Trump Sends China Warm Regards Paired With a Jab

It was a big day in China on Wednesday as President Xi Jinping attended a sprawling military parade in Beijing flanked by Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un, and President Trump offered some not-exactly-well-wishes to mark the occasion. He wrote on Truth Social:

• "May President Xi and the wonderful people of China have a great and lasting day of celebration. Please give my warmest regards to Vladimir Putin, and Kim Jong Un, as you conspire against The United States of America."

NBC News reports the Kremlin shrugged off the accusation, with a top aide saying, "No one was plotting any conspiracies, no one was plotting anything. Moreover, no one even had such a thought." Still, the parade held a clear message that Xi himself articulated. Held to mark the 80th anniversary of the end of WWII—or the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, as China refers to it—Xi said this to the crowd of 50,000: "Today, humanity is again faced with the choice of peace or war, dialogue or confrontation, win-win or zero-sum." He said the Chinese people "firmly stand on the right side of history" and called his "unstoppable" country a nation that "is never intimidated by any bullies," which the Guardian sees as "an apparent veiled reference to the US and its allies."