General Xu Qiliang: how a Chinese air force top gun shot to the top of military

General Xu Qiliang is one of the two vice-chairmen of the Central Military Commission. Here we present a snapshot of his career:

General Xu Qiliang, who joined the air force when he was only 16, climbed to the top of the military ladder on Wednesday when he became the top-ranked vice-chairman of China’s powerful Central Military Commission (CMC), which is chaired by Communist Party general secretary Xi Jinping.

The promotion, announced by the first plenum of the party’s new Central Committee, made Xu, 67, the first air force general to reach such heights, with the top leadership of the People’s Liberation Army having long been dominated by land force officers.

He became the second-ranked CMC vice-chairman and a member of the party’s decision-making Politburo five years ago, at the start of Xi’s first term as party chief, and has now succeeded General Fan Changlong as first-ranked vice-chairman.

Xu was once considered as a protégé of former party chief Jiang Zemin because his career took off when Jiang was in power in the 1990s. However, military sources told the South China Morning Post that Xu’s high-flying career was actually linked to two key people: former CMC vice-chairman Zhang Zhen and President Xi.