DEBBIE ELLIOTT, HOST:
Thousands of troops will march through Washington, D.C., later today as the U.S. Army marks its 250th anniversary. President Trump pushed for the military parade, which also happens to fall on his 79th birthday. NPR's Frank Langfitt was out talking with people near the parade route yesterday and joins us now. Good morning, Frank.
FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Hey. Good morning, Debbie.
ELLIOTT: So what are you hearing from folks?
LANGFITT: Yeah. I met a number of people who'd driven or flown here for the parade. Many of them were from military families. And they all said this is a great opportunity to honor the Army, which was created back in 1775. I met this guy named Jerry Miller (ph), says he's a veteran and a Trump supporter. He'd driven five hours from his home in a town called Hope Mills in North Carolina. We were chatting next to the fountains, you know, where this is in the World War II Memorial on the National Mall, and this is what he said.
JERRY MILLER: Having this parade is great. I'm a soldier. I've always wanted to be - I'm very proud. My family is proud of our country, and other people should grow up being proud of this country, too. United States is worth defending. It's worth fighting for. There's no other country like the U.S., and that's why everybody wants to come here. That's why we have to put walls up to keep people out.
ELLIOTT: So some people excited about this, but I imagine you found some others who maybe felt different.
LANGFITT: Yeah. There were a lot. I mean, everybody agreed with Jerry that it's very important to honor and celebrate the Army. This was not about the Army. But there were a variety of concerns we've heard. The price tag - 25- to $45 million at a time when the administration's trying to cut costs. There's concern about the tanks tearing up D.C. streets, that overnight they were going to be putting out metal plates to protect them. But the biggest objection, Debbie, is what we've heard for some time, and that is the idea of parading military hardware through the nation's capital. I mean, some people there on the Mall yesterday, they saw it as muscle-flexing by President Trump.
I met this guy named Gavin Schmidt (ph). He's - says he's a political moderate. And he was in town from - with his family from Albuquerque, New Mexico.
GAVIN SCHMIDT: I think he's trying to demonstrate strength and authority, which is that authoritarianism side of things to me. I don't think this is a necessary show of force. They know what we have and what we're capable of.
LANGFITT: And his wife, Danielle (ph), she went even further.
DANIELLE: He's trying to show his power, the same way dictators in the past and dictators of current day within China and Russia and things like that. He's just trying to show that same type of power.
ELLIOTT: These kinds of military parades are not common here in the U.S. The last one was back in 1991 after the first Gulf War. But they are common in other countries. I think, Frank, you have a little experience with that?
LANGFITT: I did. You know, I was based in China for many, many years. And I remember back in '99, I was covering this giant military parade. This was for the 50th anniversary of the founding the People's Republic of China. And the Communist regime, then, Debbie, was so afraid of protests, they told ordinary people who lived along the parade route to stay inside their homes. I ended up watching the parade from a friend's balcony. And in many ways, people saw this as a sign of weakness by the regime.
Now, this parade tonight is going to be very, very different. It's very easy to get tickets. But, you know, President Trump has also expressed concern about protesters, and he's threatened that if they show up, they'll be met with very heavy force, he says.
ELLIOTT: So what did you see? Were you able to preview some of the tanks and other things that are going to be part of the parade?
LANGFITT: I was not. You know, they were behind wooden walls. I went looking for them, right by the Potomac. I could see them on the other side of the river, but they were actually kind of hidden. I couldn't tell if that's because they want dramatic effect when they show up, or whether the organized recognized that, you know, Debbie, this parade is controversial.
ELLIOTT: That's NPR's Frank Langfitt. Thanks so much.
LANGFITT: Happy to do it, Debbie. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
