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


Sign up to our most popular newsletter, From the Editor. Look
forward to receiving free-thinking comment and the day's biggest
stories, every morning. telegraph.co.uk/fromtheeditor


Contact us with feedback or ideas:


battlelines@telegraph.co.uk 


@venetiarainey


@RolandOliphant


Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.