News Manager
Milforums News Bot
By Ben Blanchard BEIJING (Reuters) - Beijing is battening down the hatches and cranking up the propaganda ahead of a massive military parade this week to mark the end of World War Two, shooing cars from streets and shutting factories for the Communist Party's biggest event of the year. Some 12,000 soldiers will march through Beijing's central Tiananmen Square on Thursday, mostly Chinese but with Russian and a few other foreign contingents, accompanied by tanks and armored vehicles, as fighter jets scream overhead President Xi Jinping will be joined on the podium by leaders including Russian President Vladimir Putin, Sudan President Omar Hassan al-Bashir and Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. Almost all top Western leaders are staying away, alarmed by the apparent jingoism and worried by the message a Chinese show of force will send a world worried by China's military ambitions.More...