He Disappeared—Now He’s Back. But Is China’s Police Chief Safe?

China's police chief, the Minister of Public Security, Wang Xiaohong, went on a three-day visit to Vietnam from March 15th to the 17th, alongside Defense Minister Dong Jun and Foreign Minister Wang Yi in this so-called 3 plus 3 strategic dialogue. He returned to Beijing on March 17th, and since that day, he has not been seen in public. It's now been almost a month. So for someone like Wang Xiaohong, that's highly unusual. If you look at his past record, he's normally very visible, appearing every few days at meetings, inspections, or official events. So the question is, what's keeping him out of sight? Normally, the rumor mill has gone into overdrive in this kind of a scenario. Different versions of the same story started circulating, all claiming that Wang is under investigation, but each offering a different explanation. Some of them are frankly quite bizarre. For example, one claim says that Wang Xiaohong was involved in massive corruption with PLA generals, laundering billions of yuan. Another says he defected to the CIA and plotted to assassinate Xi Jinping. And then there's the theory that Xi Jinping himself is trying to silence Wang because the police chief has done too much dirty work for the Xi family and knows too much. Now, all of these narratives point to the same thing. They point in one direction, that Wang Xiaohong somehow turned against Xi, and it was Xi Jinping who took him down. But let's pause here, because none of these explanations really hold up. To me, they sound like various forms of support claims. They're just claims to support that Xi Jinping is firmly in control. But is that really so? I don't think these explanations hold up because they don't fit how the CCP system actually works. So most of these wild rumors can be set aside. But then something more specific began to surface. So according to this version, Wang Xiaohong has already been placed under investigation by the CCDI. And CCDI stands for Central Commission for Discipline and Inspection. And here's how it is supposedly happened. So on March 17th, after returning from Vietnam with Wang Yi and Dong Jun, following a three-plus-three meeting, foreign affairs, defense, and public security, the three officials landed in Beijing together. Because this was a diplomatic visit, most of the entourage consisted of foreign ministry staff. And Wang Xiaohong himself had only two civilian aides from the Ministry of Public Security with him to go to Vietnam. In other words, very limited security. He was relatively exposed. Now after landing in Beijing, protocol kicked in. Wang Yi, as the highest ranking official and a Politburo member, left first. But just as Wang Xiaohong and Dong Jun were prepared to leave, something happened. A senior CCDI official, his name is Liu Jinguo, who is the deputy director of the commission, suddenly appeared on site along with multiple investigators from the commission. They approached both men directly and told them they needed to go with them to the CCDI office to assist with an ongoing investigation. At that point, there was no room for resistance, no security team, no leverage. And they were outnumbered and taken in. And according to the claim, once they arrived at the CCDI compound, Wang Xiaohong was immediately taken inside. Dong Jun, however, was kept outside. And soon after, someone came out and told him he was free to go home, which makes one thing very clear. The operation was targeting Wang Xiaohong, and only Wang Xiaohong. Dong Jun was just there as cover. The story goes even further. It claims Dong Jun was so shaken by what had happened that he stayed out of public view for nearly three weeks, only appearing recently. Now, whether this specific account is true or not, we cannot confirm. But here's what we can confirm. Since March 17th, Wang Xiaohong has completely disappeared from public view. No meetings, no speeches, no official appearances, nothing. Some observers even went back and reviewed his entire activity record for 2025 by going through everything on the website of the Ministry of Public Security. The longest gap they could find between his public appearances was about 15 days. Now, there are people who say 12 days, and there are others who claim 15 days. So let's just say 15 days. This time, he hasn't been seen for 28 days and counting. And it doesn't stop there. He also missed several key events, most notably Xi Jinping's visit to Xiong'an on March 23rd. It was Xi Jinping's first trip outside Beijing in almost four months. Under normal circumstances, Wang Xiaohong, as Xi's top security official, would be right there with him. But he wasn't. And that's what makes the situation stand out. This isn't just a gap, it's a pattern. And in the CCP system, this is not normal. Now, the reason these rumors about Wang Xiaohong feel so credible right now, so believable and so credible, is because they didn't appear overnight. They've been building for months. In fact, they go all the way back to last September, around the time of the party's fourth plenum. Now, the first wave of rumors surfaced just before the meeting. At the time, people were saying Wang Xiaohong had stage two throat cancer and would step down after the plenum, the fourth plenum. But that did not happen. He stayed on. Then came the second wave, after Zhang Youxia and Liu Zhengli were taken down. This time, the claim was that Wang would soon retire due to illness. And it didn't stop there. There were also rumors about lung cancer, liver cancer. And some of these claims dated all the way back to 2018. But others offer a different explanation. They say that Wang Xiaohong really suffers from not physical illness, but political illness. Some claim that he has a political cancer. The argument is simple. He's done too much for Xi Jinping, from monitoring party elders to being linked, rightly or wrongly, to the death of former Premier Li Keqiang, to the rest of the two generals earlier this year. In other words, he has accumulated too many enemies. And at some point, the system moves against you. And that brings us to the key question. Is Wang Xiaohong's disappearance the result of real illness or political retribution? In my view, the answer is clear. The signs of a political takedown have been there for a while. And this is