Analysis: Military elder put silent pressure on Xi at Beidaihe

Katsuji Nakazawa is a Tokyo-based senior staff and editorial writer at Nikkei. He spent seven years in China as a correspondent and later as China bureau chief. He was the 2014 recipient of the Vaughn-Ueda International Journalist prize.

A 94-year-old military heavyweight was sitting silently as President Xi Jinping and other top decision-makers of the Chinese Communist Party carefully listened to another retired party elder remark on the country's situation at a meeting at the seaside resort of Beidaihe this summer.