Putin hails troops, warns West as Russia celebrates Victory Day
MOSCOW • Russia on Thursday wrapped itself in patriotic pageantry for Victory Day, as President Vladimir Putin celebrated the defeat of Nazi Germany in the Second World War by hailing his forces fighting in Ukraine and blasting the West for fuelling conflicts around the world.
Even though few veterans of what Russia calls the Great Patriotic War are still alive 79 years after Berlin fell to the Red Army, the victory remains the most important and widely revered symbol of Russia's prowess and a key element of national identity.
Putin has turned Victory Day — the country's most important secular holiday — into a pillar of his nearly quarter- century in power and a justification of his military action in Ukraine.
Two days after beginning his fifth term in office, he led the festivities across Russia that recall the nation's wartime sacrifice.
“Victory Day unites all generations,” Putin said in a speech in Red Square that came on the coldest May 9 in decades amid some snow flurries. “We are going forward relying on our centuries-old traditions and feel confident that together we will ensure a free and secure future of Russia.”
As battalions marched by and military hardware — both old and new — rumbled over the cobblestones, the sky cleared briefly to allow a flyby of warplanes, some of which trailed smoke in the white, red and blue of the Russian flag.
Putin hailed the troops fighting in Ukraine as “our heroes” for their courage, resilience and self-denial, adding that “all of Russia is with you.”
He accused the West of “fuelling regional conflicts, inter- ethnic and interreligious strife and trying to contain sovereign and independent centres of global development.”
With tensions with Washington over Ukraine soaring to their highest level since the Cold War, Putin issued another stark reminder of Moscow's nuclear might.
“Russia will do everything to prevent global confrontation, but will not allow anyone to threaten us,” he said. “Our strategic forces are in combat readiness.”
Nuclear- capable Yars intercontinental ballistic missiles were pulled across Red Square, underscoring his message.
Although the U. S. and U.K. ambassadors did not attend, Putin was joined by other dignitaries and presidents of several former Soviet nations along with a few other Moscow allies, including the leaders of Cuba, Guinea-Bissau and Laos.
In his speech, he accused the West of “revanchism … hypocrisy and lies” in seeking to play down the Soviet role in defeating Nazi Germany.
Putin described Victory Day as “very emotional and poignant.” He tried to cast Ukraine's veneration of some of its nationalist leaders who co-operated with the Nazis in the Second World War as a sign of Kyiv's purported Nazi sympathies. He regularly made unfounded references to Ukrainian nationalist figures such as Stepan Bandera, who was killed by a Soviet spy in Munich in 1959, as an underlying justification for the Russian military action in Ukraine.
Many observers see Putin's focus on the Second World War as part of his efforts to revive the USSR's clout and prestige and his reliance on Soviet practices.
“It's the continuous self- identification with the USSR as the victor of Nazism and the lack of any other strong legitimacy that forced the Kremlin to declare `de-nazification' as the goal of the war,” Nikolay Epplee said in a commentary for Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center.
The Russian leadership, he said, has “locked itself up in a world view limited by the Soviet past.”