BEIJING, Sept 3 (Reuters) – Chinese President Xi Jinping warned the world was facing a choice between peace or war at a massive military parade in Beijing on Wednesday, flanked by Russia’s Vladimir Putin and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un in an unprecedented show of force.
The event to mark 80 years since Japan’s defeat at the end of World War Two was largely shunned by Western leaders, with Putin and Kim – pariahs in the West due to the Ukraine war and Kim’s nuclear ambitions – the guests of honour.

Designed to project China’s military might and diplomatic clout, it also comes as U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs and volatile policymaking strain its relations with allies and rivals alike.
“Today, mankind is faced with the choice of peace or war, dialogue or confrontation, win-win or zero-sum,” Xi told a crowd of more than 50,000 spectators at Tiananmen Square, adding that the Chinese people “firmly stand on the right side of history”.
Riding in an open-top limousine, Xi then inspected the troops and cutting-edge military equipment such as hypersonic missiles, underwater drones and a weaponised ‘robot wolf’.

XI’S GLOBAL VISION

IMPRESSIVE STRIDES

Over the past two years, more than a dozen generals – many formerly close to Xi – have been purged from the People’s Liberation Army in a sweeping corruption crackdown.

“The parade allows Xi to focus the world’s attention on its impressive strides in modernising its military hardware, while overshadowing the stubborn challenges afflicting the PLA, most notably the continued purges rolling through the ranks of its most senior officers,” said Jon Czin, a foreign policy analyst at Brookings Institution, a U.S.-based think tank.

The parade was not only aimed at projecting China’s might to the outside world, but also galvanising patriotic spirit at home, analysts said.

In his keynote address, Xi called the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation “unstoppable”. Civil servants up and down the country have been tasked with watching the parade and writing down their reflections, one of them told Reuters.

Additional reporting by Xiaoyu Yin, Go Nakamura, Xihao Jiang, Alessandro Diviggiano, Maxim Shemetov, Shubing Wang, Tingshu Wang, Laurie Chen, Joe Cash, Xiuhao Chen, Tiffany Le, Lewis Jackson, Nicoco Chan, Florence Lo and Kevin Krolicki in Beijing; Liz Lee, Shi Bu, Qiaoyi Li in Shanghai; Lidia Kelly in Melbourne; Ju-min Park, Joyce Lee and Josh Smith in Seoul; Writing by John Geddie; Editing by Alex Richardson, Lincoln Feast and Michael Perry