Zhang Youxia is Xi's childhood friend, their fathers were comrades-in-arms even before the founding of the PRC. Both Zhang and Liu received first-class merit awards in the Sino-Vietnamese War.
Xi really has a heart of stone.
This is a persistent problem with East Asia culture. Where someone breaks the rules/law and get caught and punished for it, people don’t tend to blame them for committing the crimes but instead criticise family and friends for not turning a blind eye or bailing them out.
If there was a betrayal here, it was Zhang who betrayed Xi’s trust and friendship by committing his crimes instead of serving faithfully in the high office he was given.
Holy moly, at this point who is even left in the CMC? It's literally just Xi and Zhang Shengmin who's a political officer. lol at those people claiming that all pro-Xi generals were purged when, in the end, there's only Xi left. But this has to have huge strategic implications since there is literally no one in the CMC responsible for actual military command anymore.
Then who's responsible for directing the operational employment of the PLA forces from the highest levels?
You guys know there is a chain of command right? There are any number of suitable candidates ready and willing to step up and fill the vacancies. And with the nature of the military, there should be at least one understudy already fully up to speed with both daily operational tasks as well as long term strategic planning ready to step in at a moments notice. Their permanent replacements should be able to move in quickly with minimal impact and disruption or the PLA has serious problems with basic contingency management, because in a real shooting war, you won’t get a 3 month advanced notice that opfor is going to target one of your generals to arrange an orderly hand over.
I think this is all part of China’s slow but steady war prep. Now that the 3 year countdown for Japan has been announced, they cannot afford any more weak links in the chain of command anymore. Better to purge the compromise and incompetent generals now rather than risk them fucking up or betraying their troops when the bullets start to fly for real.
Zhang probably only survived this long because of his well known closeness with Xi. Xi would not have pulled any strings for him, but lower level officials sometimes pull strings or turn a blind eye all by themselves in such cases for fear of offending superiors. This culture of tolerance and mutual ass covering is likely what Xi wants to stamp out more than the generals caught up this time themselves.
To be frank, Zhang probably needed purging as at 75, he should have cashed out and retired long ago, so it’s really his own fault for being too greedy to be caught now. But by remaining, he has also presented Xi with a golden opportunity to set the tone from the very top and state in no uncertain terms that no one is above the law, and to cut all the bull with trying to curry favour by ‘looking out’ for friends and acquaintances of higher ups. I would not be surprised with a wave of lower officials who did turn a blind eye or took more proactive steps to ‘pre-empt’ being asked to do so also get purged to really drive home the message that this sort of behaviour will no longer be tolerated.
