Xi Jinping's anti-corruption campaign is less about clean governance and more about consolidating one-man rule — purging rivals, silencing dissent and tightening internet censorship under officials like Lu Wei. The arrests haven't loosened Beijing's grip on information; apps keep disappearing and online speech remains criminalized. Calling this a genuine reform ignores that the crackdown intensified right after Xi secured a second term and moved toward lifetime rule.
China's anti-corruption drive has delivered real, measurable results — public satisfaction with clean governance rose from 75 percent to 97.4 percent, and military strength has only grown stronger through self-reform, not weaker. Corruption itself erodes combat readiness and public trust; rooting it out is what rebuilt the PLA into a force capable of publicly demonstrating submarine-launched strategic missiles. Dismissing this as mere power consolidation misreads a decade of documented institutional transformation.
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