The military parade held on September 3 in Beijing to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II and the Japanese occupation of China was the perfect opportunity for the country to send an unequivocal message: to demonstrate to the world, and particularly to the United States, its power and its increasingly decisive role on the global stage in stark contrast to the West.

The event's main focus was on China's weapons, which it displayed prominently in the presence of Chinese president Xi Jinping, Russian Vladimir Putin, and North Korean Kim Jong Un. These weapons represent the new world order that has already begun to become increasingly evident in recent days at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (Sco) summit held in Tianjin, China (see AVIONEWS). Notably absent from the parade (but present at the summit) were Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Turkish resident Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who, however, attended the summit along with Modi.

Moreover, except for Slovak prime minister Robert Fico and Serbian president Aleksandar Vucic, representatives of Western countries were not in Beijing, underlining the distance from the Eastern bloc.

Donald Trump extended his "best wishes" for the anniversary celebration, writing on his "Truth" platform: "The big question to be answered is whether or not Chinese president Xi will mention the enormous amount of support and 'blood' the United States of America gave to China to help secure its freedom from a very hostile foreign invader. May president Xi and the wonderful Chinese people have a great and lasting day of celebration." "Please pass on my heartfelt greetings to Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un as you conspire against the United States of America," he added. "No one was plotting, no one was plotting anything," retorted Russian foreign policy adviser Yuri Ushakov .

During the parade along Beijing's Avenue of Eternal Peace, the People's Liberation Army's current armaments were paraded one after another. Among the standouts were the DF-61 intercontinental ballistic missile mounted on an eight-axle truck, hypersonic glide vehicle (Hgv) missiles, heavy trucks capable of carrying nuclear warheads at speeds five times faster than the speed of sound, a wide array of drones -both underwater and airborne- stealth fighters, land-based drones -some equipped with machine guns, others suitable for mine clearance and logistics- Awacs, and directed-energy weapons (lasers), one variant for naval air defense and another for protecting ground troops.

"What the Chinese are demonstrating is that they possess advanced autonomous military capabilities, that they can deploy them operationally, and that they can do so more rapidly than we're seeing in the West. And they're also doing so in greater volumes in terms of the number of weapons deployed," Malcolm Davis, senior defense strategy analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (Aspi), explained to the American press. According to experts at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (Csis), China has also increased its defense spending 13-fold over the past 30 years, five times more than Japan and nearly seven times more than South Korea, key eastern allies of the United States. Today, Washington, Seoul, and Tokyo represent a trio that competes with Beijing, Moscow, and Pyongyang, but this wasn't always the case. In 2015, then-South Korean president Park Geun-hye attended the September 3 commemorations, while Kim Jong Un was absent. This year, however, the North Korean leader is at the forefront, while Lee Jae Myung, president of South Korea -still China's partner- declined the invitation and sent only his parliamentary representative to the event. This is a sign that in ten years, the relationship between the countries has changed significantly, shaping a new world order. In this context, what will be Europe's place?

According to local sources, the parade was attended by Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko, Pakistani prime minister Shehbaz Sharif, Vietnam's president Luong Cuong, Iran's president Masoud Pezeshkian and Zimbabwe's President Emmerson Mnangagwa , Myanmar's military chief General Min Aung Hlaing, Mongolian president Khurelsukh Ukhnaa, Uzbek president Shavkat Mirziyoyev, Malaysian prime minister Anwar Ibrahim, Maldives president Mohamed Muizzu, Nepalese prime minister K.P. Sharma Oli, Indonesian president Prabowo Subianto, Congolese president Denis Sassou Nguesso, Cambodian king Norodom Sihamoni, Cuban president Miguel Díaz-Canel, Laotian president Thongloun Sisoulith, Kazakhstan's president Qasym-Jomart Toqaev, president Tajikistan's Emomalī Rahmon, Kirkigistan's president Sadır Japarov, Turkestan's president Serdar Berdimuhamedow, Azerbaijan's president İlham Əliyev and Armenia's prime minister Nikol Pashinyan.

The list confirms that most of the participants came from countries with strategic or economic ties to China, particularly Central and Southeast Asia, and some African and South American nations. The absence of nearly all high-profile Western leaders underscored the geopolitical nature of the event, a show of strength and alliances against the West.

Below is a video of the military parade in China marking the 80th anniversary of the end of the war: