Chinese Military Corruption & Readiness - The Rocket Force, Purges & PLA Readiness

Earlier this month, Bloomberg carried an article which included claims about corruption in the PRC's Rocket Force .

Those claims have gotten plenty of attention – so today, I want to look into corruption and anti-corruption campaigns in the PRC, some of the claims from the article, how we might interpret them, and what all this might mean for the PLA and the region

Patreon:

Relevant Reading/sourcing

The Bloomberg article:

Nuclear Notebook – PRC

Military and Security Developments involving the PRC – 2022

2020 version

Yang, Milanovic, Yaoqi Lin – Anti-corruption campaign in China: An empirical investigation

China’s national defence in the New Era

Reporting on the Rocket force removals:

Deng & Wei – Measuring Corruption in China

Chinese media on Xu Caihou and surrounding cases

The party-military relationship

Reporting on anti-corruption in China

Peng Wang – Military corruption in China: The role of Guanxi in the buying and selling of military positions

Featured article on Russian corruption

China deploying to Gulf of Aden

Chinese military raises pay

RAND – US China military scorecard

Naval exercises

FAS – Chinese silo construction

Caveats & Comments:
All normal caveats and comments apply.

In particular – I would like to note as always that this material has been created for entertainment purposes and is not intended to be a complete or comprehensive examination of the topic in question and should not be relied upon to inform financial or other similar decisions.

All contentions of fact presented in this presentation should be assumed to be subject to be qualified by the words "reportedly" "allegedly" or both depending on context. In some cases, these words have been omitted from the audio for reasons including a need to keep the presentation understandable and suitable for its primary purpose - entertainment.

Timestamps:
00:00:00 — Opening Words
00:00:46 — What Am I Talking About?
00:03:10 — PRC Military Modernisation
00:04:01 — Corruption And Purges
00:20:15 — The Bloomberg Claims
00:30:54 — The Silo Thing - And Implications
00:44:42 — Solid Fuel Issues?
00:48:25 — Readiness
00:56:21 — Regional Developments And Strategy
00:59:38 — Conclusion
01:01:12 — Channel Update

[PerunAU]

When interpreting intelligence reports - it pays to be cautious. When interpreting second hand fragments of intelligence that make it into the press, it pays to be especially so.

Personal view - annonymous source + odd or extreme claim + tension with other evidence and assessments = extreme scepticism about some of these specific headlines.

One day, I want to have a detailed look at the capabilities of the modern PLA (as best as we can assess them from afar) but with the recent claims of water filled missiles, broken silos and continued turnover in senior Chinese military leaders, I thought it might be worth stopping for a week and going through some of the recent claims, how we might interpret them, and what the impact of corruption might be on China's overall military modernisation efforts.

If there is one other thing I'll say, it's that when I use the term 'possible' - that does not mean likely. I can't disprove the claims, and they're not physically impossible - but that very much doesn't mean I'd give the specific claims we go over here (like the water in the missile thing) good odds of actually being a real, substantial phenomenon in the way described.

[casbot]

Due to mistranslation, Chinese media has reported that Emutopians are cracking down on sex with spiders, with officers having to regularly remind troops _that they are not there to have sex with arachnids._

[Graatand]

Is it just me or does “convicting 5 US congressmen for corruption every year and one state governor every second year” not actually sound that unreasonable?

[Who_knows-tere]

As a Chinese scientist I'd like to add one point, the worst corruption is in the form of miss-allocation of resources. Like someone in the high rank decided to carry on a already failed project so that they don't have to call it a failure and keep being funded. Which use all the resources they have including our lab, leaving me utilizing my Monday watching Perun video on 'a cannot legally accessed website'.

[gudmundursteinar]

As I was informed by the channel Sandboxx filling something with water can be a chinese euphemism for corruption. So a missile filled with water might not be literally filled with water but simply rendered useless due to corruption.

[texasranger]

The filled with water thing comes from the chinese term "Guan Shui" literally "Fill water " is a blanket slang term used to describe replacing any material with cheaper substandard material to increase your profit margin. Like garbage steel, or actually replacing fuel with water.

[Muz]

As a concerned Emutopian, I believe we should immediately acquire more magpie 2s and accelerate development of the magpie 3!

