Bastille day, 1994. The President glides by in a convertible camo car. Turning their back to the parade plainclothes police hiding behind dark glasses look for urban terrorists armed with calicos and slogans.

Oblivious to a crossfire of flash photographers elite troops march down the avenue. Gawkers clap, crane their necks to spot the aerobatics squad through the foliage of plane trees.

‘Shouldn’t have been invited’ grumbles an ageless man; ‘wars are over for ever’ lauds some wellwisher; ‘they must be standing somewhere close to the Arc de Triomphe’ adds a trailing voice. Kids giggle, point fingers at mounds of dung left by the Horse Guards. Arm in arm a pair of women whisper, ‘do you hear that whirr? I saw them all lined up on Avenue d’Iena… Napoleon thrashed the Prussians at Iena… didn’t he?’

The whirr grows into a roar, the roar explodes into thunder. Thirteen tanks storm the Champs Elysées under the command of a starched officer standing tall in his grey-green turret. All at once the panzers come to a standstill. Awe strikes the crowd. Hundreds of eyes stare at the once dreaded Cross of Iron on the flanks of the beasts.
Collaboration is in the air again.