Paris hosted an extra-special visitor for France’s nationwide vacation on July 14 — the Olympic flame lighting up the town’s grandiose navy parade for Bastille Day.
Simply 12 days earlier than the French capital hosts exceptionally formidable and high-security Summer season Video games, the torch relay joined up with hundreds of troopers, sailors, rescuers and medics marching in Paris beneath roaring fighter jets.
Whereas individuals round France mark the day with concert events, events and fireworks, right here’s a take a look at what the vacation’s about, and what’s totally different this 12 months:
On July 14, 1789, revolutionaries stormed the Bastille fortress and jail in Paris, heralding the beginning of the French Revolution and the tip of the monarchy.
The vacation is central to the French calendar, with occasions throughout the nation. It goals to embody the nationwide motto of ‘’liberty, equality and fraternity,” although not everybody in France feels the nation lives as much as that promise.
The Paris parade is the vacation’s spotlight. This 12 months, it paid tribute to those that freed France from Nazi occupation 80 years in the past, with a re-enactment of the D-Day landings of June 6, 1944, and a presentation by service members from the 31 international locations whose troops contributed to the liberation. About half are African nations that had been underneath French colonial rule throughout World Warfare II.
Some 4,000 individuals and 162 horses marched within the tightly choreographed present, amongst them items that served in NATO missions in jap Europe, towards Islamic extremists within the Sahel, defending French territories within the South Pacific and international delivery corridors. They had been joined this 12 months by three German officers from a cross-border brigade.
Navy technicians and members of the media stand on the roof of the Arc de Triomphe at dawn, forward of the Bastille Day parade in Paris, on July 14, 2024
| Photograph Credit score:
Reuters
The decorative uniforms are wealthy in symbolism — most notably these of the French Overseas Legion sappers, with lengthy beards, leather-based aprons and axes from their authentic position as route-clearers for advancing armies.
Overhead, 65 plane flew in formations, together with a British Storm fighter alongside French Mirages and Rafales, rescue helicopters and plane utilized in missions from Afghanistan to Mali or worldwide drug busts.
President Emmanuel Macron kicked Sunday’s occasions off with a evaluate of the troops.
French President Emmanuel Macron waves from the command automotive as he drives down the Avenue Foch throughout the Bastille Day parade, Sunday, July 14, 2024 in Paris.
| Photograph Credit score:
AP
Navy bands and choirs performed an essential position, performing a medley of French navy songs, American jazz tunes, a Scottish bagpipe ballad — and the Marseillaise.
The numbers are scaled again in contrast with earlier years, due to Olympics safety measures. Round 130,000 police are deployed round France for the vacation weekend.
This 12 months’s Bastille Day provided Macron a second of distraction from the political turmoil he unleashed with snap elections that weakened his pro-business centrist occasion and his presidency.
The consequence left a deadlocked parliament with nobody clearly in cost. The prime minister may go away workplace inside days, whereas the left-wing alliance that received probably the most seats is struggling to agree on a proposed substitute.
In the meantime, Russia’s warfare in Ukraine is threatening Europe’s safety. At a gathering with navy leaders Saturday, Macron mentioned France will sustain help for Ukraine and referred to as for larger protection spending subsequent 12 months due to ‘’approaching threats.’’
The Olympic torch relay reached Paris simply in time.
The parade wrapped up with the arrival of the flame, escorted by riders on horseback, 25 torchbearers, and cadets dressed within the 5 Olympic colours forming the shapes of the 5 interlocking Olympic rings.
The primary torchbearer was Col. Thibault Vallette, equestrian gold medalist within the 2016 Rio Olympics, who handed it on to a bunch of younger athletes smiling broadly as they handed it hand-to-hand in entrance of the presidential tribune.
Often, the parade travels from the Napoleon-era Arc de Triomphe to the Concorde plaza, the place France’s final king and queen had been beheaded.
This 12 months, Concorde has been remodeled into an enormous Olympic venue for breakdancing, skateboarding and BMX. So the parade route headed to the Bois de Boulogne park on the town’s edge as a substitute.
Olympic venue development across the Eiffel Tower means spectators can’t collect beneath the monument to observe its annual fireworks present, both.
After its Bastille Day look, the torch relay will swing by Notre Dame Cathedral, the historic Sorbonne college and the Louvre Museum earlier than heading to different Paris landmarks Monday.