CMC Political Work Conference; Xi inspects Qinghai; Video from Second Thomas Shoal incident; Policy support for hard tech and venture capital

Summary of today’s Essential Eight:

1. CMC Political Work Conference - As discussed in several newsletters over the last week, Xi did convene a PLA political work conference in Yan’an, as part of the rectification and political training campaign that ha been underway, presumably because of the corruption mess that came to light last year. This was not the same as the 2014 All Military Political Work Conference 全军政治工作会议 as it was a Central Military Commission Political Work Conference 中央军委政治工作会议. Regardless, it is important, and from the readout it does like sound the corruption problems are still significant and the supervisory bodies within the PLA have underperformed. Bloomberg's January story that US intelligence assessed that the PLA corruption was still such a significant problem that PLA readiness to fight was impacted looks to be validated by this conference. The choice of Yan’an, and repeated references to the brutal “Yan’an Rectification” in PLA commentary pieces ahead of thi…