Throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, Yang Shangkun was hugely influential within the People's Liberation Army. Yang and his younger half-brother, Yang Baibing, purged China's military of any officers who had not sufficiently supported the government's violent crackdown on students. Yang then began an organized attempt to fill as many senior military positions as possible with his supporters, generating an attitude of resentment among other military elders, who accused Yang of attempting to dominate the army and possibly challenge Deng's authority by developing a "Yang family clique". When Yang resisted the rise of Jiang Zemin (who had been the Party secretary of Shanghai), whom Deng began to groom to succeed him as paramount leader, party elders, including Deng himself forced Yang to retire in 1993, along with some of his family.