Xu Caihou

Xu Caihou
徐才厚
Xu Caihou in October 2009
Vice Chairman of the Central Military Commission
In office
State Commission
13 March 2005 – 14 March 2013
Party Commission
19 September 2004 – 15 November 2012
ChairmanHu Jintao
Head of the General Political Department of the People's Liberation Army
In office
November 2002 – September 2004
Preceded byYu Yongbo
Succeeded byLi Jinai
Secretary of the Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Central Military Commission
In office
December 2000 – November 2002
Preceded byZhou Ziyu
Succeeded byZhang Shutian
Personal details
BornJune 1943
Wafangdian, Fengtian, Manchukuo
(now Liaoning, China)
Died15 March 2015(2015-03-15) (aged 71)
Beijing, China
Political partyChinese Communist Party (1971–2014, expelled)
Alma materHarbin Military Engineering Institute
Military service
Allegiance People's Republic of China
Branch/service People's Liberation Army
Years of service1963–1966
1970–2013
Rank General
(stripped in 2014)
CommandsJinan Military Region (1996–1999)
Chinese name
Chinese
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu PinyinXú Cáihòu
Wade–GilesHsü Ts'ai-hou
IPA[ɕǔ tsʰăɪhôu]

Xu Caihou (Chinese: 徐才厚; June 1943 – 15 March 2015) was a Chinese general in the People's Liberation Army (PLA) and vice chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC), the country's top military council. As vice chairman of the CMC, he was one of the top ranking officers of the People's Liberation Army. He also held a seat on the 25-member Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party between 2007 and 2012.

Born to a working-class family in Liaoning province, Xu spent much of his earlier career in northeastern China. He moved to Beijing in 1990 to become political commissar of the 16th Group Army, later serving as editor of the PLA's flagship newspaper, the PLA Daily. In 1996 Xu became political commissar of the Jinan Military Region. He became vice chairman of the CMC in September 2004. He retired from office in March 2013.

In March 2014, Xu was detained and put under investigation on suspicion of bribery in one of the highest profile corruption investigations in PLA history. In June 2014, Xu was expelled from the Communist Party. Xu allegedly accumulated massive wealth by routinely demanding large bribes for the promotion of officers under him during his time as vice chairman of the CMC. Xu was undergoing legal proceedings and facing a court martial but charges were dropped after he died of bladder cancer in March 2015.