CCP’s Admiral Miao Hua Won’t Be Able to Challenge Xi Amid Military Purge: Insider

Chinese Type 052D missile destroyer Hefei (R) and Chinese Type 054A frigate Yuncheng dock in Saint Petersburg, Russia, on July 27, 2017. Olga Maltseva/AFP via Getty Images

Chinese admiral Miao Hua has recently been reported as a potential challenger to Xi Jinping amid the leader’s continuing purge of top military officials. However, an insider revealed exclusively to The Epoch Times that Miao doesn’t possess the power needed to challenge Xi.

Freelance writer Du Zheng published an article in “Upmedia,” a Chinese publication, on Feb. 15, stating that Miao, who is also responsible for political work, has positioned his allies throughout the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) military branch, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA).

He noted that the regime’s new Minister of Defense Dong Jun, who comes from a naval background, had a close relationship with Miao when he served as the political commissar of the navy. According to Mr. Du, Hu Zhongming, the current commander of the navy; Wang Houbin, the former deputy commander of the navy who was promoted last year to commander of the Rocket Force across services; and Lin Xiangyang, the current commander of the Eastern Theater Command, are all considered close confidants of Miao.

Miao, 68, was born in Fuzhou in Fujian Province. He served in the 31st Army of the Nanjing Military Region, stationed in Fujian, and developed a close relationship with CCP leader Xi Jinping when he worked in Fujian in his early years.

Miao was transferred from the army to the navy in December 2014, moving from the position of political commissar in the Lanzhou Military Region to become the navy’s political commissar. He was appointed as the director of the Political Work Department of the Central Military Commission in August 2017. In October of the same year, he joined the CCP’s Central Military Commission, taking charge of military personnel.

Mr. Du said that Miao is also the first deputy leader of the military leadership group of the “Learning Xi Thought” movement. This position allows Miao to extend his influence and employ assessments to enlist individuals loyal to him within the military, he added.

Wang Juntao, a political commentator based in the United States and chairman of the national committee for the Democracy Party of China, shared his views with The Epoch Times on February 16. Mr. Wang, whose father served as a corps leader in the CCP military, expressed skepticism about Miao’s ability and desire to pose a challenge to Xi, stating he believes he lacks both the necessary capability and ambition.

Not in Charge of Spy System

Mr. Wang said that he has a friend who was Miao’s neighbor when he was a child and they grew up together.

He learned from his friend that “Miao Hua grew up in the compound of the CCP officials, but he knows the CCP is over, and he doesn’t have feeling[s] for it. He’s not being anti-communist, [it] was just a matter of inertia. Such people are not particularly active. He is not someone who can really control the situation, nor is he a capable person.”

Mr. Wang said that Xi appoints people to positions based solely on whom he considers reliable and that now Xi has no one he can trust.

He pointed out that before the military reform, the General Political Department of the CCP wielded significant power. However, by the time Miao took charge of the political system, its power had waned substantially. The core of the CCP’s entire political system is its spy system, which is crucial for the CCP’s control over the military. This system was not under Miao’s control. After the military reform, the original General Political and Security Department was transferred to the Political and Legal Affairs Committee of the Military Commission and is now directly under Xi’s rule, he explained.

“He (Miao Hua) doesn’t have so much power. The core of the CCP’s political system is its actual core repressive mechanism, which is not controlled by him. The ideological work that he’s in charge of is just superficial. The real core is not with Miao Hua.”

A new Chinese nuclear submarine participates in a naval parade in the sea near Qingdao, in eastern China's Shandong province, on April 23, 2019. Mark Schiefelbein/AFP via Getty Images

Regarding reports that Miao could challenge Xi’s control, Mr. Wang said that this would be very difficult to accomplish because the political commissars and commanders within the CCP military also serve to restrain each other. “I grew up in the military and know how the CCP controls them. Sometimes generals will place spies around their opponents or partners, so two military leaders who are stationed close to each other could still be enemies, not necessarily good friends.”

Mr. Wang believes that Xi is still arresting top officials in the military, and Miao does not possess core power. Most individuals in the CCP’s military, similar to Miao, have kept a low profile and scarcely do much work, he said.

”Who dares to work for him [Xi]? If they want to do something, they will soon be taken down.”

Ning Haizhong and Luo Ya contributed to this report.