Chinese anti-corruption authorities are investigating a senior executive at one of the country’s top military equipment suppliers, China Electronics Technology Group Corporation, in a new sign of turmoil in the country’s defence establishment.
The probe into He Wenzhong, deputy general manager of CETC, a company subject to US sanctions, follows a shake-up of the armed forces last year, when the two generals in command of the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force were replaced. The force controls China’s land-based nuclear missiles.
Around the same time, China’s defence minister Li Shangfu also disappeared from public view. He was later replaced. Chinese authorities gave no details of He’s case or whether it was linked to the Rocket Force investigation or Li’s dismissal.
CETC works closely with the armed forces, producing a wide range of high-tech military equipment, including early-warning radar. “He Wenzhong . . . is suspected of serious violations of discipline and law and is currently undergoing disciplinary review and supervisory investigation,” the Communist party’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the government’s National Supervisory Commission said in a statement.
Formed through the merger of 46 electronic research institutes and 26 state-owned companies, CETC has 200,000 employees, making it one of the biggest defence groups in the world. CETC claims to be China’s only domestic military-industrial group that serves all branches of the military, including those operating in space.
Aside from radars, it designs drone swarms and navigation and electronic warfare systems. Its scores of subsidiaries include surveillance equipment group Hikvision, which is also subject to US sanctions. He Wenzhong was the director of the group’s 11th Research Institute, which studies solid-state laser and infrared detector technology that can be used for precision-guided weapons.
The discipline commission said last year that “some problems had been found and some leads on issues with certain leaders had been received” during previous inspections of CETC. This led to “rectification” work this year, CETC said.
Aside from Hikvision, CETC also holds shares in other domestic military-linked groups, such as Taiji Computer, Guorui Technology, Sichuang Electronics and Phenix Optics. Former defence minister Li’s disappearance at the end of August came six weeks after the Central Military Commission, China’s top military organ chaired by President Xi Jinping, announced a corruption probe into its Equipment Development Department. The department is responsible for developing and acquiring new weapons and was led by Li for five years until his elevation into the CMC a year ago.
A number of senior officers removed from the Rocket Force leadership last year had previously served with Li at the Equipment Development Department, though some people familiar with the situation said their removal was linked to suspicions they had leaked secrets. China’s former foreign minister and ambassador to the US, Qin Gang, mysteriously disappeared from public view in June and was officially replaced as minister a month later.
While the disappearance of officials in China is common, analysts saw the removal of cabinet ministers such as Li and Qin as highly unusual and a sign of upheaval within the government.