[nekomakhea]

"An India-China nuclear war isn't on anyone's 2024 bingo card"
this timeline has been going full throttle with no brakes since 2020, don't tempt fate

[idioluh]

"Invalidate the intelligence" story regarding the silos reminded me of an old anecdote: a farmer owning watermelon field in a Kherson oblast was tired of locals stealing his melons, and placed signs "one of the watermelons is poisoned" around the field. One day he noticed the sign was updated by somebody and now reads "2 of the watermelons are poisoned".

[jackbailey]

I wish all YouTube shows could be like this: (1) Assume you (the viewer) are adult and have critical intelligence (2) Present facts crisply without usual bad stock visuals (3) Admit unknowns & possible mistakes. (4) Well researched. You get the picture.

[matthewmatthew]

Semi-relavant anecdote:

My Boss was working in Hong Kong Investment Banking with a bulge bracket about a decade ago and had insight into the hiring processes there. Of the junior positions they hired, fully half of them were so-called 'relationship' hires, which in China-speak meant sons/daughters of investment banking clients and/or prominent senior officials. Needless to say if nepotism and connections play such a large part in an ostensibly foreign financial institution (and its not like HK IBD only focused on Chinese business), it's not hard to imagine how much it will effect something as ideliably tied to the state as the PLA and associated MICs.

[nuresproblemchind]

Corruption isn't a bug, it's a feature of authoritarian systems. You pay your officals very little but you allow for plenty of opportunity for graft and enrichment. This has a couple of benefirs, the most loyal get to enrich themselves the most and if they should ever budge in their loyalty you get to dispose of them perfectly legally. You also ensure an ample supply of candidates for the position. The case of Alexey Dymowski provides a good example.

[DHunter]

I am no rocket scientist. However, in another life I was an aircraft fuel system mechanic. In that, I learned a bit about vacuums and venturis. Given the volatility of liquid rocket fuel, it may be safer (likely) and quicker to fuel the rocket by drawing in fuel by pumping out water. Adding a liquid to an enclosed cylinder requires it either be vented or have a vacuum applied to the cylinder. Venting creates a danger by venting gas off the liquid that is volatile. By drawing in the liquid fuel by pumping out water, the need for a vent is removed. The only other reason to have a vent would be thermal expansion as the fuel warms. Therefore fueling just before launch and doing so rapidly would be key. Drawing in fuel by pumping out water would also aid in this. Fueling could be done far more rapidly and safer than purely venting.

[philiphockenbury]

I gotta say the guy getting arrested for having a metric ton of bribes is an absolute stud. Horrendously corrupt. But like insane numbers. This is Dragon Hoard levels of wealth and ill gotten gains. Bravo you crazy crook.

[ingloriuspumpkinpie]

I think that "filled with water" is Chinese slang for filled with low quality substitutes, where the difference in cost is grabbed by the command and manufacturers. I dont think any missiles are actually filled with water. *Alright nevermind he talked about that.

[Squeaky_Ben]

"You're not gonna go to the moon on a solid fuel rocket"
The entire KSP community:
"WATCH ME."

[shanewall]

As an Australian ex-uniformed Southeast Asia Operational Intelligence Analyst at a Military Headquarters level, where China was the constant elephant in my 'room', I suggest Perun hugely undersells his own understanding of how the CCP and the Chinese military 'work' in relation to military capabilities and weaknesses.

[phillkilgore]

This is simply the most fair, balanced, and insightful reporting to be found freely anywhere. My sincere thanks, you are a blessing in this world of disinformation and overly hyped media. Please keep up the good work.

[TheFirstHarbinger]

Your local energetics guys here. I'm so glad you clarified the "water in the missiles" piece, when I heard that my skeptical eyebrows went to the moon.

Liquid propellants, both bi-propellant but especially mono-propellant are horrendous to work with. Corrosive, volatile, carcinogenic and generally angry. They need special care to store properly let alone use without big fireballs.

When I read the story I thought filling up a missile with water (or some other stable substance) was probably a good idea if they don't need high readiness. For example if they were stored in a depot with all their other explosive friends. You probably don't want to find out your missile leaks for the first time when it's dripping carcinogenic boom sauce.

Selling the propellant is kinda laughable too. "Hello prospective buyer. Would you like some liquid cancer that will almost certainly explode randomly and publicly leading back to me?"

[andrewlm]

It is good to keep in mind that stories like this one can be accurate, fabricated, or deliberately/accidentally only partially true and that the target of the reporting could either be the governments involved or their populations. The purpose of making the information available is something we will never know but a strong possibility is that it is to obscure the truth or to sow confusion.

This analysis of the details of the story is a great demonstration of how we should take it - with a huge grain of salt