Earlier this week, in “Autocrats On Parade,” I spent some time talking about the importance of optics for authoritarian heads of state, for whom everything tends to be stage-managed spectacle.

Lacking the credibility bestowed by free and fair elections, autocrats have to manufacture ersatz legitimacy and a big part of that effort entails round-the-clock image maintenance. In simple terms: The state functions a de facto PR firm for its leader.

In the linked article, I mentioned military parades, and specifically those held by Kim Jong-Un. Fast forward two days and Kim was spotted at a military parade. Not in Pyongyang, but rather in Beijing where, on the heels of the annual Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit in Tianjin, Xi Jinping invited the North Korean dictator to join Vladimir Putin for VIP access to an event marking the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II. Masoud Pezeshkian and Alexander Lukashenko were there too.

Chinese state media, as well as The Kremlin, produced countless images on Wednesday showing Xi, Putin and Kim together, as a trio, always with Xi in the center. Pezeshkian, Lukashenko and other invitees were arranged in the background.

As a quick but notable aside, Kim brought along Ju-ae or “dear daughter,” as Pyongyang calls her. Some years back, her existence was confirmed to the world via a series of KCNA propaganda visuals including the infamous picture of Kim and his young child holding hands while walking away from an enormous missile launcher looming in the background. Ju-ae’s 12 now. If something were to happen to Kim, she’d be in charge of a nuclear state, probably with Kim Yo Jong (“dear sister”) serving as regent for a time.

To call the proceedings in Beijing elaborate would be an understatement, and not a small one either. Xi’s parade was a comically grandiose attestation to the CCP’s adeptness at choreographed pomp. And a gaudy testament to the autocratic penchant for synchronized pageantry more generally.

Xi’s extravaganza, which capped a week of propaganda aimed at revising the history of the second World War to paint China with the most heroic brush possible, featured tanks, fighter jets, helicopters, laser weapons, new ICBMs, hypersonic missiles, underwater drones and even robotic dogs.

There was a choir, a military band and goose-stepping troops aplenty, including scores of uniformly beautiful female soldiers donning bright red lipstick and marching in tight formation with automatic weapons.

The display unfolded on Chang’an Avenue and much of the marching took place in Tiananmen Square. At one point, Xi stood up through the sunroof of a domestically-made limo, drove past the troops and shouted “Greetings, comrades!” As The New York Times recounted, “the troops turned their heads in perfect synchronicity as Xi’s car passed them, and responded in unison: ‘Follow the Party!'”

Enormous screens showed Xi, Putin and Kim standing on a bright red carpet with crimson and yellow flowers lining the walls waiting to ascend stairs to a viewing gallery.

Speaking as though a god from the Tiananmen Gate rostrum Xi, dressed in a Mao suit, said the Chinese people have always “united in hatred of the enemy” whenever confronted with “a life-and-death struggle between justice and evil.” China, he said, “fears no tyranny.”

I suppose I don’t have to say this, but unafraid nations don’t assert their courage in ostentatious public displays of military prowess, just like unafraid people don’t drive around with bumper stickers that read “This car protected by Glock.” Anything you have to assert is something you most likely aren’t. If you need affirmation — from yourself or anyone else — you’re not confident.

It’s unfortunate, to put it mildly, that China’s youth have to grow up in the shadow of this absurdist tyranny. Xi’s the only leader anyone under 13’s ever known in China. A man who believes, earnestly, that Mao Zedong, a heinous dictator and one of modern history’s worst villains, is a good role model.

No one in the West takes these sorts of spectacles seriously. Or at least they didn’t previously. Donald Trump takes them seriously, though. Indeed, he envies them.

Late Tuesday evening in the US, as the festivities in Beijing commenced, a plainly jealous Trump issued a petulant statement which appeared on his social media platform between badly-placed ads for dental implants and discounted Ivermectin.

“May President Xi and the wonderful people of China have a great and lasting day of celebration,” he said. “Please give my warmest regards to Vladimir Putin, and Kim Jong-Un, as you conspire against The United States of America. PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP.”