War lies of Putin the truth-twister
Leader hijacks history to tell Moscow parade: Russia is fighting for its OWN survival
VLADIMIR Putin kept the West guessing yesterday as his big Victory Day speech gave away no hint of what he is planning next.
Rather than the expected threats to his enemies or declarations of all-out war with Ukraine, or even trumped up claims of military successes, the Kremlin leader used a truthtwisting 11-minute speech in Moscow to claim Russia was fighting for its own survival.
If the Russian army was as impressive on the battlefield as it was yesterday in Moscow’s Red Square this could have been the victory celebration that the 69year-old craved so much. But, while the troops on parade appeared to have rehearsed meticulously, those he’s dispatched to Ukraine seem never to have practised fighting together.
Thousands of soldiers, resplendent in ceremonial dress marched past the president as military bands performed a rousing repertoire of Russian anthems.
They were followed by hundreds of armoured vehicles and tanks, rocket launchers and mobile missile batteries, the growl of their engines challenging the thunder of brass and drums for supremacy.
Because of the Ukraine war there were fewer pieces of military hardware on display yesterday than previous years and no jet fly-past. But the procession still included the fearsome 49.6-ton RS-24 Yars thermonuclear missile alongside modern T-72 and wartime T-34 tanks.
Also on display were several Iskander missiles, similar to those fired by Russian forces in eastern Ukraine, including the attack on Kramatorsk railway station which killed at least 57 people in April.
Parades for Victory Day – the anniversary of Soviet triumph over Nazi Germany in the Second World War – took place in 28 cities across Russia involving 65,000 people, 2,400 items of military hardware and more than 400 aircraft.
Putin’s address, the centrepiece of the event, had been expected to include nuclear threats, a declaration of full-scale war and the mobilisation of tens of thou
sands of men to bolster his armed forces – weakened after huge losses in Ukraine.
But, not for the first time, the former KGB chief confounded expectations. His address to the massed ranks and the crowds of veterans and their families was instead measured in its messaging and delivery.
He presented his ‘special military operation’ as a necessity rather than a choice, forced upon him by Nato’s efforts to intimidate Russia. Trying to align the past with the present, he told his country that as Germany’s invasion of Russia in 1941 had forced the country to fight for its existence, so Nato’s expansionism into former Soviet territories and its recent military support for the ‘Nazi’ regime in Ukraine required a defence of the Motherland.
‘May 9, 1945 is forever inscribed as a triumph of our united Soviet people,’ he said. ‘It is our duty to keep the memory of those who crushed Nazism, to do everything so that the horror of global war does not happen again. last year Russia called on the West, proposed dialogue to search for reasonable solutions. All in vain. Nato did not want to hear us.’
While Putin’s speech may have projected strength, his demeanour did not. He appeared to limp as he laid a wreath and he sat through much of the ceremony with a blanket on his legs on what was a warm day.
The address triggered protests, as anti-war activists hacked Russian TV stations, confronting viewers with the message: ‘The blood of thousands of Ukrainians and hundreds of their children is on your hands’.
The occasion was also celebrated in Kyiv to remember the eight million Ukrainians who perished in the same war. President Volodymyr Zelensky promised his countrymen and women a second Victory Day once they had routed the Russian troops occupying the Donbas. ‘We won then, we will win now too,’ he said.
‘Nato did not want to hear us’