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Donald Trump’s military parade: where might he find inspiration?
The Week offers a few suggestions for a president needing a show of bravado
Donald Trump has ordered the Pentagon to plan a military parade, conjuring up images of US soldiers and tanks marching down Washington DC’s Pennsylvania Avenue.
The news, first reported in The Washington Post, has led to comparisons between Trump and various autocratic leaders from across the globe. Democrat Representative Jackie Speier told CNN that the US president was “truly Napoleon-like” and that a parade would be a “waste” of money.
Many in the West view such displays of military might as “a relic of a bygone era and the Cold War, but they remain a common occurrence in many states - communist and former Soviet nations and beyond”, says the BBC, noting that the UK celebrates the Queen’s birthday each year with Trooping the Colour.
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Join more than 350,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with a selection of The Week’s most interesting, enlightening and entertaining stories - plus daily puzzles.
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Trump conjured up the idea after being “awestruck by the tableau of uniformed French troops marching down Avenue des Champs-Elysees”, The Washington Post says.
So what might a Trump military parade look like? The Week offers the president a few ideas for inspiration:
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un regularly stages huge military parades in Pyongyang, showing off ballistic missiles in a bid to claim international prestige.
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Indeed, the autocratic state is due to stage a massive military parade tomorrow, on the eve of the Winter Olympics. Some observers claim it “is a deliberate attempt to upstage the South Korean games and stir fear”, says CNBC.
Parades “are typically organised to commemorate key dates on the North Korean calendar, and last year’s parade marked the 105th anniversary of the birth of Kim Il Sung, who founded the state’s totalitarian system and Juche ideology”, says The Independent.
China
Since President Xi Jinping came to power in 2012, parades have become more common, as he seeks to “cement control over and reform the colossal People’s Liberation Army”, says CNN.
In 2015, Beijing hosted a massive military parade to mark the 70th anniversary of the end of the Second World War. The parade involved 12,000 troops, 200 fighter jets, hundreds of ballistic missiles, tanks, amphibious assault vehicles, drones, and other military equipment.
France
Led by French President Emmanuel Macron, the 2017 parade that inspired Trump’s decision involved 3,720 soldiers, 211 vehicles, and 241 horses, as well as fly-bys of dozens of planes and helicopters.
While most countries host military parades, those on the scale of France or China are rare. “Rarer still are parades involving hi-tech weaponry, tanks and other heavy equipment, which Trump has reportedly requested,” says CNN.
Moscow hosts an annual event to mark Victory Day, which celebrates the Soviet Union’s triumph over Nazi Germany during the War.
In 2015, this saw “Russia’s biggest ever military parade, with some 16,000 soldiers, 200 armored vehicles, 150 planes and helicopters, as well as ballistic missiles and other assorted hardware put on show”, says CNN.
Trump may want to take note of the troop and tank numbers, as he has already boasted to the world about the size of his nuclear button.
