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In the People's Republic of China (PRC), supreme command of the armed forces is exercised by the Central Military Commission (CMC) of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). A parallel state CMC (PRC CMC) exists. Legally the two CMCs have separate responsibilities, but the distinction is practically irrelevant because the bodies typically have the same members. [1] Since the 2000s, the CCP General Secretary chairs the CMC, and represents the armed forces in the Politburo Standing Committee, the country's ruling body. [2]
When the PRC was founded in 1949, command of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) was transferred to the People's Revolutionary Military Council, a state body, with the CCP leading the coalition government. The CCP CMC was abolished. The 1954 PRC constitution designated the president as the supreme commander, and also as the chair of the National Defense Council (NDC). At the same time, the CCP CMC was reestablished and became the primary policy-making body for the armed forces. The separation of command and policy-making between the state and the party was bridged by the shared memberships of the state and party bodies; for example, Mao Zedong was president and CMC chairman. In the late-1970s and the end of the Cultural Revolution, revisions to the PRC and CCP constitutions made the CCP chairman the supreme commander. [3]
Deng Xiaoping's political reforms again divided responsibilities for the armed forces between the party and the state. The 1982 PRC constitution created the PRC CMC to formally exercise supreme command, with the National People's Congress selecting the chairman, and handle all matters except political work. The CCP CMC — as defined in the 1982 CCP constitution — was responsible for political work. Again, conflicts between the CMCs were eliminated by shared membership. [4]
The relationship between the CMCs and various state and party bodies can make the exercise of supreme command legally ambiguous. The ambiguity may have caused the CCP's regular demands for loyalty from the armed forces since the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre. [5]
The State Council of the People's Republic of China, also known as the Central People's Government, is the chief administrative authority and the national cabinet of China. It is constitutionally the highest administrative organ of the country and the executive organ of the National People's Congress, the highest organ of state power. It is composed of the premier, vice premiers, state councilors, ministers of ministries, directors of committees, the auditor general, and the secretary-general.
The People's Liberation Army (PLA) is the military of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the People's Republic of China. It consists of four services — Ground Force, Navy, Air Force, and Rocket Force — and four arms — Aerospace Force, Cyberspace Force, Information Support Force, and Joint Logistics Support Force. It is led by the Central Military Commission (CMC) with its chairman as commander-in-chief.
The People's Armed Police Force is a Chinese paramilitary organization primarily responsible for internal security, riot control, counter-terrorism, disaster response, law enforcement and maritime rights protection as well as providing support to the People's Liberation Army (PLA) during wartime.
The Central Military Commission (CMC) is the highest national defense organization in the People's Republic of China, which heads the People's Liberation Army (PLA), the People's Armed Police (PAP), and the Militia of China.
A commander-in-chief or supreme commander is the person who exercises supreme command and control over an armed force or a military branch. As a technical term, it refers to military competencies that reside in a country's executive leadership, a head of state, head of government, or other designated government official.
The orders of precedence in China is the ranking of political leaders in China for the purposes of event protocol and to arrange the ordering of names in official news bulletins, both written and televised. It is also sometimes used to assess perceived level of political power. Although there is no formally published ranking, there is usually an established convention and protocol, and the relative positions of Chinese political figures can usually be deduced from the order in meetings and especially by the time and order in which figures are covered by the official media. Since 1982, the General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party has been the highest-ranking official in the People's Republic of China (PRC).
Paramount leader is an informal term for the most important political figure in the People's Republic of China (PRC). The paramount leader typically controls the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the People's Liberation Army (PLA), often holding the titles of CCP General Secretary and Chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC). The state representative, head of state (president) or head of government (premier) are not necessarily paramount leader—under China's party-state system, CCP roles are politically more important than state titles.
The Minister of National Defense of the People's Republic of China is the head of the Ministry of National Defense and one of the top positions in the State Council. The minister usually is also a member of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and a member of the Central Military Commission (CMC), the top governing body of China's armed forces including the People's Liberation Army (PLA).
The Chairman of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party was the leader of the Chinese Communist Party. The position was established at the 8th National Congress in 1945 and abolished at the 12th National Congress in 1982, being replaced by the general secretary. Offices with the name Chairman of the Central Executive Committee and Chairman of the Central Committee existed in 1922–1923 and 1928–1931, respectively.
The government of the People's Republic of China is based on a system of people's congress within the parameters of a unitary communist state, in which the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) enacts its policies through people's congresses. This system is based on the principle of unified state power, in which the legislature, the National People's Congress (NPC), is constitutionally enshrined as "the highest state organ of power." As China's political system has no separation of powers, there is only one branch of government which is represented by the legislature. The CCP through the NPC enacts unified leadership, which requires that all state organs, from the Supreme People's Court to the President of China, are elected by, answerable to, and have no separate powers than those granted to them by the NPC. By law, all elections at all levels must adhere to the leadership of the CCP. The CCP controls appointments in all state bodies through a two-thirds majority in the NPC. The remaining seats are held by nominally independent delegates and eight minor political parties, which are non-oppositional and support the CCP. All government bodies and state-owned enterprises have internal CCP committees that lead the decision-making in these institutions.
The chairman of the Central Military Commission is the head of the Central Military Commission (CMC) and the commander-in-chief of the People's Liberation Army (PLA), the People's Armed Police (PAP) and the Militia. The officeholder is additionally vested with the command authority over China's nuclear arsenals.
The national security of China is the coordination of a variety of organizations, including law enforcement, military, paramilitary, governmental, and intelligence agencies that aim to ensure China's national security. China considers three factors in its national security: national sovereignty, security, and development interests.
The Central Guard Unit, formerly known as the Central Guard Regiment is a unit of the People's Liberation Army Ground Force (PLAGF) of the People's Republic of China responsible for providing security to senior members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), including the General Secretary, the Politburo, and Central Committee as well as ministers and members of the State Council. It is a powerful political tool for the paramount leader as it can control access to, and conduct surveillance on, its charges.
The National People's Congress (NPC) is the highest organ of state power of the People's Republic of China. The NPC is the only branch of government in China, and per the principle of unified power, all state organs from the State Council to the Supreme People's Court (SPC) are subservient to it. With 2,977 members in 2023, it is the largest legislative body in the world. The NPC is elected for a term of five years. It holds annual sessions every spring, usually lasting from 10 to 14 days, in the Great Hall of the People on the west side of Tiananmen Square in Beijing.
The organization of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is based upon the Leninist concept of democratic centralism.
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The president of China, officially titled the president of the People's Republic of China, is the state representative of the People's Republic of China, which on its own is a ceremonial office and has no real power in China's political system. While the office has many of the characteristics of a head of state, the Chinese constitution does not define it as such. However, since 1993, the post has been held by the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and chairman of the Central Military Commission, who is China's de facto leader.
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The National Day Parade, officially the National Day of the People's Republic of China Parade, is a civil-military parade event held at Tiananmen Square in Beijing, the capital of the People's Republic of China, on the National Day of the People's Republic of China on 1 October. It is organized by the People's Liberation Army, the People's Armed Police and the Militia, as well as civilian groups of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). It has been held every decade since 1959, annually from 1950 to 1959, and has been broadcast live on China Central Television since 1984.
The organization of the armed forces of the People's Republic of China is based on grades. Each institution, billet, and officer has a grade. Personnel grades flow from the institution's grade. For example, the grade of a unit commander billet is the same as the unit's, and the officer in that billet receives that grade. Historically, grade, rather than rank, determined or indicated an officer's authority, and various professional and career factors.