China on Friday removed two of its highest-ranking military officers - Generals Zhang Yuxia and Liu Zhengli - from their posts in the state Central Military Commission, the Xinhua news agency reported, citing the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress. The news was reported by the "Reuters" agency.
The decision is the latest step in a large-scale purge among the top command of the People's Liberation Army of China, which over the past three years has affected the Rocket Forces, the military supply system, two former defense ministers and members of the country's top military leadership.
Zhang Yuxia was vice chairman of the Central Military Commission and effectively the second person in the military hierarchy after Chinese President Xi Jinping, who chairs the commission. He is also a member of the Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party.
Liu Zhengli is a member of the Central Military Commission and chief of its Joint Staff - the structure that has a key role in planning and coordinating the operations of the Chinese armed forces.
The investigations against the two were announced on January 24. The Defense Ministry said at the time that Zhang and Liu were suspected of "serious violations of discipline and law" - a term that Chinese authorities routinely use in investigations into corruption and other serious violations.
Zhang Yuxia, 75, has long been considered one of Xi Jinping's closest military allies. He is also one of the few members of China's current top military leadership with real combat experience, gained during border clashes with Vietnam.
His removal is particularly significant because it comes at a time when Beijing is rapidly modernizing its military and expanding its military capabilities, including in the context of tensions over Taiwan and rivalry with the United States.
However, there is an important institutional peculiarity. China has a parallel state and party Central Military Commission, which in practice have almost identical composition and are led by Xi Jinping.
Friday's decision concerns the posts of Zhang Yuxia and Liu Zhengli on the state Central Military Commission. It has not yet been officially announced that the two were also removed from their posts on the Central Military Commission of the Communist Party of China.
The purge began in the Rocket Forces
The latest wave of purges in the top military leadership began in 2023 and was initially concentrated around the Rocket Forces - the elite structure that controls China's ballistic missiles, including the country's nuclear forces.
In the summer of 2023, the command of the Rocket Forces was suddenly changed. Subsequently, a number of current and former generals from the structure were removed or placed under investigation.
At the end of the same year, nine senior military officials were removed by the National People's Congress. Among them were former commanders and deputy commanders of the Rocket Forces, as well as officers related to military procurement and equipment acquisition.
The investigations raised questions about the scale of corruption in the huge investments that China has made in its rocket forces and the modernization of the army in recent years.
Only days ago, the Chinese military again showed that inspections in this area are ongoing. They launched a campaign to collect signals from the public about violations in the Rocket Forces' public procurement - from the supply of materials and construction projects to food and medical equipment.
Removal of two consecutive defense ministers
The purge quickly went beyond the Rocket Forces. In 2023, then-Defense Minister Li Shangfu disappeared from public view just months after his appointment. He was officially dismissed from his post in October.
Before becoming minister, Li headed the Central Military Commission's department responsible for the development and acquisition of military equipment, one of the areas that has been the focus of anti-corruption investigations.
In June 2024, the Chinese Communist Party expelled both Li Shangfu and his predecessor as Defense Minister, Wei Fenghe.
Chinese authorities accused Li of accepting large bribes and offering bribes himself, as well as using his official position for personal gain. Wei was also charged with serious corruption offenses.
In May 2026, the two former ministers received death sentences with a two-year reprieve for corruption. In Chinese legal practice, such a sentence can usually be later commuted to life imprisonment if there is no new crime during the period of reprieve.
The purge reached the very top of the military
A new stage came in 2025, when the investigations reached the Central Military Commission itself.
Admiral Miao Hua, who led the political work of the People's Liberation Army and was a member of the commission, was removed after an investigation for "serious violations of discipline".
In October 2025, China expelled General He Weidong and Miao Hua from the Communist Party and the army, along with several other senior officers.
He Weidong was vice chairman of the Central Military Commission and one of the highest-ranking generals in the country. His removal was the first time since the Cultural Revolution of 1966-1976 that a serving general of this level in the Central Military Commission had been subjected to such a purge.
The fall of Zhang Yuxia just a few months later made the purge even more unprecedented. When the investigation against him was announced in January, Reuters described him as the highest-ranking victim of the campaign in the military leadership to date.
It is particularly telling that Zhang was long perceived not as an adversary, but as one of Xi Jinping's closest military allies.
Fighting corruption and controlling the army
Xi Jinping launched his large-scale anti-corruption campaign after coming to power in 2012, with the People's Liberation Army among its main targets from the beginning.
Beijing's official position is that the actions are necessary to eliminate corruption, increase combat readiness and strengthen discipline.
Xi himself stated in 2024 that there were "deep-rooted problems" in the army in political terms, ideology, work style and discipline, and warned that corrupt military personnel "should have no place to hide".
However, outside analysts also see the campaign as a means of tightening Xi's personal control over the armed forces and ensuring the political loyalty of the high command.
The scale of the removals also raises another question - to what extent the continuous change of commanders affects the operational efficiency and modernization of the People's Liberation Army.
The situation in the Rocket Forces and military supply structures is particularly sensitive, since it is in them that China is investing huge resources to build capabilities that should play a key role in a possible conflict in the Taiwan Strait or a wider confrontation in the Indo-Pacific region.