{"id":389561,"date":"2025-09-01T15:42:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-01T15:42:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/389561\/"},"modified":"2025-09-01T15:42:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-01T15:42:10","slug":"chinas-victory-day-military-parade-why-are-putin-and-kim-jong-un-there-and-what-is-the-axis-of-upheaval-china","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/389561\/","title":{"rendered":"China\u2019s Victory day military parade: why are Putin and Kim Jong-un there, and what is the \u2018axis of upheaval\u2019? | China"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Wednesday, China<\/a> is holding a military parade in the capital, Beijing, to mark 80 years since the end of the second world war. But it\u2019s not just about the past, the parade says a lot about the forces reshaping the world today, and in the future.<\/p>\n

At the parade, Chinese leader Xi Jinping will be flanked by the leaders of some of the world\u2019s most heavily sanctioned nations \u2013 Russia, North Korea<\/a>, Iran and Myanmar \u2013 and a host of other leaders of the global south but notably almost no western leaders.<\/p>\n

The parade is seen as a show of military and diplomatic strength by Beijing amid high-stakes negotiations with Donald Trump\u2019s administration in the US over trade.<\/p>\n

Who is going to China\u2019s victory day parade?<\/p>\n

Russian president Vladimir Putin and North Korea\u2019s Kim Jong-un will attend the victory day parade on 3 September, marking the end of the second world war after Japan\u2019s formal surrender. It will be the first time the two leaders have appeared in public together alongside Xi.<\/p>\n

Iranian president Masoud Pezeshkian is also expected to be on the dais as tens of thousands of troops march through the Chinese capital, completing a quartet that western political and economic analysts have described as the \u201caxis of upheaval\u201d.<\/p>\n

Myanmar junta chief Min Aung Hlaing, who rarely travels abroad, will also attend, the Chinese foreign ministry said on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Most western leaders are expected to shun the parade, making it a major show of diplomatic solidarity between China, Russia and the global south.<\/p>\n

The only western heads of state or government attending the events in Beijing are Robert Fico, the prime minister of EU member state Slovakia, and Aleksandar Vu\u010di\u0107, the president of Serbia.<\/p>\n

Fico has been an opponent of sanctioning Russia for its war against Ukraine and has broken ranks with the EU by visiting Moscow. Vu\u010di\u0107 also visited Moscow in May and wants good relations with Russia and China but says Serbia remains committed to joining the EU.<\/p>\n

The United Nations will be represented by undersecretary general Li Junhua, who previously served in various capacities at the Chinese foreign ministry, including time as the Chinese ambassador to Italy, San Marino and Myanmar.<\/p>\n

What can we expect to see at the parade?<\/p>\n

The highly choreographed event, one of China\u2019s largest in years, will unveil cutting-edge equipment such as fighter jets, missile defence systems and hypersonic weapons \u2013 the results of a long-running modernisation drive of the People\u2019s Liberation Army (PLA) which has lately been beset by corruption scandals and personnel purges.<\/p>\n

China is expected to showcase a range of new weapons, including an enhanced DF-26 intermediate range ballistic missile \u2013 dubbed by Chinese media the \u201cGuam killer\u201d for its ability to hit the US Pacific base with a conventional or nuclear weapon.<\/p>\n

New anti-ship missiles called the Ying Ji, which means \u201ceagle attack\u201d in Chinese, have been spotted by analysts. Chinese commentators have described them as designed to \u201cprevent the United States from posing a serious threat to China\u2019s national security.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the day, Xi Jinping will survey tens of thousands of troops at Tiananmen Square alongside several foreign dignitaries including guest of honour Vladimir Putin.<\/p>\n

Many ordinary Beijing residents who have experienced weeks of widespread disruption to their daily lives will be hoping for a brief respite. The last time the parade was held in 2015, China implemented a nationwide three-day public holiday and Beijing schools delayed the start of term.<\/p>\n

Ahead of the parade, Beijing has also mounted a campaign to emphasise the \u201ccorrect view\u201d of second world war history, which emphasises that China and Soviet Russia played a pivotal role in fighting fascist forces in the Asian and European theatres.<\/p>\n

A People\u2019s Daily commentary this week claimed China\u2019s contribution to fighting Japan was \u201cselectively ignored and underestimated by some\u201d, adding the Communist party\u2019s (CCP) wartime efforts were \u201cdeliberately belittled and vilified\u201d.<\/p>\n

What are the experts saying?<\/p>\n

Political analysts say the parade is designed to demonstrate Xi\u2019s influence over nations intent on reshaping the western-led global order.<\/p>\n

\u201cXi Jinping is trying to showcase that he is very strong, that he is still powerful and well received in China,\u201d said Alfred Wu, associate professor at the Lee Kuan Yew school of public policy at the National University of Singapore.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen Xi was just a regional leader, he looked up to Putin, and saw the kind of leader he could learn from \u2013 and now he is a global leader. Having Kim alongside him, as well, highlights how Xi is now also a global leader.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lim Chuan-Tiong, a researcher with the Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia at the University of Tokyo, said the primary purpose of the \u201ctemporary spectacle\u201d was to reinforce Xi\u2019s power and the strength of the CCP.<\/p>\n

\u201cCommemorating the 80th anniversary … does not necessarily require a military parade,\u201d he said, noting that China only really started marking the date 10 years ago, and at a fraction of the budget.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost of the [leaders] attending, the ones invited, are not there to support China\u2019s commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the victory of WWII,\u201d Lim said. \u201cThey are there to give face to China, to give face to Chinese leaders and to avoid harming bilateral relations. Very simple.\u201d<\/p>\n

What other world leaders have been in China? <\/p>\n

Prior to the parade, world leaders have been attending the Shanghai cooperation organisation security forum (SCO). As well as Vladimir Putin<\/a>, Indian prime minister Narendra Modi and the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdo\u011fan, have been among the attendees.<\/p>\n

Much has been made of Modi\u2019s visit \u2013 his first in seven years \u2013 just as India\u2019s ties with Washington have soured. It has come days after the US doubled tariffs on Indian exports to 50%<\/a>, citing Delhi\u2019s refusal to stop buying Russian oil.<\/p>\n

For China, the two-day SCO summit that started on Sunday could not be better timed. Modi \u201cwill be in China at a moment when India-China relations are stabilising<\/a> and India-US relations have gone south. It is a powerful optic,\u201d South Asia analyst Michael Kugelman said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not sure whether US officials fully realise how much trust they have squandered in such a short time.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Wednesday, China is holding a military parade in the capital, Beijing, to mark 80 years since the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":389562,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[12,26],"class_list":{"0":"post-389561","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-news","9":"tag-world"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115129807362759067","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389561","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=389561"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389561\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/389562"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=389561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=389561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=389561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}