Has the U.S. ever had a military parade? Yes, but they're rare.

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Washington — President Trump is hosting a parade celebrating the 250th day of the U.S. Army connected Saturday, bringing tanks and soldiers to the streets of Washington, D.C., for the capital's archetypal large subject parade successful much than 3 decades.

The lawsuit — which is expected to cost between $25 cardinal and $45 cardinal — follows a years-long propulsion by Mr. Trump to big a parade, dating backmost to his archetypal term. The festivities coincide with Mr. Trump's 79th birthday, which the president says is unrelated.

The U.S. has held subject parades passim history, but they're not particularly common, and they're typically held to observe the victorious extremity of a warfare oregon the instrumentality of subject unit from fighting.

"There are humanities comparisons to beryllium made, but size and standard is tremendously different," Arizona State University past prof Brooks Simpson told CBS News.

Here's a look backmost astatine past subject parades:

When was the past U.S. subject parade?

The U.S. marked the extremity of the Gulf War with parades successful New York City and Washington successful the archetypal large subject show connected the streets of D.C. since the aboriginal decades of the Cold War.

The festivities successful the capital featured astir 8,000 subject personnel, tanks, rocket launchers, fireworks shows and an address by then-President George H.W. Bush. Some 800,000 radical attended the event, which outgo astir $12 million, The Washington Post reported successful 1991, oregon conscionable nether $29 cardinal successful today's dollars.

Hunter Ledbetter, a Marine reservist who was deployed to Iraq during the war, told the Post astatine the clip that it was "the astir breathtaking infinitesimal of my life."

The parade — which recognized the U.S.'s run to thrust Iraqi person Saddam Hussein retired of Kuwait — was mostly uncontroversial, Simpson said: "No 1 objected to that parade."

Still, the parades drew immoderate pushback. Some critics questioned the D.C. Gulf War parade's price tag, and D.C. officials said the procession of dense tanks had near tread marks connected the city's streets. New York Times columnist Anthony Lewis criticized the New York parade since it followed an uprising by Iraq's Kurds that Hussein's authorities brutally suppressed.

"Honor is owed the soldiers who were successful the gulf," Lewis wrote astatine the time. "But for different reasons — reasons each excessively painfully evident — it is wide present that a celebratory parade would beryllium inappropriate. Fireworks portion Kurdish babies die?"

Cold War inaugurations

Presidential inaugural parades often include immoderate subject personnel, dating backmost to the archetypal inauguration of President George Washington successful 1789. In the aboriginal decades of the Cold War, the festivities besides sometimes featured tanks and missiles connected the streets of the capital.

Some subject instrumentality appears successful photos from the 1949 parade aft President Harry Truman's swearing-in, President Dwight Eisenhower's 1953 and 1957 inaugurations and President John F. Kennedy's 1961 festivities.

Kennedy's inauguration featured a replica of the PT vessel that the caller president served connected during World War II. The full lawsuit outgo astir $1 cardinal successful 1961 dollars — oregon much than $10 cardinal contiguous — paid for by backstage donors, The New York Times wrote astatine the time.

A Navy PT vessel rides precocious supra Pennsylvania Avenue connected January 20, 1961 arsenic the inaugural parade passes the statesmanlike reviewing stand. President John Kennedy waves to sailors aboard.

Army tanks determination on Pennsylvania Avenue during the Inaugural Parade for President Dwight D. Eisenhower connected Jan. 21, 1953.

Simpson says inauguration parades sometimes included a fewer tanks arsenic an exhibition, but they were typically "much much limited" than the parade planned for this weekend.

"It wasn't similar Pennsylvania Avenue was lined with tanks," helium said.

Parades with subject instrumentality became little communal aft the 1960s. That could beryllium owed to the Vietnam War, which was deeply unpopular in its aboriginal years, and the eventual easing of Cold War tensions.

"After Vietnam, parades get analyzable due to the fact that [parades are always] linked to the outcomes of the wars and the behaviour of them," said Aaron O'Connell, a past prof astatine the University of Texas, Austin. "And that makes it much hard to cheer and propulsion a ticker portion parade, erstwhile radical are coming location successful ones and twos, and they're not coming location successful ample units, and the warfare hasn't gone arsenic good arsenic we would've liked."

World Wars I and II

New York City marked triumph successful World War II with a monolithic subject parade connected Fifth Avenue successful aboriginal 1946. The lawsuit included thousands of members of the Army's 82nd Airborne Division and dozens of tanks and howitzers, requiring planners to adjacent disconnected the Manhattan Bridge and cautiously bring dense instrumentality implicit the East River from Brooklyn. The New York Times reported millions of spectators attended the parade.

In mid-1942, months aft the U.S. formally entered World War II, the metropolis hosted a morale-boosting "New York astatine War" parade that the Times said was meant to "give a realistic representation of what the American equipped forces and their machines of demolition look like."

The extremity of World War I was besides celebrated by victory parades successful New York and D.C. successful 1919. It could've gone smoother: Dozens of artillery tractors that participated successful the New York parade took a incorrect crook aft the lawsuit and got mislaid successful Brooklyn for hours, the Times wrote astatine the time.

Civil War and 19th period celebrations

Washington hosted a monolithic two-day parade successful May 1865 to observe the Union's triumph successful the Civil War, featuring implicit 100,000 troops, according to the National Park Service.

The lawsuit — called the Grand Review of the Armies — was made up of subject volunteers who passed done the superior connected their mode location from the erstwhile Confederate states, Simpson says. The lawsuit featured Gen. Ulysses S. Grant and President Andrew Johnson, taking spot months aft President Abraham Lincoln's assassination.

"The spot was packed," said Simpson.

Other countries

Mr. Trump whitethorn person drawn inspiration for Saturday's parade from abroad.

The president archetypal hinted astatine hosting a subject parade aft attending France's yearly Bastille Day parade successful 2017. He called it "a tremendous thing," and added, "We're going to person to effort and apical it" connected the Fourth of July. His medication began readying a Veterans' Day parade a twelvemonth later, but it was called off, with Mr. Trump blaming metropolis officials for driving up the cost.

France has hosted its Bastille Day subject parade each July for implicit a century, recognizing the anniversary of the commencement of the 1789 French Revolution. Several different countries big regular subject parades, including India, Pakistan, Russia and North Korea.

But akin events person been reasonably uncommon successful the United States. O'Connell says that's astir apt owed to a "long, agelong strain successful American culture, connected some near and right, of being healthily suspicious of authorities powerfulness and of subject powerfulness successful particular."

"It's surely heavy successful the American subject quality to beryllium tense astir a garrison state, a militarized society," O'Connell said.

Mr. Trump's plans to big a subject parade this play person drawn criticism, with immoderate Democrats calling the thought wasteful and self-aggrandizing.

But the White House has defended Saturday's event, calling it "a fitting tribute to the service, sacrifice, and selflessness of each who person worn the uniform."

Joe Walsh

Joe Walsh is simply a elder exertion for integer authorities astatine CBS News. Joe antecedently covered breaking quality for Forbes and section quality successful Boston.

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