A show of force might be a disturbing display of intent but it says nothing about military readiness
China is trying to nudge the world into an arms race. It is a competition it thinks it can win. On 3 September, President Xi’s People’s Liberation Army put on a display of 15,000 troops and hundreds of pieces of hardware that took 70 minutes to trundle across Tiananmen Square. Following the symbology of Putin and Trump riding in the US presidential limousine recently, Xi, Putin, and Kim arrived and departed together in Xi’s armour-plated car.
Apart from the “terrible threesome” in the front rank, China’s guest list advertised Beijing’s growing influence in the used to be known as the Third World, now the Global South. There were no surprises that Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian, the Belarusian Aleksandr Lukashenko, Zimbabwe’s Emmerson Mnangagwa, the Republic of Congo’s Denis Sassou Nguesso, and Cuban Miguel Díaz-Canel walked and chatted as equals with Putin and Kim. From Europe came a pair of pro-Kremlin bad boys, Serbia’s Aleksandr Vucic and Slovakia’s Robert Fico. Though Hungary’s Victor Orban visited Beijing in July 2024, he was absent for Xi’s 3 September extravaganza.
It was puzzling that no one else came from the Americas or Africa, and the remainder of national leaders originated from the old USSR or Asia. They included those from Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, the Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan and Vietnam. From Central Asia came the presidents of Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro sent fraternal greetings, and flashed his Huawei phone given by Xi, commenting “Neither the gringos, nor spy planes, nor satellites can intercept it,” which is surely tempting fate. But he was a no-show. Remember them. As other invitees stayed away, analysts will assess this line-up of rascals as tomorrow’s trouble-makers.
It was designed as a follow-on from the 25th Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) annual economic summit attended by the ‘Big Four’ of Putin, Xi, Turkey’s Erdogan and India’s Modi, it is noticeable how the Turkish and Indian leaders did not stay, but headed home to Ankara and Delhi before Xi’s excessive display of hardware began to trundle through. Ostensibly held to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II when from the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931, China lost 20 million, Xi’s military spectacle was allegedly to “signal that China upholds peace and will firmly defend international fairness and justice”. Really? Tell that to the Taiwanese.
Just as parades elsewhere in time and place have contained important subtexts, Beijing’s had several important aims. It was partly a meeting of minds for Putin and Xi, who unusually wore workers’ suits of the kind once sported by Chairman Mao. Both modern leaders are actively revising and upgrading their national histories of World War II, while downplaying the wartime help received from their allies. However, with Russia and its equipment well and truly busted as a paper tiger, the show was also created for Xi to advertise his military power, both its awesome size and hi-tech appearance.
Should we be worried? At present, not in the slightest
This may actually worry Putin. He must know that China and Russia are partners only of convenience, bonded by their antipathy to the West. Any day, a resurgent Beijing might shift its military gaze at Moscow, and with most Russian combat power sacrificed pointlessly in Ukraine, the Kremlin would be left incredibly vulnerable. Some, like India’s Modi, will hedge their bets and try to ride both tigers. Having lined up his potential customers, Xi’s event was also an unsubtle arms emporium, showcasing China’s latest weaponry to potential buyers, particularly those who have bought embarrassing quantities of now-questionable Russian kit, or want cut-price copies of modern Western equipment.
Should we be worried? At present, not in the slightest. The unmanned land, sea and air fleets, submarine drones, high energy laser projectors, military platforms, sensors and shooters, missiles and ladder-climbing “robot wolves”, designed to dazzle or unnerve observers of the 3 September display may have been shiny and new, and obviously more modern than those equivalents found in the arsenals of G7 democracies, but most western military equipment has been extensively road-tested under arduous conditions in Afghanistan, Iraq, or Ukraine — unlike China’s.
Remembering that some kit on display may be plastic mock-up concept weapons, highly synchronised music, singing and robotic marching do not an army make. Instead, realistic combat exercises, tests of joint theatre commands with integrated logistics, information, cyber and space activities, are the only true way to assess a nation’s military strength. We have seen little of this on any large scale, and China would be most unwise to indulge in an expeditionary operation against Taiwan without such preparations and rehearsals.
We must not overlook the immaturity of Beijing’s armed forces. Featuring in the 160 aircraft flypast were three Chinese YY-20 aerial tankers, the first indigenous design of this type, but a combat capability the UK and USA have possessed for the last 70 years. Likewise, Xi has two active aircraft carriers, a third undergoing sea trials and a fourth under construction, with two more planned by the 2030s. New to China, these are warship types the West have possessed for over a century. Additionally, the People’s Liberation Navy have few carrier aircraft and no doctrine or experience in their operational use. Its air-to-air refuellers and its carriers, as with the rest of its army and air forces, are combat virgins, a fact 3 September could not conceal.
