China shows off military might at 60th anniversary parade

Tanks and lorries roll through Beijing to mark 60th anniversary of communism in China

Nuclear missile carriers and rocket launchers rumbled past Beijing’s Forbidden City today as the Chinese Communist party celebrated 60 years in power with its biggest display of military hardware and a weather-modification package.

With elements of both the cold war and the new economy, the spectacular parade was intended to showcase how China has modernised and opened up since Mao Zedong declared the founding of the People’s Republic in 1949.
Tania Branigan reports on the festivities Link to this audio

But few of the people of Beijing were allowed anywhere near the event. While about 30,000 guests were invited, local residents were told to stay indoors and watch the two mile procession on television.

The parade was a mix of old-fashioned communist-realist kitsch and newfangled weaponry. From the Gate of Heavenly Peace, the politburo reviewed an array of unmanned drones, Long Sword cruise missiles and other modern weaponry, most of which was developed in China and being shown to the public for the first time.

The huge display of might combined with the ideological slogans and massed ranks of previous parades with unprecedented security levels and extraordinary choreography.

Events began with a 60-gun salute that set off nearby car alarms. The sound of the blasts took several seconds to catch up with the images broadcast on huge LED screens at the other end of a Tiananmen Square decked out in red flags.

Hu Jintao – chairman of the central military commission, general secretary of the Communist party and Chinese president – then reviewed the troops in a glide past. His rigid torso poked out of the roof of a Red Flag limousine that cruised along the ranks of infantry and tanks lined up on Chang’an avenue. Local residents were warned not to go on to their balconies.

“Hello comrades!” an almost motionless Hu shouted out at intervals. In unison, the troops replied: “Hello commander!” and “Serve the people!”

Later, standing on the Tiananmen rostrum, the spot where Mao proclaimed the creation of the new China, Hu declared in an eight-minute speech: “[We] have triumphed over all sorts of difficulties and setbacks and risks to gain the great achievements evident to the world. Today, a socialist China geared towards modernisation, the world and the future towers majestically in the east. We have realised the goal of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.”

Commentators on China’s English-language TV channel repeatedly stressed the country’s commitment to peace, describing its military as defensive and stressing its contribution to peacekeeping initiatives. “It sticks to the strategy of using nuclear power to defend and refuses to engage in the nuclear arms race,” said the commentator as camouflage lorries bearing ballistic missiles rolled past the leaders and the air force roared overhead, leaving a rainbow of smoke-trails behind them.

Tens of thousands of schoolchildren, who had slept in Tiananmen Square overnight, formed a human screen, flipping over coloured cards to create slogans including “Loyalty to the party” and “Harmonious society” as tanks and amphibious landing craft, many painted in pixellated khaki, rolled past.

Soldiers had spent months practising. Most were arranged according to height, in part to ensure their steps were precisely the right length. The women’s militia, all uniformly tall, marched in skirts and boots.

Compared with the spectacular Olympic opening ceremony last year, the parade was surprisingly old-fashioned. The veteran “model workers” waving to the crowd, and the floats with engines and giant wheatsheafs could have come straight from the China of the fifties.

Historical sections paid tribute to Mao Zedong thought, which state television commentators said had been “proved correct” and Deng Xiaoping theory, which mixed market economics with state intervention under the banner of “socialism with Chinese characteristics”.

As displays of space rockets, high-speed railways and petrochemical plants rolled by, state media commentators noted that China was on course to overtake Japan as the world’s second-biggest economy by the end of the year. They said the average daily income in China today was now more than the amount for a whole year in 1949.

There was an Olympic formation, with a model of the Bird’s Nest stadium and an appearance from the Chinese astronaut who performed the country’s first spacewalk last year. He must have sweltered in his spacesuit as despite the heavy fog of the last two days, blue skies appeared on cue early this morning. Officials had pledged to seed clouds if necessary to ensure good weather, and rain appeared abruptly at about midnight last night.

After the recent unrest in Tibet and Xinjiang, the parade tried to emphasise ethnic unity. “Look at all our ethnic groups holding hands and dancing together,” gushed a commentator on the state’s China Radio International. “They are a moving picture of harmonious unity.”

The increasing priority placed by the government on “green issues” was apparent on the environmental protection float and the lauding of China’s “beautiful rivers and mountains”. There was no mention of pollution or melting glaciers on a day of celebration.

The most evident sign of change was in the wind turbines alongside oil derricks on an energy-themed float surrounded by marchers carrying photovoltaic panels.

The country’s first female fighter pilots were among those flying the 151 jets, “reminders of our heroines in history”. But more than half a century after Mao declared that “women hold up half the sky”, the frequent shots of leaders on the Tiananmen rostrum were a reminder that no women serve in the Politburo select committee.

Hu and his predecessor, Jiang Zemin, watched as huge portraits of themselves were carried past, part of a lengthy section celebrating China’s leaders since 1949, but omitting Hua Guofeng, Mao’s immediate successor. As Mao’s portrait passed, a loudspeaker blared out a recording of him announcing the founding of the republic.

At times, the parade was more reminiscent of North Korea’s mass games than a modern global economy. The parade finished with a moment of choreographed joy as hundreds of cheering schoolchildren rushed towards the rostrum to wave at the politburo as tens of thousands of white and brown doves were released.

A 2,000-strong military band played martial tunes throughout the procession.

Minxin Pei, a professor of government at Claremont McKenna college in California, said of the parade: “For more than 15 years [Chinese leaders] have been denouncing those who call China’s rise a threat. Now they put on this display of military hardware, with goose-stepping soldiers to match. Aren’t they confirming the China threat?”

Geremie Barmé, of the Australian National University, who has studied past National Day parades, said the displays were typically aimed at the domestic audience which comprised Communist party officials and ordinary Chinese.

“It is meant to educate, excite, unite and entertain,” he told Associated Press. “If a tad of ‘shock and awe’ is delivered around the world, all well and good.