A large-scale campaign against corruption is underway in China. Xi Jinping is currently purging the military particularly thoroughly. Felt in an elite group resulted in dramatic quality deficiencies.
Felt must have been omnipresent in the missile force of China's People's Liberation Army. It guards the nuclear arsenal and is therefore responsible for the land-based nuclear deterrent, as well as the country's conventional ballistic missiles. But things have been rumbling there for months; two senior commanders suddenly disappeared in August; Without comment, there were two successors for her from other military units.
Much remains hidden when it comes to corruption in China's army: unlike China's banks or state-owned companies, it does not disclose its investigations. Only occasionally does something leak out – as was the case at the turn of the year, when the Central Committee of the Communist Party excluded eleven high-ranking military officials from central political committees. They had already lost their military positions. Five of them alone come from the missile forces.
“These purges were quite surprising,” said Helena Legarda, a security expert at the Merics Institute for China Studies. “They are probably a sign that something is very wrong, be it in the Rocket Forces or the People's Liberation Army in general.” If it is just a matter of political unreliability on the part of individuals, then it is enough to replace the leadership. “But when it comes to corruption and the associated failure to invest in military equipment, then capabilities are assumed that may not even exist,” Legarda added IPPEN.MEDIA. This could have an impact on “Xi’s trust in the military, its generals and its capabilities.”
USA: Chance of aggressive military actions by China has decreased
According to the US intelligence service, it is indeed about corruption, like the news agency Bloomberg reported this week, citing unnamed sources: According to this, the tanks of many rockets were said to have been filled with water instead of fuel. Huge fields of missile silos in western China have lids that do not open properly – meaning that the missiles inside cannot launch effectively if necessary. It sounds simple: expensive lids are priced in and cheap lids are ordered, and the corrupt military cadres themselves pocket the difference. US officials believe loudly Bloombergthat all of this has reduced the likelihood of aggressive military action by China.
It wasn't long ago that China's growing nuclear arsenal caused unrest in the West. Depending on how China structures its armed forces, “it could have at least as many intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) as the USA or Russia by the end of the decade,” wrote the Stockholm peace research institute SIPRI almost a year ago. At that time, it estimated the number of nuclear warheads in the People's Republic at 410. The new report is expected shortly. But what if the warheads don't work at all?
China's military: purges in various units
Meanwhile, the missile forces are not the only problem. The military's procurement department has also been investigating its own members for corruption for several months; two were expelled from the National People's Congress, China's official legislature, as part of the purges in late December. Purchasing expensive equipment in Russia, for example, generates many opportunities to put money in your pocket.
This may be precisely why former Defense Minister Li Shangfu, who disappeared in August, fell because he had headed the same procurement department a few years ago – and the investigations now fall precisely during his term of office. General Li was removed from office in October. Three managers of state-owned rocket manufacturers who had previously been fired also lost their political positions. In addition to corruption, these cases also show how intertwined the state, military and party are.
And these are just the layoffs that Beijing has made public. Another missile force major general was quietly removed from the Beijing city parliament in November, the magazine reports Caixin reported. Wei Fenghe, General Li's predecessor as defense minister, has also disappeared – which hardly anyone noticed because he is retired. Wei also once commanded the missile force. “More heads will roll. The missile force purge is not over yet,” predicted Alfred Wu of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy in Singapore Reuters.
Xi promoted the military officers and ministers who had now been fired
The corruption in the elite unit is embarrassing for China's head of state Xi Jinping, who, as chairman of the Communist Party's Central Military Commission, is also the top commander. “He personally promoted most of the people who have now been laid off, many only recently. What does that say about the system’s ability to screen people before promoting them?” says Merics expert Legarda. Defense Minister Li, for example, was only in office for seven months. “Either something was missed during the reviews or something happened in the short time since these people took office. In any case, what they did must be very serious to justify such a strong reaction from the system.” Because Beijing knows very well that this doesn’t look good to the outside world.
The campaign is also surprising because almost everyone believed that Xi had the military under control. Bribery in the People's Liberation Army has been endemic since at least the 1980s, Legarda says. At that time, the military was given space to develop all sorts of businesses on the side. “There also appears to have been very little civilian oversight back then. Only Xi was in a position to do something decisive here. He carried out military reforms and launched anti-corruption campaigns – probably also to dismantle some influence networks.”
Legarda believes that if the current purges are actually a case of rampant corruption, this could also influence the West's assessment of the Chinese military's actual capabilities. “In my opinion, it is still better to overestimate these somewhat than underestimate them – always without undue panic – especially since Xi is relatively unclear about his intentions.” The capabilities that the military openly demonstrates are undoubtedly visible to everyone – for example during maneuvers near Taiwan or in the South China Sea. “But for operations that are higher up the escalation ladder,” says Legarda, “there is now a question mark.”
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