China widens PLA anti-graft campaign, expelling corporate chiefs, 16 generals from party

Beijing has given new details about the scale of its anti-corruption drive into the People’s Liberation Army and defence industry, with fresh names confirmed as being investigated.

They include top generals who once oversaw theatre commands, heads of the powerful Central Military Commission’s General Office and executives in key defence companies.

The names are included in a communique released at the close of the fifth plenum of the 20th Central Committee on Thursday, as the party concluded its investigation of the officials and executives and finalised decisions to expel them.

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Former PLA generals expelled from China’s Communist Party for factionalism and disloyalty

The four-day conclave confirmed the expulsion of 33 full and alternate Central Committee members, including 16 senior generals, indicating that the unprecedented anti-corruption storm sweeping through the armed forces shows no sign of abating.

The number of officials disciplined marked a new high for recent plenary sessions.

The communique said the party leadership under President Xi Jinping had confronted its internal problems with “enormous political courage and a strong sense of responsibility”, and that it was turning the knife inward and eliminating “serious hidden dangers” within the military.

Thursday’s revelations include updates on two successive directors of the Central Military Commission (CMC) General Office – lieutenant generals Zhong Shaojun and Fang Yongxiang – who were stripped of their Central Committee membership at the plenum. The position is one of the most important conduits for the chairman of the Central Military Commission to exert command over the armed forces.

Zhong had a long history of serving under Xi, having followed the Chinese leader since his tenure as a senior provincial official in Zhejiang from 2002 to 2007. He accompanied Xi to Beijing in 2007 and entered the military establishment in 2013 as deputy director of the CMC General Office, becoming a key lieutenant to Xi within the armed forces.

Zhong was promoted to director of the General Office in 2017 before stepping down in 2024. In August this year, he was stripped of his seat in China’s top legislature.

His successor, Fang, rose through the ranks of the PLA Ground Force and spent much of his career in the military’s political work system before taking over the General Office in 2024.

Fang was absent from the fourth plenum in October last year and, despite being an alternate Central Committee member, was passed over in the promotion queue when vacancies on the committee were filled.

The latest expulsions have also swept through the PLA’s theatre commands, which are responsible for directing military operations.

Among those expelled were generals Liu Qingsong, former political commissar of the Eastern Theatre Command; Huang Ming, former commander of the Northern Theatre Command; and Wang Haijiang, former commander of the Western Theatre Command.

All three were absent from last year’s fourth plenum.

Former Southern Theatre Command commander Wu Yanan and political commissar Wang Wenquan have been missing from public view for an extended period, with their respective duties taken over by lower-ranking generals.

The plenum also confirmed the downfall of several senior figures in China’s sprawling defence industry who had long vanished from the public eye.

Among them were Jin Zhuanglong and Lei Fanpei, who served as deputy directors of the Office of the Central Commission for Integrated Military and Civilian Development, the body responsible for coordinating the military-industrial system. Both were expelled from the party.

Jin took up the post in 2017 before being appointed minister of industry and information technology in 2022. He was removed from the ministerial position in February last year.

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China’s fifth plenum focuses on discipline and loyalty to Xi

All four were removed from their posts around 2024 and subsequently disappeared from public view.

The meeting came as the upper ranks of China’s armed forces were already reeling from a series of shake-ups.

The plenum confirmed the party expulsions of former CMC vice-chairman Zhang Youxia and former commission member Liu Zhenli, whose downfall earlier this year left just two members of the once seven-strong military leadership body – Xi himself and CMC vice-chairman Zhang Shengmin, who was elevated to the Politburo at this plenum.