Washington, Feb 12 (RHC)-- While the U.S. has been a major military power all of the years after World War I and outspends the next eight nations combined when it comes to military expenditures, instances of showcasing Washington’s military power on the streets in the form of parades have been very rare. Observers say this seems to be changing as U.S. President Donald Trump has asked the Pentagon to plan a large-scale military parade later this year to showcase the might of America’s armed forces.
Trump has long wanted to hold such a parade and he finally discussed it with senior military leaders, including Vice President Mike Pence, White House chief of staff John Kelly, Defense Secretary James Mattis and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Joseph Dunford in a meeting last month.
Apparently the president was so impressed by France’s Bastille Day parade, which he witnessed in July last year, that he finally asked one for himself. “I want a parade like the one in France,” Trump had told his senior military aides in the last month meeting, referring to the Bastille Day procession he attended.
Numerous critics, among them politicians, comedians and celebrities, immediately hit the administration with accusations of behaving like dictatorial and authoritarian regimes, defying long traditions of abstaining from the display of military might on city streets. Others also argued that a military parade would cost millions of dollars at a time when an overstretched military is constantly asking for more money. Democrat Representative Jackie Speier of California said: “We have a Napoleon in the making here.”
Congressman Ted Lieu, also from California tweeted anything “would be more useful than asking the Pentagon to waste money on a big military parade.” And U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham, a right-wing Republican lawmaker in the upper chamber of Congress, said he favored highlighting the country’s military but not its weaponry.
Trump’s proposal for a military parade in times of peace demonstrates that he is preoccupied showing-off his personal grandeur. Coupled with his “Make America Great Again” slogan, Trump’s personal ambitions to display himself as a powerful nationalist leader illustrate his true objectives for ordering military parades.
In this sense, political observers say it seems Trump’s military parade proposal is a vehicle for two objectives: firstly to boost American nationalistic fervor in line with his “make America great again” slogan, and secondly to fulfill President Trump’s lifelong endeavor for individual greatness.
