The PLA’s Biggest Corruption Scandal

Xu Caihou is one of China's big "tigers", the prize of Xi Jinping's anticorruption. If Zhou Yongkang showed that even being a member of the Politburo Standing Committee did not protect you from prosection, then Xu's fall showed that it goes the same even for China's powerful military.
The People's Liberation Army is the world's largest army and probably its second most powerful. The Party controls it through the Central Military Commission, chaired by China's most senior generals and party members.
Corruption in the Chinese military is a largely unexplored topic. Basically, a state secret. Charging Xu for what he did is characteristic of Xi Jinping's style - shaking up the status quo. In this video, let us look at his rise to power and how he fell from grace.
Links:
- The Asianometry Newsletter: asianometry.com

[@ImtheHitcher]

Bit of an audio glitch at around the 0:42 mark just fyi

[@xeniosaias]

yeap

[@vi4135]

Thank you for this message, I thought it was interference messing with my Bluetooth headset.

[@sarcasmo57]

I hope they keep it up.

[@kkiptum]

Dude, lovely channel!

[@asheru9254]

Cham ge

[@cycla]

appearantly the "death sentence with repreive" has nothing to do with death sentences

[@dewittbourchier7169]

This is a huge after effect of Deng's reforms or deformation as some Party hardliners might have referred to it in private. Essentially government salaries were frozen and job security eroded while prices and the cost of living shot up and up. This meant that the incentives for corruption increased massively. It is also a pattern it seems to me in most Asian militaries - namely that they get a few resources from the centre but otherwise all units are left to fend for themselves. This is especially astonishing to me in the case of the PLA as it compromises a key reserve of the Party. Some good news is that since the late 1990s under Jiang and continuing under Hu and Xi, slow but continuous efforts have been made to improve job quality in the PLA, but it does not speak highly of Deng that he let the PLA essentially atrophy in a lot of ways.

[@cd5433]

The pla has been selling ranks since the Era of Mao. Its hilarious you try to blame it on the one reformer who actually turned china into a powerhouse with rhe Schenzen ecenomic zone and free markets instead of a backwater. and then you say its gotten better under more authoritian dictators like Xi. What a joke. The corruption now is just being done by people who are giving Xi his cut. It's always hilarious to see pro China people slander Deng because he completely ruined the communist fantasy your dear leader Mao spent so long trying to build up. He opened up free markets and look at that china's economy actually explodes . So now revisionists like uour self love to hate on him because Xi is transforming China back into an authoritarian personality cult dictatorship and reformers like Deng must be looked back upon with hatred and shame so nobody gets any ideas in the future.

[@jerrybaird2059]

Stirring things up within the military is hazardous. I hope it does not undermine political control.

[@annarboriter]

*party control. The PRC lacks an national army

[@orneryokinawan4529]

Cash for substandard steel armor too.

[@warmonger82]

Great vid bro! I'd like to hear your thoughts on the F-16 maintenance issues the ROCAF is having. Apparently one of the officers committed suicide after recent grounding of the fleet.

[@Asianometry]

I think it’s more important that they invest in drones, missiles and other asymmetric weapons first.

[@Nightfighter82]

You mean the J-16? with it’s under powered engines, among other issues. It’s what happens when you steal tech instead of having smart people that can properly develop it.

[@shinchan-F-urmom]

@@Asianometry so u support taiwan separtists?

[@sumanadasawijayapala5372]

@@Nightfighter82 No, he meant the Taiwan Air Force's F-16s.

[@cd5433]

@@shinchan-F-urmom Taiwan is an independent country and china will never get itback. Deal with it.

[@oye4511]

😮😮👍

[@annarboriter]

The crime isn't in taking bribes, but in not giving a cut to the capo

[@melvinch]

Not the biggest yet.

[@fintech1378]

Bribing to be promoted in the military/police force also occurs in other developing countries

[@karthur3421]

yep, no way around it, that's why it's important to restore confidence in any organization when corruption occurs, it's a vicious cycle, when the ppl within see no future, self-interest creeps to the top of their priorities, gotta nip it in the bud asap.
In Malaysia today, we can see them scrambling to nip the long overdue corruption within government, military and police, although it doesn't fix the old problem of "bumiputra", at least it's hope for the people after the last couple years of fiasco with the 1MDB.

[@shazmosushi]

1:48 You flubbed the pronunciation of Tiananmen exactly how you did it in a previous video!

[@Asianometry]

Some words just elude me. That’s one of them

[@cheng3580]

Well. I kinda expected the PLA's title of Paper Force to be true to some extend but even the higher ranks are fake.

[@karthur3421]

yeah, paper force, the paper force that kicked the US's arse back to square 1 in the korean war, and with super outdated, land only army.