PLA continues battle cries supporting graft crackdown after Xu Caihou's downfall
Senior officers make a public show of support for the president after the graft investigation is announced into a former top general
The military has further closed ranks and rallied behind President Xi Jinping and his anti-corruption campaign, loudly voicing their loyalty on the front page of the army's official newspaper after the fall of retired general Xu Caihou.
The nation's top military institutions and all seven regional military commands pledged support for the anti-graft investigation into Xu and swore absolute allegiance to the president - who is also their commander-in-chief as head of the Central Military Commission - in a front-page article published in yesterday's .
The banner headline said the People's Liberation Army and the People's Armed Police "stand firmly for" the crackdown and that Xu's expulsion from the Communist Party was the right decision by its top leaders.
PLA officials of all ranks were asked to read or watch news reports about the investigation, while regional military commands vowed to step up measures to fight corruption, the newspaper said.
The pledges were a show of loyalty but also of self-preservation amid the sweeping anti-graft probe in the military, according to the Beijing-based political commentator Zhang Lifan.
"The announcement of Xu's case served as a warning to the military not to take any actions [against the anti-graft campaign]," Zhang said.
