Purge of China’s military elite suggests fear at the top as world tensions move toward Cold War 2.0

Jeffrey Snider, speaking on Eurodollar University, frames the past weekend’s developments in China as something bigger than a routine personnel change, calling it “an unprecedented shakeup at the very top of the Chinese military leadership” that has “shaken up pretty much the entire world.”

Snider’s core point is simple but heavy: he doesn’t think Xi Jinping is just removing a rival or tidying up a bureaucracy, because he says it looks like a “methodical teardown” that has reached even longtime friends and allies, the kind of move that signals fear and urgency at the very top.

He also argues the timing matters, because he connects this purge to a wider shift he calls “Cold War 2.0,” saying it’s no longer a vague talking point but something being “carried out all across the global stage,” with various geopolitical “chess pieces” moving into place.

The Numbers Snider Says Should Alarm Everyone

Snider lays out the purge in a way that feels like a scoreboard, not a rumor: he says Xi appointed six generals to China’s top Central Military Commission in 2022, but after the latest purge, “all but one of them is left,” and Snider notes that the remaining one is “the guy purportedly carrying out the purging.”

Then Snider expands the lens to the Communist Party Central Committee, saying that out of 44 military officers placed there about three and a half years ago, 29 – roughly two-thirds – have either been confirmed purge victims or have “just simply gone missing,” which he presents as evidence that China’s top political-military structure is being rewritten, fast and ruthlessly.

To support that picture, Snider reads figures he attributes to Neil Thomas, described as a researcher on Chinese politics at the Asia Society, and he also references former CIA analyst Christopher Johnson as someone calling the move “unprecedented” and a near “total annihilation” of the high command.

Even if you treat every one of those numbers with caution, the pattern Snider is pointing to is still unsettling: when a leader replaces so many handpicked people so soon, it raises the basic question Snider keeps returning to – what changed so dramatically that loyalty no longer feels safe?

Corruption Charges, Missing Ministers, And A Leadership That Looks Spooked

Snider argues that purges in China aren’t new, because he says Xi has been removing rivals since taking power in 2012, often using corruption allegations as the official reason, but he insists what’s happening in the 2020s is different because it’s reaching into Xi’s own circle.

As an example, Snider points to a case from October involving He Weidong, described as China’s “number two general,” along with a Navy admiral who was the top political officer for the PLA, both hit with corruption charges, which Snider says raised red flags because He Weidong was “handpicked” and seen as a longtime ally.

Snider also goes back to 2023 and says China’s foreign minister and defense minister “went missing,” with the defense minister later turning up under corruption charges, and he uses that to build his argument that the public explanation – corruption – may be doing double duty as a political weapon.

At one point Snider cites China analyst Bill Bishop, quoting him as saying it would be “remarkable” if, in year 11 of Xi being in charge of the PLA, corruption at that level is still so severe, because in Bishop’s view, Xi can’t blame predecessors anymore – Snider then translates the meaning the way he sees it: this isn’t just cleanup, it’s control.

Snider’s bigger interpretation is that China’s older system treated corruption as something close to a management tool – he calls it “a feature” used to maintain loyalty through patronage networks – so if Xi is suddenly trying to purge those networks, Snider thinks it’s because Xi is trying to force a radical new direction that many insiders don’t want.

Cold War 2.0, Deglobalization, And Why Snider Thinks Cooperation Is Over

Snider repeatedly ties the purge to economics and what he calls a long, involuntary slide into “deglobalization,” arguing the world has been moving away from the old globalization era for nearly two decades, whether people wanted it or not.

He describes a framework he says he discussed with Brent Johnson. In a globalizing period, countries have incentives to cooperate because “everybody’s getting rich.” Still, when the upside fades, the mood shifts toward “tribalism and nationalism,” because there’s less to gain from playing nice.

Snider then pushes the idea further, arguing that after 2008 the monetary system “broke down,” the economy followed, and now the political fallout is finally rising to the surface, which is why he says the U.S. and China are no longer “strategic rivals” but simply “rivals,” and possibly even “outright enemies,” as he bluntly puts it.

This is also where Snider’s theory becomes a warning: he suggests people who support aggressive government power when it targets “the other side” often learn too late that the same tools can be used against them, because once a country is thinking in Cold War terms, everything becomes “security risk,” including things that used to be normal perks for elites.

Snider even mentions rumors that some officials were targeted because their children live in Europe or the West, and he argues that in a tightened, suspicious environment, those overseas links stop looking like status symbols and start looking like vulnerabilities.

Here’s my take, woven into Snider’s framing: when leaders start acting like everyone is a potential leak, it usually means they believe the system they’re running is brittle, not strong, because confident governments don’t typically need to keep purging their own handpicked leadership to feel secure.

And if Snider is right that this is part of a long trend away from cooperation and toward confrontation, then the scariest part isn’t any single headline, it’s the slow normalization of “worst-case thinking” on all sides, because that mindset makes overreaction feel like common sense.

The Wider Chessboard Snider Sees Forming

Snider argues this story “goes way beyond Taiwan,” even though he understands why Taiwan is the first place many people look, and he says that gutting military leadership could even slow China’s short-term capability, which is part of why he believes the purge is about a bigger strategic reset rather than immediate action.

In his telling, the central focus is the United States, and he pivots into examples of what he describes as an escalating security contest, including a segment he references from “60 Minutes” about Chinese-linked property purchases near U.S. military sites and concerns around Chinese-backed cryptocurrency mining operations.

Snider quotes former national security official David Feith, as described in that “60 Minutes” segment, warning that access to land and facilities near sensitive sites could be exploited for intelligence or worse, and Snider also repeats Feith’s concern that crypto mines, because they draw so much power, could pose risks to the electric grid.

Snider then brings up another case he attributes to the Secret Service, describing a network of “SIM servers” and “100,000 SIM cards” in the New York tri-state area, which the agency said could be used for telecommunications attacks, and he asks the rhetorical question of “nationstate threat actors” – implying China, even while acknowledging some might suspect Russia too.

After that, Snider broadens again, arguing that if you place U.S. moves in the Western Hemisphere – Venezuela, Panama Canal influence, and what he calls a 21st-century Monroe Doctrine – into the same Cold War framework, actions that look random start to look connected.

He also claims Cold War logic helps explain the aggressive stance he describes around Greenland, suggesting it isn’t only about minerals, but about strategic positioning and reducing reliance on China, especially around rare earths.

Snider finishes with a blunt illustration of the new posture using Canada: he quotes Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney telling Davos that the “rules-based order” has been “frayed, if not cut entirely,” then contrasts it with a harsh response Snider attributes to Donald Trump on Truth Social, warning Canada that a China deal would trigger massive tariffs and that “China will eat Canada alive.”

This is where Snider’s argument lands, whether you agree with him or not: he says the old order is dead, the pace of economic change has slowed, the pace of political conflict has surged, and that’s why we’re seeing volatility at the top – purges in Beijing, hard talk in Washington, and countries scrambling to pick sides in a world that no longer rewards neutrality the way it used to.

Snider’s closing message is basically a cold splash of water: none of this guarantees a hot war tomorrow, he says, but Cold War footing means both sides prepare as if the worst is possible, and he urges viewers to “prepare accordingly,” because in his view there’s now a visible method behind what feels like growing madness.