The Chinese New Year celebration observed later this month is the “Year of the Horse” but you probably will not want to put any money down on either win, place or show. Perhaps not since Soviet dictator Josef Stalin had at least eight of his top generals tortured and executed on the eve of World War II have we seen another nation dismantle their top military brass in the manner just pursued by Chinese President Xi Jinping.

In the closing days of January, Communist China’s government announced that it was investigating their army’s top general for “suspected serious violations of discipline and law.” So we are clear, that top general, Zhang Youxia, was considered the highest military member of the Chinese government just below Xi. This was no casual action by China’s strongman.

Like in Stalin’s purge, General Zhang is not alone. The Chinese Defense Ministry said they were also investigating a number of senior staff on their Central Military Commission, China’s top military body, along with General Liu Zhenli, who had been in charge of their military’s Joint Staff Department.

One media outlet quoted Neil Thomas, a fellow at the Asia Society Policy Institute’s Center for China Analysis: “Xi Jinping has completed one of the biggest purges of China’s military leadership in the history of the People’s Republic.”

In Stalin’s case, he so decimated his military command that when Hitler invaded three years later, German troops could see the spires of Moscow before they were turned back, in part due to the fierce Russian winter. In Xi’s case, it may take years to restore his nation’s military leadership.

This purge was not the only setback for Xi’s effort to project global dominance. The Supreme Court of Panama just ruled that a contract held by a Hong Kong company to run the ports situated on both ends of the strategically vital Panama Canal is unconstitutional. While that decision creates a “clean sheet of paper” as to who may run those ports next, it shows the door to a company that was clearly a conduit for Chinese power and Latin American influence.

Needless to say, the Chinese government is not pleased. Its Foreign Ministry issued the expected protest about “resolutely safeguard(ing) (their) legitimate rights.”

For a regime that has used its military “rights” to harass and intimidate nations throughout the Pacific Rim, for a nation that has placed military bases on artificial islands — thereby violating the sovereign waters of nearby countries — and for a ruthless Communist giant that has used its economic power to bully and threaten others, it must come as quite a shock that in the Year of the Horse, the track just got so very muddy.

 egretnewseditor@gmail.com