CHINA-INTERNAL: FOURTH PLENUM-MILITARY APPOINTMENTS
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With the commencement of the 18th CCP CC's Fourth Plenum on October 22, 2014, in Beijing, there is widespread speculation that CCP CC General Secretary and PRC President Xi Jinping might get the plenum to approve new inductions in the Central Military Commission (CMC). Among the names being mentioned are of General Liu Yuan, current Political Commissar of the PLA's General Logistics Department (GLD) who has been an outspoken critic of corruption and is a friend of Xi Jinping. He is a 'princeling' whose father was the former President of China Liu Shaoqi. Liu Yuan was widely assessed as likely to be promoted and inducted in to the CMC at the 18th Party Congress in December 2012, but that did not materialise. The name of Zhang Youxia is also being mentioned. General Zhang Youxia, who is Director of the PLA's General Armaments Department (GAD) is, however, already a Member of the CMC and if his name is under consideration it would be for a post of Vice Chairman to be newly created. There are currently two vice chairmen of the CMC, PLAAF General Xu Qiliang and General Fan Changlong.
(Comment:Two of the three Fourth Plenums over the last 15 years have involved CMC personnel reshuffles. In 1999, the Fourth Plenum of the 15th CCP Central Committee (CC) in 1999 appointed future President Hu Jintao as Vice Chairman of the CMC and future CMC Vice Chairmen Guo Boxiong and Xu Caihou as CMC members. Five years later at the Fourth Plenum of the 16th CCP CC, Hu Jintao was named CMC chairman in place of former President Jiang Zemin, while Xu Caihou was elevated as CMC Vice Chairman.)
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