14th of July: a parade that always takes place, in a weekend longer than usual
Laurenţiu SfinteşToday, the Gallic rooster sings La Marseillaise and at 10.09 am o’clock, will be on Arc de Triomphe, the one from the Avenue de Champs-Elysees, 75008 Paris. That is because at 10.10 am o’clock, the president of the French Republic, Emmanuel Macron, will arrive. He watches the troops and he receives the Place de la Concorde salute.
The parade will begin at 10.30. The ceremony’s theme will be “Fraternité d’armes sous l’uniforme, l’engagement d’une vie”/ Fraternity of weapons in uniform: a commitment for life. It will be opened by the guests of honor, Japan’s representative, foreign minister Taro Kono, and Singapore’s Prime Minister, Lee Hsin Loon. At 10.35 will begin the show offered by the air force, directly on Paris’s sky.
At 10.55 the scrolling blocs that has 4.290 soldiers, both men and women, will walk on march to Arch of Triumph, representing different kinds of forces and services of the French army. At the ceremony will also participate contingents invited from Belgium and Spain. The parade ends after the 220 vehicles, 250 horses and horsemen from the Republican Guard, 30 army helicopters from the army, gendarmerie and civil security will assist the terrestrial detachments.
At 11.55, opera singer Julie Cherrier will sing La Marseillaise and also L’hymne a l’amour.
At 12.00, the curtain will fall across the military festivities on 14th of July, the National Day of France, Jour de Bastille, from Paris’s center.
Yet, this year’s scenario will be more complicated. The parade on Champs-Elysees is in the middle of a high risk weekend as the security French forces consider. 12.000 members of these forces will be mobilized due to the festivity and the public manifestations that begin on Friday night and will end during Sunday’s night to Monday. Also, in Paris’s center will be disposed around 3000 members of emergency situation structures. For Sunday’s evening, will also be mobilized 4000 policemen, to assure the protection for those that will watch Moscow’s final in public areas, specially arranged for this event. The Champ-de-Mars area will be the central objective of the security measures, because this is the place where a giant screen will be installed, to watch the football game, for around 90.000 Parisians.
The French press presents unitary the two events. «Finale du Mondial-2018 et 14-juillet: n week-end sous haute sécurité à Paris» World Final 2018 and 14th of July: a weekend with high security in Paris, is one of the titles, used by France24.
The victory, but also the loss, will definitely produce popular manifestations. On Tuesday, after the French qualification, from the match with Belgium, hundreds of Parisians got out on the streets, and the tensions between the civil groups and the policemen led to tear gas’s intervention and to evacuating the protestants. On Sunday evening the public will probably be a lot tense, even if, the second day, the Parisians will face another parade.
After watching on 14th of July the French soldiers parade, from Colmar 152 Regiment, the so-called “Red Devils”, as well as the football players from the Belgian national team (it is just a coincidence), the Rafale fight plane’s flight, having on board the astronaut Thomas Pesquet, but also the presence at the parade of one of the first female officer from the French nuclear submarine, the Parisians will have to prepare for the parade that will take place on 16th of July. Monday, on the same route, they could also see and applaud Antoine Griezman, Kylian Mbappe, Paul & Comp, in front of these staying the commander Didier Deschamps, each of them having on their t-shirts the Gallic rooster. It is a parade that will look more like the 4th of July parade from the US. It is possible for the French men to see sooner the joy parade then the one that Trump will may get to organize in Washington (the promised military parade).
A long-awaited and extended weekend in Paris!
