Zhang Youxia purged: Is Taiwan closer to conflict?
China’s latest military purge spills outwards and will reshape the structure and tempo of risk in the Taiwan Strait, says commentator Deng Yuwen. The major factor is not about the “removal of doves”, but the downgrading of professional judgment within decision-making.
Zhang Youxia and Liu Zhenli have been taken down. Last year, it was He Weidong and Miao Hua, along with seven other full generals. Before that, it was Li Shangfu, Wei Fenghe and others. In recent years, violent personnel shocks at the top of the PLA have become almost routine. Still, the latest round — two vice-chairmen of the Central Military Commission (CMC), plus a batch of CMC members and senior commanders falling in quick succession — amounts to nearly flipping over the entire apex of the PLA’s command system.
And with Zhang’s case in particular, many observers have rushed to tie it to the Taiwan Strait, producing two seemingly opposite judgments. One claims that with Zhang and others removed, obstacles inside the military to using force against Taiwan have been cleared, and Xi Jinping will move earlier. The other argues that Zhang was among the very few senior PLA figures with real combat experience, so his removal weakens the PLA and will push Xi to delay the use of force against Taiwan.
These two claims point in different directions, but they share the same flaw: both treat a “purge” as a direct causal driver of a “war decision”. The first, especially, carries a conspiratorial imagination — as if taking down Zhang were itself meant to prepare for war against Taiwan. A more reasonable approach is not to keep asking whether Xi truly wants to fight or not, but to see something else: how the purge itself, as an event, spills outward and reshapes the structure and tempo of risk in the Taiwan Strait.
... there is no hard evidence that Zhang was some kind of “dove”, much less that he opposed a forcible unification of Taiwan. To equate military caution with political position is itself a highly politicised reading.
Zhang Youxia may not have been a ‘dove’
First, one overused claim needs to be clarified. Zhang is said to have urged Xi to be “extremely cautious” about a Taiwan campaign. But there is no hard evidence that Zhang was some kind of “dove”, much less that he opposed a forcible unification of Taiwan. To equate military caution with political position is itself a highly politicised reading.
Zhang spent his career immersed in the military-industrial sphere, weapons and procurement, and the command system. Even if he did tell Xi that attacking Taiwan required being “extremely cautious”, that would be closer to a professional assessment of costs and uncertainty than a value judgment about the path to unification. To retroactively reframe such professional caution as “obstructing the use of force”, and then conclude “purge equals clearing obstacles”, simply does not hold up logically.
Snowball effects
Yet this does not mean the purge cannot, in objective terms, change the likelihood of using force. The question is not whether Zhang was “anti-war”, but whether the purge changes the preference structure inside the military.
If Zhang’s replacement — by background, factional ties or personal political security — depends even more heavily on the top leader’s trust, risk assessments may tilt toward political correctness. And if, amid rising nationalist mobilisation, the use of force against Taiwan is turned into a kind of political commitment, then the military option could indeed be pushed forward in time. In other words, what might move the timetable forward is not the “removal of doves”, but the downgrading of professional judgment within decision-making.
The purge acting as a brake
At the same time, from the standpoint of organisation and execution, another spillover effect of the purge is equally important: a short-term suppression of momentum. This is not about Zhang’s personal battlefield experience. It is about scale.
Those taken down are not a handful of isolated individuals; they form an entire chain of critical nodes — from vice-chairmen of the CMC, to CMC members, to senior commanders across theatres and services. A shock of this magnitude inevitably forces a re-wiring of the command chain and a recalculation of coordination mechanisms.
The issue is not the loss of any single commander; it is that the entire top system has entered a state of shock.
A Taiwan operation depends heavily on joint operations and system-level integration. Any structural change at the top compels existing plans to enter a “version-update” phase. At such a moment, an organisation’s instinct is not to gamble but to protect itself; not to push forward but to avoid blame. Even if the top leadership has an intention to use force, the executing system will tend to slow down in order to reduce its own risk.
This is why the claim that “Zhang’s absence will delay war because his Vietnam-era combat experience is gone” is unconvincing. Vietnam-era experience has little direct value in modern war. But it is also why the claim that “a large-scale purge will not affect military deployment” underestimates organisational inertia. The issue is not the loss of any single commander; it is that the entire top system has entered a state of shock. From this perspective, if Xi never had a clear plan to use force early, the purge would more likely have acted as a brake.
The most alarming spillover, however, is a third and deeper one: changes to the information chain. The most dangerous condition in war decision-making is not the presence of opposition, but the absence of anyone willing to deliver bad news. When the military develops an atmosphere in which “risk warnings equal political disloyalty”, upward information will be filtered systematically. Assessments become more optimistic, projected success rates are repeatedly raised, and costs are — explicitly or implicitly — downplayed. This change often does not show itself immediately as action, but over time, it accumulates into a kind of false confidence.
More caution in the short run, more danger in the long run
This also explains a phenomenon that seems paradoxical but recurs in authoritarian systems: more caution in the short run, greater danger in the long run. After a purge, the system first enters a phase of self-protection; the tempo slows. Then, under the banner of “rectifying the army and preparing for war”, the command structure is rebuilt, centralisation and obedience are strengthened.
When centralisation overwhelms professional judgment — especially amid nationalist excitement — the realism of risk assessment declines. And at some point, once the external environment is interpreted as “the window is closing”, the leadership may be more likely to make a high-risk choice under conditions of incomplete information.
Moreover, the Taiwan timetable itself is not necessarily determined primarily by internal military personnel. More decisive is Xi’s reading of the external window...
Moreover, the Taiwan timetable itself is not necessarily determined primarily by internal military personnel. More decisive is Xi’s reading of the external window: whether the US would intervene directly, whether US-Japan coordination is credible, whether China can absorb the shock of sanctions and financial warfare and whether grey-zone frictions in the Taiwan Strait show signs of slipping out of control. Compared to these variables, the supposed “hawk-dove” divide inside the PLA is often overstated. The real danger is not that someone internally urges force, but that the external reaction is misread in systematic ways.
Unintended escalation a possibility
The purge can also raise risk through an external feedback loop. When the PLA’s top echelon is effectively “swept clean”, and transparency drops, the US, Taiwan and Japan will be more inclined to prepare for worst-case scenarios. Once such preparation intensifies, Beijing may in turn interpret it as “the opponent is locking the window”, thereby reinforcing its own sense of urgency. The result is a cycle in which both sides look increasingly like they are preparing for conflict, even as both insist they do not want war — and the probability of accidental escalation rises accordingly.
Ultimately, the impact of this purge on the Taiwan Strait cannot be reduced to a simple question of “earlier” or “later”. What it changes is the form of risk: it may suppress impulsive action in the short term, while in the long term it may erode the realism of decision-making. If Xi never had an intention to use force early, taking down this group of generals could become part of “rebuilding the army for war”, potentially creating conditions more favourable to a future forcible unification. But at the same time, it compresses the space for professional judgment and increases the likelihood of miscalculation and risk-taking.
War often does not break out at the moment when leaders most want to fight, but at the moment when they are most prone to misjudge. For the Taiwan Strait, what deserves the greatest vigilance is precisely this kind of risk — accumulating gradually inside an opaque and politicised information environment.