not something we can ignore. They started as early as late 2025. So let me go back to November last year. Because that's when people first started to notice something was off. At the time, Wang Xiaohong disappeared from public view for eight days, not long enough to raise eyebrows like this time. This is 28 days. But during that window, two events stood out. The first was on November 15th. The CCP published an article calling on the entire police system to study or follow a model officer. His name is Dong Yijun, who was a deputy director of the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau. He had died in the line of duty. But the details didn't add up. The day that he died was October 21st, last year, second day of the fourth plenum. It's just one day after the opening of the fourth plenum. Cause of death? Sudden illness. A phrase that inside the CCP system is both the most common and the most suspicious. And then there was the timing. The announcement of his death came on November 15th, a full 25 days delay. Now, you know, inside the CCP system, this kind of delay is not normal. It usually signals something sensitive, something that cannot be disclosed immediately, which raises a serious question. What really happened to Dong Yijun? And here's why his death matters. Now, Dong wasn't just any deputy. He was one of Wang Xiaohong's closest aides. Someone deeply embedded in his inner circle with access to highly sensitive information, which means that whatever happened to Dong points directly back to Wang Xiaohong. That's the first event that happened during the eight days that Wang Xiaohong was missing. And then there was a second event, which adds an entirely different layer. On November 10th, FBI Director Kash Patel quietly arrived in Beijing. The purpose? Direct negotiations on fentanyl cooperation. Now, under normal circumstances, there's only one person on Chinese side who should be handling this, Wang Xiaohong, because he is the minister of public security. He's the head of National Narcotics Control Commission and the primary official responsible for past US-China counter narcotics negotiations. But this time, he wasn't even there. Instead, the meeting was handled by Xu Datong, a vice minister, ranked third within the ministry. So that's why as early as last November, people were already noticing that something wasn't right, that Wang Xiaohong's position was becoming unstable. Now, if you track Wang Xiaohong's trajectory through 2025, it reads like a step-by-step dismantling of his power network, a systemic cutting operation. In addition to those two events I mentioned, his inner circle or his outer circle, whatever you call that, were being cut. He lost his vice minister and the head of National Immigration Administration. His name is Xu Ganlu. Now, this is not just any official, he's a longtime Fujian ally of both Wang Xiaohong and Xi Jinping. So that move alone weakened Wang's support base. And then came the core. In July, Wang Xiaohong lost two more key lieutenants, Cheng Siyuan, who is in charge of internal administration at the ministry, and then Sun Maoli, who manages all the financials within the ministry. So one does all the administrative work, the other handles money. Those two were also removed, they're gone. So his operational nerve system within the ministry was effectively severed. And their replacements, they're not people with ties to him at all. So throughout 2025, what we see is a stripped down Wang Xiaohong. His regional allies removed, his institutional base reshaped, his closest aid dead during suspicious circumstances, his public appearances becoming irregular, his role in key international negotiations diminished. And when you put all of that together, the current rumor that he's being taken in by the CCDI doesn't feel out of place. It feels like the logical endpoint of everything we've already seen or we've already been watching unfold. He is a man who sits at the center of a vast and highly opaque network of power. He served as police chief in Fujian. That's how he started his career. Now, Fujian is a region long tied to overseas Chinese networks, which means he's widely believed to have deep connections to Chinese-linked organized crime operating overseas. There are also persistent allegations tying him to telecom scam operations in Southeast Asia, in Myanmar and Cambodia. And these scam operations are tied to money laundering, illegal gambling, human trafficking, and even organ harvesting. There are even claims that Wang Xiaohong was involved in building parallel security networks of private armed forces in Southeast Asia. It's what some describe as a form of private armed forces that ultimately serves Xi Jinping. Wang Xiaohong rose because he was Xi Jinping's sharpest blade. But in the system, the sharper the blade, the more dangerous it becomes. After my Tuesday live stream, Wang Xiaohong made a quiet appearance, but if anything, it only signals more trouble. As Vietnam's party chief visits China on April 15th, Xinhua News Agency published a report titled, Chen Wenqing meets with Vietnamese Politburo member and Minister of Public Security. Now, Chen Wenqing is Wang Xiaohong's superior in the system. He was front and center. But here's what doesn't add up. Vietnam's Minister of Public Security should be meeting with Wang Xiaohong, his direct counterpart. Under normal protocol, Wang shouldn't just be there, he should be leading the meeting. And yet, in Chinese state media coverage, his name is nowhere to be found. Now look at the Vietnamese side. Vietnam News Agency reported the same day that their Minister of Public Security met with Chen Wenqing and Wang Xiaohong. They even released a photo showing Wang at the meeting. So why does Chinese state media omit his name? And it goes further. The Ministry of Public Security's own website makes no mention of the meeting. Think about that. His own ministry doesn't report one of his key engagements. If you check Wang Xiaohong's major activities section, the latest update stops at March 17th this year, his trip to Vietnam for the first 3 plus 3 ministerial dialogue. After that, nothing. So what are we looking at? Wang Xiaohong has been allowed to reappear, but only selectively. At the same time, he's being deliberately downplayed. And that usually means one thing. He is in trouble.