I was given the great honor of being invited to watch the military parade marking the 70th anniversary of the end of the WWII at Tiananmen Square on Thursday.

To be honest, I brought with me to Beijing a heavy heart but also high expectations for the ceremony.

My heart was undoubtedly heavy as it was filled with my knowledge of how the march of fascism and imperialism destroyed millions of lives across Europe, Asia and North Africa in the first half of the 20th century.

… The author is a senior fellow with the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.