Gathering stormclouds can’t wipe smile from Trump’s face as long-held dream of military parade is realised

In scenes that could have been set in Moscow, families queued to sit in helicopters, while tanks and robot dogs paraded Constition Avenue

It may have been billed as a military parade to celebrate the American military's history, but it said even more about the country's present and future under Donald Trump.

Soldiers, tanks and even robot dogs paraded along Constitution Ave. on Saturday, as paratroopers swooped in from overhead and military aircraft buzzed past the Washington Monument for the first major military parade held in the US capital since the victory after the first Gulf War of 1991.