Here is the uncomfortable truth about being the “Chairman of Everything”: It sucks. You sit in the big chair, wear the nice suit, and people clap because if they don’t, they disappear. It’s an ego trap. You never know if the applause is genuine or just a survival tactic to avoid prison.

Xi Jinping is finding this out the hard way. He runs the show in China, but he has a massive problem: the generals of the **People’s Liberation Army (PLA)**. These are the guys who control the missiles, the guns, and the tanks, and Xi is terrified of them. Headlines globally are dominated by the latest **Xi Jinping military purge**—a scary euphemism for firing people with extreme prejudice. In his line of work, you don’t get a pink slip and a cardboard box; you go to jail, or you simply vanish.

He is doing this because he demands “absolute loyalty.” He wants 100 percent adherence, no questions asked. He wants robots who breathe. But he is looking for something that does not exist, like a dry spot in the middle of the ocean. Humans are messy, greedy, and prone to lying. But Xi doesn't care about the reality of **Chinese politics**; he cares about control.

So, he is reaching back to the old playbook, echoing the days of **Mao Zedong**. They call it “rectification.” It sounds like a medical procedure you don’t discuss at dinner, but it means cleaning house. It means brainwashing. You make everyone confess their sins and study the boss’s doctrine until their eyes bleed. He is signaling that control over the “gun”—the military—requires a state of perpetual cleansing. He thinks he has to scrub the floor every day, or the dirt will kill him.

But here is the massive, cosmic joke that dictates the failure of **authoritarian leadership**. When you make people that scared, they lie to you. Imagine you are a general involved in **PLA corruption**—everyone steals money in these systems; it’s how the wheels turn. Suddenly, the boss is looking for traitors. You aren't going to tell the truth. You are going to point at the guy next to you and say, “He did it! He hates you! I love you!”

This creates a dangerous information bubble. Xi is surrounding himself with people too terrified to report that the missiles might be junk. They will say, “The missiles are perfect, sir!” This is how you end up with a military that looks scary on TV but falls apart in a real fight. He is destroying his own power by trying to tighten his grip.

Don't think we are better in the West, by the way. Our politicians are just as pathetic, demanding their own versions of loyalty tests. The Left cancels you if you miss the right buzzwords; the Right primaries you if you don't kiss the ring. It is the same sickness—a desperate need for total agreement. Leaders everywhere are weak and want a warm blanket of “Yes Men.” Xi is just taking it to the extreme because he has the power to ruin lives.

He will keep firing people. He will fire the new guys he just hired, and then the guys who replaced them. It is a wheel that never stops crushing people. He thinks he is fixing the engine, but he is just stripping the gears. Eventually, he will be the only one left in the room, shouting orders at an empty chair. And honestly, considering the state of humanity, maybe that is exactly what we deserve.

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**Authoritative Sources & Fact-Check:** * **Primary Source:** *The New York Times* – [In Xi Jinping’s Purge of the Military, a Search for Absolute Loyalty](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/16/world/asia/xi-military-zhang-youxia-mao.html) * **Context:** This article discusses the ongoing anti-corruption campaign targeting the People's Liberation Army (PLA) and the Rocket Force, drawing parallels to historical rectification campaigns under Mao Zedong.