These various parades hint that we may be staring into the abyss of a worldwide modern arms race
Perhaps the main concern was President Xi’s 3 September rhetoric. In stating that “Today, humanity once again faces choices: peace or war, dialogue or confrontation, mutually beneficial cooperation or zero-sum games,” it is disturbing to observe that China and its 27 friends think that by bullying and threatening war, they will achieve their geostrategic objectives for the 21st century. President Trump caught the mood in his post to Xi on Truth Social, “Please give my warmest regards to Vladimir Putin, and Kim Jong Un, as you conspire against the United States of America.” These various parades hint that we may be staring into the abyss of a worldwide modern arms race. Think dreadnoughts before 1914, but this time the competition will be with drones and missiles. Clearly the West must rearm, fast and effectively. Meanwhile, we should perhaps be relieved that the scoundrel nations assembled in Beijing still think that big parades designed to dazzle or terrify will do the job for them.
Like Tiananmen Square, Moscow’s Red Square is tailor-made for military spectacles, as its cobbled surface and surrounding buildings magnify and reflect the squeal of tanks tracks and thud of multiple jackboots. Its annual victory day parades, designed to exude power but killed under Yeltsin though resumed under Putin, have attracted Western experts, who minutely scrutinise every passing vehicle and soldier to upgrade knowledge of their foes. The first big military gathering was held on Mayday in 1941 when a five-hour procession of two million advertising their love and loyalty to Josef Stalin processed, including uniformed troops, youth groups, students, musicians, artists, factory workers, mothers and farmers from across the USSR, who carried banners reading, “we are ready”, “peace-through-preparedness”, and “we will sacrifice our lives for the Motherland”.
Designed to deter Berlin, from an aerial display of 300 warplanes dive bombers descended from high altitude towards the densely packed square below, but above all, the event was designed to impress and reassure the frightened Soviet populace, amongst whom rumours of impending German invasion rippled. Seven weeks later Russia found itself at war in a long, bitter struggle with the Third Reich that concluded only on 9 May 1945. Subsequently, on 24 June, Red Square witnessed the gathering of 40,000 Red Army soldiers, cavalry brigades, artillery, 38 military bands totalling 1,300 musicians, plus 1,850 military vehicles, tanks, motorcycles and armoured cars to celebrate Soviet victory. Led by Marshal Zhukhov on a white stallion galloping across the rain-soaked cobbles (some say Stalin hoped his potential rival would be unseated in the poor weather), its high point came when NKVD combat troops threw down Wehrmacht and SS banners captured in Berlin at the foot of Lenin’s mausoleum, on whose roof Stalin was saluting. This parade was to acknowledge the extreme sacrifice of 30 million, savour the perseverance of the Soviet people in defeating Hitler’s Reich, and cement the position of their leader, Stalin. Tsar Nicholas I’s old maxim of “Orthodoxy, Autocracy and Nationality” had triumphed.
More recently, President Donald Trump found the tarmac-surfaced and tree-lined Constitution Avenue in Washington DC dissipated military noise, when tanks, helicopters, bands and drones, plus 6,600 soldiers in historic and modern uniforms, helped celebrate the US Army’s 250th anniversary on 15 June this year, by happenstance also their president’s 79th birthday. Methinks that DJT was secretly aching for the Moscow version, rather than Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth’s modest 8 CH-47 Chinook and 16 UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters, World War II-era P-51 Mustangs, pair of Sherman tanks and six modern M1A1 Abrams tanks that flew or clanked past spectators at a cost of $25-45 million. Some Americans baulked at even this heavy equipment in their capital, never mind the cost. Who was the parade for? As the president insisted on it, the celebrations appeared to be mostly for his benefit.
We should not tell Xi or Kim that multiple brass bands, acres of precision-orchestrated, bayonet wielding soldiers and long columns of freshly painted tanks do not herald warfighting effectiveness, as Putin has already discovered. In fact, the 1941 Moscow Mayday version so lulled Stalin into a sense of false security that Russia almost lost the war. Hitler, too, had an eye for a good ceremony and polished perambulations. His Wehrmacht’s thumping triumphal march down the Avenue Foch in Paris of 14 June 1940, directly copied the route of the allied victory procession of 14 July 1919. Both events created false narratives which ultimately did neither force any good. Though Britain has its Trooping of the Colour and France its Bastille Day, this is why in the West, defence spending in the democracies is always diverted to exercises and training rather than numbers, show and spectacle.
