Special to WorldTribune.com
By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com
President Xi Jinping has determined to outdo Mao Zedong in terms of building up a cult of personality: he has ordered a gigantic military parade at Tiananmen Square this autumn to demonstrate his ironclad hold over the army – and most other levers of power in the country.
In Communist Chinese Party (CCP) history, military parades have only been held to mark major anniversaries of the founding of the People’s Republic on Oct. 1, 1949. The last two extravaganzas took place in October 1999 and October 2009.
The ostensible reason for this year’s demonstration of China’s hard power was to mark the 70th anniversary of the “triumph in the struggle to defeat fascism,” which is the CCP’s phrase to describe the surrender of the Japanese Imperial Army in 1945. …
Political analysts in the capital pointed out, however, … that one of the military parade’s main purposes was to silence opposition to Xi’s claim of absolute authority within the party-state apparatus.
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‘Emperor Xi’? Unprecedented military parade to salute ‘Mao Zedong of the 21st Century’ added by World Tribune on
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