The Pentagon’s newest report on China's military power says corruption within the People's Liberation Army could hinder a potential Taiwan operation. TaiwanPlus speaks to Lauren Dickey from the China Power Project for more.
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00:00Lauren, this report by the Pentagon highlights that corruption within China's military, the PLA, could hinder a goal to be a modernized fighting force by 2027.
00:11How big of a hindrance is corruption in the military?
00:15So the annual China Military Power Report, just to start, is a must-read annual document.
00:22And so if the Department of Defense has chosen to highlight an issue such as corruption or other personnel and organizational weaknesses, you know that it's something that we should be taking seriously.
00:35I think the message there is we can't guarantee that the rank and file within the People's Liberation Army will always be following Xi's orders as the PLA is structured today, right?
00:48If there's more corruption, there's higher likelihoods of sort of breaking from order and going against the grain, doing things that aren't maybe condoned by the commander-in-chief, or in this case by Xi Jinping himself.
01:03It's particularly notable, I think, too, that it's the high-level officials where there seem to be, or more senior officials where there seem to be, issues of corruption.
01:12They are the ones that, you know, in any system really set the standard for those subordinates beneath them.
01:19And so if they are corrupt at that higher, more senior level, you know, I think it increases the likelihood that corruption is pervasive and systemic across the PLA and could really effectively undermine the ability of the PLA as an organization, as an institution to operate when called upon to do so by Xi Jinping.
01:41When it comes to that corruption and specifically a Taiwan operation, if that happens, how big of an obstacle is corruption going to be?
01:49So what the report does is it situates the effects of corruption alongside Xi Jinping's military modernization goals, which are these targets to build military capacities by 2027.
02:05It's not a deadline to take action against Taiwan.
02:08I just want to be very clear about that.
02:10But if we are now at this point where there's pervasive or rampant corruption within the PLA at the leadership level and potentially in the rank and file, it says to me that the PLA's ability to take any form of military action against Taiwan is going to be conditioned heavily upon the PLA's ability to overcome these institutional shortcomings.
02:33So in other words, corruption could really impede the ability of the PLA to act in a unified way, whether it's towards Taiwan or frankly, any other territorial issue that the PLA faces in the region or beyond.