News Analysis

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) appears to be entering one of its most unstable periods in years.

The sudden downfall of two of the military’s top figures—Central Military Commission (CMC) Vice Chairman Zhang Youxia and CMC member Liu Zhenli—has exposed hesitation, confusion, and quiet resistance within the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and unease among Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s faction, a China affairs analyst told The Epoch Times.

“The CCP leadership says it has taken down two of the military’s most senior figures. But the messaging that followed—especially from the PLA’s own newspaper—suggests the purge is not being sold with full confidence inside the ranks,” said Heng He, a veteran China-affairs analyst and contributor to The Epoch Times based in the United States.

“With the regime highly opaque and its information system tightly controlled, the best clues often aren’t in dramatic announcements, but in subtle shifts in how the CCP talks to [its members].”

In this case, Heng pointed to what he described as a clear step-down in tone and status across four front-page articles in the PLA Daily—the military’s official newspaper—after China’s defense ministry announced on Jan. 24 that Zhang and Liu had fallen.

“The PLA is not just China’s military—it is the Communist Party’s ultimate power base,” Heng said.

He added that when systems like the CCP start to wobble, history suggests that real change is often driven by outsiders—or by former insiders willing to break the rules.

A Message That Started Strong—Then Faded Fast

After the defense ministry’s Jan. 24 announcement, the PLA Daily ran four front-page articles on the subject, on Jan. 25, Jan. 31, Feb. 1, and Feb. 2.

Heng said what mattered was not only what the paper said but also how it delivered the content—and how the message changed over time.

The first article, published on Jan. 25, was a top-level editorial and the main front-page headline. It accused Zhang and Liu of “serious” political violations, including “trampling and undermining the chairman’s responsibility system” under Xi.

It also called for the military to “shed its feathers and be reborn,” language that Heng interpreted as a push for a sweeping internal shakeup.

After that, he said, the tone shifted quickly.

The Jan. 31 piece was no longer an editorial. It ran as a commentary article titled “Strengthening Confidence in Certain Victory in Anti-Corruption and Building a Strong Military.”

Instead of focusing on political wrongdoing, it shifted toward corruption and framed the case as a “major victory” in Xi’s anti-corruption campaign. The “reborn” phrase appeared again. Heng said the repetition likely signaled further purges—an attempt to present the upheaval as discipline and a cleanup, rather than a political rupture.

The last two articles, published on Feb. 1 and Feb. 2, remained on the front page but were no longer the main headlines. Zhang and Liu were only briefly mentioned at the beginning. The articles lacked details—no specific allegations or broad political charges, only vague references to corruption.

Instead, the articles stressed two themes. First, they urged the entire military to support Xi and the central leadership—language, in Heng’s view, that suggests such support cannot yet be assumed. Second, they repeated calls to “strengthen the military and prepare for war,” but placed greater emphasis on political discipline and loyalty than on combat capability.

To Heng, the pattern looked deliberate: strong condemnation up front, followed by vaguer, lower-profile messaging. He said it appeared to be an effort to ease tensions and prevent anxiety from spreading within the military ranks.

Heng said the CCP often uses the PLA Daily to impose a unified “correct” narrative across the military. When that narrative becomes subtler and less explicit, he said, it usually signals friction at the top—or fear about how the message will be received within the ranks.

Quiet Resistance

Heng said what may be unfolding within the PLA is not outright rebellion but something quieter: passive resistance, delays, and inaction. In a system built on loyalty, he noted, even minor acts of noncooperation can be significant.

“The PLA is a Party-army,” Heng said. “The CCP Central Military Commission is the top military decision-making body, which is chaired by Xi Jinping.”

He said China’s military operates very differently from most Western democracies. Even top commanders such as Zhang and Liu do not have independent authority to make major decisions; ultimate control rests with Xi as chairman of the Central Military Commission.

Heng described the CMC as China’s top military command body, roughly comparable to the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff. In that framework, he said, Zhang was roughly equivalent to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Liu was comparable to the chief of Staff of the U.S. Army.

Even so, Heng said, top commanders still lack direct authority to mobilize troops independently. The system is designed for centralized control, with layers of approvals and compartmentalized units; even weapons and ammunition are stored separately, he said.

“The reason for that [system] is to ensure ‘regime security’ and reduce chances of a coup,” Heng said. “But in a fast-moving crisis, that structure can make rapid, coordinated action difficult—the opposite of ‘combat readiness.’”

In Heng’s view, the PLA Daily’s shifting narrative points to a lack of consensus at the top of the force. If senior leaders cannot agree on how to define the cases against Zhang and Liu, he said, the safest move inside the system is often to do as little as possible and wait.

What History Suggests

Heng observed that history in China and the former Soviet Union shows that when rigid political systems start to weaken, significant change is rarely driven by long-term insiders. Instead, it typically comes from outsiders or from former insiders who choose to challenge the system’s rules.

He pointed to the late Qin Dynasty, when one of the first major uprisings was not launched by top generals or the old nobility but by commoners who challenged the idea that power belonged only to the elite.

Heng said the Qin’s collapse also involved deeper problems—elite infighting, administrative breakdown, and over-centralized control—dynamics that, in some respects, resemble those of contemporary China under communist rule.

The Soviet Union fell in a different way, Heng said, but he argued that the pattern was similar.

Boris Yeltsin, who later became the first president of the Russian Federation, became a serious political force only after breaking with the Communist Party and returning as an outsider willing to challenge the system’s foundations, Heng stated.

And when Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev concluded that the system could not be saved, he did not try to hold it together by force but instead allowed it to unravel, Heng added.

By contrast, Heng pointed out that leaders who cannot fully break with the old system tend to deliver half measures, citing former CCP leader Deng Xiaoping as such an example.

Deng pushed forward China’s post-Mao reforms and sought to correct major Mao-era disasters, such as rehabilitating many officials and intellectuals purged during the Cultural Revolution, dismantling collective farming, and restoring education, Heng said. Deng also opened the economy to market forces, private enterprise, and foreign investment, thereby fueling rapid growth, he said.

However, Heng noted, Deng stopped short of a full break with the political foundations—the CCP’s communist, one-party system—that enabled those abuses and he did not allow challenges to the Party’s monopoly on power—a limit underscored by his authorization of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.

Heng said that in his view, that left reforms incomplete and allowed long-term problems—including one-party authoritarian rule—to persist.

For now, Heng said, the PLA appears stuck in quiet resistance—waiting rather than acting. But he said history shows that even rigid systems can crack.

“When the Wuchang Uprising succeeded, provincial armies followed. Within two months, 14 provinces declared independence, forcing the Qing Dynasty to step aside,” he said.

The Wuchang Uprising was a revolt by revolutionary soldiers in Wuchang—now part of Wuhan—on Oct. 10, 1911, that helped ignite the Xinhai Revolution and accelerate the fall of the Qing Dynasty. As provinces broke away in quick succession, the Qing court stepped down, and China became a republic in 1912.

At a moment of political turbulence within the CCP, Heng said, the military members—officers and soldiers alike—still face a choice: to stand with power or with the people.