be safe from suspicion, thanks to his rare combat experience and close relationship with Xi.
He had evaded earlier purges of top generals and retained deep loyalty within the ranks, having been kept on as the country’s top uniformed officer well beyond the typical retirement age.
His removal suggests a sense of urgency on Xi’s part to clean house, analysts say, given that Zhang was widely expected to retire in 2027 at the next party congress, held once every five years.
The downfall of Zhang and Liu marks the most high-profile firings since Xi launched a sweeping purge of China’s military in 2023, beginning with the senior leadership of the elite Rocket Force and expanding to the Air Force, Navy and Army, eventually sweeping up the defence minister and scores of other officers and defence-industry figures.
Xi has left many of those positions vacant.
The latest rupture leaves the CMC – China’s top military decision-making body, staffed by Xi in 2022 with six senior generals – reduced to just one member besides the leader himself.
After the purge in March of General He Weidong, Zhang became the CMC’s sole vice-chairman, overseeing 15 departments and commissions responsible for key military decisions and two million troops.
Previously, he served as head of the General Armaments Department, a powerful body overseeing weapons procurement contracts and a longtime focal point for corruption investigations.
Analysts say earlier purges may have helped set the stage for Zhang’s downfall by concentrating too much power in the hands of the senior general.
“I don’t think Xi Jinping was comfortable with how much power Zhang Youxia had accumulated in this process. And maybe Zhang, internally, wasn’t exactly deferential,” said Dennis Wilder, a former CIA China analyst and now a senior fellow for the Initiative for US-China Dialogue on Global Issues at Georgetown University.
It remains unclear whether Xi will move to replace Zhang, Liu or other senior officers stripped of their ranks.
The timing of the announcements – just ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday, when formal political activity largely pauses – further clouds the succession picture. The only remaining CMC member is Zhang Shengmin, who is head of the military’s anti-graft watchdog that has overseen the sweeping purges.
The extreme concentration of military power under Xi also narrows the circle of decision-makers overseeing Taiwan and other critical matters, including control of China’s vast nuclear arsenal.
Analysts say older-generation PLA leaders have historically served as a moderating force within military decision-making.
“I think these old guards are much more reluctant to attack Taiwan,” said Sun. “Xi wants his own people; he wants younger people that will, in a way, be more beholden to him.”
The reshuffling of China’s military leadership comes as Xi pushes to rapidly modernise the armed forces and meet major benchmarks, including a stated goal of achieving the capability to invade Taiwan by 2027.
Late last month, Beijing staged an unprecedentedly large military exercise encircling the self-governed island, a show of force that used live-fire missiles and simulated a near-total blockade of Taiwan.
The developments also come amid fast-changing dynamics in the US-China relationship, as US President Donald Trump plans to visit China later this year.
Last month, he brushed off concerns about the Taiwan exercise – widely interpreted as Beijing’s response to a US$11 billion US arms package for Taipei – by saying he had “a great relationship with President Xi”.
The purges could, however, give Trump a modicum of leverage in future talks, analysts say, even as Beijing projects confidence amid widening rifts between the US and Europe over Greenland. “Xi is going to want to show that everything’s normal, that he’s in charge. He wouldn’t want a disruptive visit,” Wilder said.
China’s military and political leadership structure is among the world’s most opaque, leaving the full impact of the purges unclear.
In an annual report released in December, the Pentagon said the sweeping personnel changes likely “caused uncertainty over organisational priorities and lack of continuity”, but said the streamlining has “the potential to improve PLA readiness in the long term”.
Beyond the military, China is carrying out a record-breaking disciplinary purge across the government, punishing over 980,000 officials last year, according to official statistics – the highest total since authorities began publishing such figures in the early 2000s.
Officials punished under such disciplinary rules are rarely exonerated and can face allegations ranging from negligence to graft, with penalties spanning mandated political education to, in the most serious cases, execution.
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