Liu Yazhou
|
Air Force General Liu Yazhou |
|
|---|---|
| 刘亚洲 空军上将 |
|
| Personal details | |
| Born |
October 19, 1952 Fenghua County, Zhejiang Province, China |
| Spouse(s) | Li Xiaolin |
| Children | One son |
| Military service | |
| Allegiance |
 China
|
| Service/branch |
 People's Liberation Army Air Force
|
| Rank |
 Air Force General
|
Liu Yazhou (Chinese: 刘亚洲; born 19 October 1952) is a general of China's People's Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF), and the political commissar of the PLA National Defence University since September 2009. He is known for his hawkish views on the defense and strategic posture he believes China should adopt.
Liu was born in 1952 in Fenghua, Zhejiang Province, near the city of Ningbo. Liu Yazhou has been described as a "princeling": his father-in-law was a top military officer, and Li Xiannian, who once served as President of the People's Republic of China, was his father-in-law. This privileged political pedigree gives him a greater platform for his views and opinions. His writings "have dazzled as well as upset his readers; supporters praise his boldness and insight, and detractors condemn his alleged militarism and demagoguery."
Liu has written novels and essays to both acclaim and controversy; he is unusual in China, as a prominent military figure, for his outspoken views and apparent violation of a number of taboos on political discourse.
At the same time, his prolific writing may have contributed in part to his rise through the ranks. He leans on the sayings of former Chinese leaders to make indirect criticisms of Chinese Communist Party policies. Unlike many PLA officials, Liu has traveled much overseas, including serving as a visiting professor at Stanford University.
In 2010 Liu was promoted by deputy political commissar of the PLA Air Force, to political commissar of NDU, the premier academic and defense research institute in China. Prior to that Liu was the director of the political division of the Beijing Military Region, the political commissar of the Chengdu Military Region's Air Force, and the deputy political commissar of the PLA Air Force.
Liu Yazhou made headlines in the West in 2010 when he made a series of public remarks about democracy in China. "Democracy is the most urgent; without it there is no sustainable rise. Ideals of democracy are not restricted by national borders, or by historical ones," he said in August 2010, in an article in the Hong Kong magazine Phoenix Weekly.
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Wikipedia