Nuclear secrets leak or paranoia? Why Xi really purged China’s top general

Xi Jinping is purging again. Generals once seen as untouchable are gone, rivals erased, loyalty enforced through fear. Is this the move of a leader under real threat or the paranoia of a man who has ruled too long and trusts no one? To find out more, Venetia talks to Oriana Skylar Mastro, director of the Indo-Pacific Policy Lab at Stanford University’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies.

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has been to Beijing, the first British leader to do so in eight years, talking trade, visas and whisky tariffs while security concerns barely made the script. We hear from The Telegraph’s Ben Riley-Smith, behind the smiles come burner phones, burner laptops, fears of honey traps and even planes being bugged. Economic opportunity versus national security. Values versus power.

Meanwhile Britain faces its own reckoning. Spies in Parliament. Phones hacked inside Downing Street. A vast Chinese mega embassy rising in central London amid warnings from MI5. Venetia is joined in the studio by The Telegraph’s Gareth Corfield and Rozina Sabur to discuss the extent of the national security threat posed by China.

Read Rozina Sabur's hacking scoop: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/01/26/china-hacked-downing-street-phones-for-years/

Read Gareth Corfield's embassy scoop: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/01/12/revealed-china-embassy-secret-plans-spy-basement/

Read Colin Freeman's analysis: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/01/27/general-zhang-youxia-chinas-nuclear-secrets/

Producer: Peter Shevlin

Executive Producer: Louisa Wells

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battlelines@telegraph.co.uk

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@RolandOliphant

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