Is China Preparing for War in the Taiwan Strait?

Something may be afoot in the Far East. As tensions rise in the Taiwan Strait and Beijing launches an unprecedented media campaign against Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, of course the question is not whether China maintains an interest in achieving reunification with Formosa—this has been an explicit strategic aim of the People’s Republic since 1949, when, at the end of the country’s Civil War, Kuomintang leader Chiang Kai-shek withdrew what was left of his battered forces across the strait. Instead, what has long mattered is whether the political and military developments in Beijing are shifting the likelihood, timing, or shape of a possible conflict. The internal changes unfolding within the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) may offer in this regard important clues.

Over the past year, Chinese President Xi Jinping appears to have fired a large number of high-ranking generals and admirals, including figures responsible for the nation’s rocket forces, equipment procurement, and theatre-level operations. It is significant that these were not mid-tier officers; several sat at the uppermost levels of China’s military hierarchy. The current purge is exceptional in that it is targeting particularly big fish: He Weidong, China’s second-highest-ranking general was publicly expelled from the Communist Party; the same occurred to Admiral Miao Hua, until recently the People’s Liberation Army top political officer. His eviction marks the first time since the Cultural Revolution that a sitting commander of the Party’s Central Military Commission – China’s supreme military leadership organ – faces such opprobrium. 

While the official justifications generally involve corruption, the timing and breadth of the removals point to a broader political logic. It is harder to say which: Perhaps the leadership is seeking to consolidate loyalty, tighten command chains, and reduce institutional autonomy within the PLA; or instead it may be that the party leadership is withdrawing peacetime, armchair generals and replacing them with officers it finds more well suitable to fight an actual conflict. So which is it?