Updated June 12, 2025 at 12:19 PM PDT
In a few days, the nation's capital will host its largest military parade in decades — filled with thousands of marching soldiers, rows of tanks, parachute jumps and flyovers.
The event on Saturday marks the U.S. Army's 250th anniversary. It also happens to fall on President Trump's 79th birthday, as well as Flag Day.
The Army has been preparing a celebration for over a year, but the idea of a parade came into the picture more recently. Although Trump's birthday is not officially linked to the festivities, a large-scale military parade has been on the president's wish list since his first term.
" We will celebrate a spectacular military parade in Washington, D.C., like no other," Trump said in a video posted on Instagram earlier this month.
Trump is expected to observe the day's events from the sidelines, but at one point, the president is scheduled to possibly receive a folded American flag. Such a move would be unusual, given that it's traditionally presented to families of the fallen at military funerals.
Beyond war victories and presidential inaugurations, large-scale military parades have not been part of American tradition — though smaller parades at the town-level tend to be more common.
Since the parade was announced, some Democratic lawmakers have criticized it as a vanity project and a misuse of funds. Other critics are unsettled by the display of military might.
Here's a by-the-numbers look at the upcoming military parade in D.C. and the key events that led up to it.
$25 million to $45 million
The massive military parade and festivities are expected to cost between $25 million and $45 million, according to Army spokesperson Heather J. Hagan. Part of the hefty bill could include millions just to repair D.C. streets, since tanks and other heavy armored vehicles tend to damage roads.
Last month, in an interview with NBC's "Meet the Press," Trump said he stands by the cost of the military display, describing it as "peanuts compared to the value of doing it."
"We have the greatest missiles in the world. We have the greatest submarines in the world. We have the greatest army tanks in the world. We have the greatest weapons in the world. And we're going to celebrate it," he added.
6,000
More than 6,000 soldiers from every Army division are expected to participate in the parade. It will also showcase members of the National Guard, the Army Reserve, Special Operations Command, West Point and Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC).
Beyond troops, the parade will feature 49 aircraft, 128 vehicles, 25 horses, two mules and one dog — not counting the historic aircraft and vehicles also set to appear, according to the Army. The canine, a Blue Heeler named Doc Holliday who has frequented military parades and celebrations, comes from the 1st Cavalry Division Horse Cavalry Detachment at Fort Cavazos, Texas.
According to Peter Mansoor, a professor of American military history at Ohio State University, animals have played an important role throughout various conflicts. Dogs have helped sniff out explosive devices. Mules have sent ammunition to units in mountainous and difficult terrain.
"It could have been done with soldiers, but at much greater cost," Mansoor said.
To close out the parade, the Army's Golden Knights demonstration parachute team, based at Fort Bragg in North Carolina, is expected to perform a jump, member station WUNC reported.
July 14
Trump's interest in a massive military parade appeared after he attended France's Bastille Day parade in 2017. The holiday, held annually on July 14, commemorates the storming of the Bastille prison in Paris in 1789 — a major event near the start of the French Revolution.
"We had a lot of planes going over and we had a lot of military might, and it was really a beautiful thing to see," Trump said in 2017. "They had representatives from different wars and different uniforms. It was really so well done."
The Bastille Day parade is considered one of the biggest and longest-running military parades in Europe. When Trump visited, the two-hour spectacle featured 241 horses and nearly a hundred aircraft, CNN reported in 2017. More than 3,700 people also participated in the parade, according to the U.S. European Command.
But some historians say U.S. presidents have often avoided such displays to distance themselves from Cold War adversaries — such as China, North Korea and Russia, formerly the Soviet Union — where military parades are symbols of state power.
Presidential historian Michael Beschloss previously told NPR that in the 1950s, some White House officials suggested to President Dwight D. Eisenhower to hold a military parade to match the Soviet Union — but he declined.
"Eisenhower said absolutely not, we are the pre-eminent power on Earth," Beschloss said in 2018. "For us to try to imitate what the Soviets are doing in Red Square would make us look weak."
2018
Trump first vied for a large-scale military parade in 2018 in honor of Veterans Day. That event was planned without tanks to minimize damage to city streets. But it was still expected to be costly, and the parade was later canceled.
Trump blamed the cancellation on D.C., accusing the local government of overcharging the federal government to have the parade in the city. At the time, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser estimated that police expenses alone would run $13 million.
Some projected the overall price tag could climb up to $92 million, NPR reported at the time, though then-Defense Secretary Jim Mattis disputed that figure.
1,800
On the same day as the military parade in D.C., more than 1,800 cities across the country are expected to have "No Kings" events — largely protests — to decry what the group says are anti-democratic policies by the Trump administration.
"On June 14th, we're showing up everywhere he isn't—to say no thrones, no crowns, no kings," read the No Kings website.
The group was also behind nationwide protests on Presidents Day and in April, orchestrated to push back against a range of Trump's policies and promises ranging from mass deportations, to a major reduction of the federal workforce to funding cuts for federal programs and research projects.
In a note on the campaign's website, No Kings said it deliberately chose not to include a rally in D.C. Instead, the major flagship march will take place in Philadelphia "to draw a clear contrast between our people-powered movement and the costly, wasteful, and un-American birthday parade in Washington," organizers said.
Earlier this week, Trump warned that protesters who try to disrupt the festivities on Saturday would face tough consequences.
"For those people that want to protest, they're going to be met with very big force," he told reporters from the Oval Office. "And I haven't even heard about a protest, but you know, this is people that hate our country, but they will be met with very heavy force."
1991
The last military parade to roll through D.C. took place in 1991 to celebrate the victory in Operation Desert Storm and the end of the Gulf War.
About 8,800 troops marched while more than 200,000 spectators lined the streets. At the time, street lights were taken down along the parade route to allow tanks to pass more easily.
"There was a fairly heated debate within George H.W. Bush's administration as to whether it was appropriate," Joshua Zeitz, a historian and contributing editor for Politico, told NPR's Consider This earlier this month.
Zeitz said that Bush ultimately supported the parade in order to help Americans overcome "Vietnam syndrome," referring to the public's negative view of the military following the Vietnam War.
The event cost around $12 million, which was paid in part by the Defense Department and a group of veterans organizations, The New York Times reported.
Historically, the U.S. has held military parades to mark the end of a major conflict, like the Civil War, World War I and World War II. (However, there were no national parades following the wars in Korea, Vietnam or, more recently, the Iraq War and war in Afghanistan.)
Notably, when the Army turned 200-years-old in 1975, there was also no grand parade given that the country was still grappling with the aftermath of the Vietnam War.
NPR's Tom Bowman contributed reporting.
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