Russia: Victory Day celebration is a key pillar of Putin’s rule

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia wrapped itself in patriotic pageantry Thursday for Victory Day, a celebration of its defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II. President Vladimir Putin became a pillar of his nearly quarter-century mandate and a justification for his military action in Ukraine.

Although few veterans of what Russia calls the Great Patriotic War are still alive 79 years after the fall of Berlin to the Red Army, the victory over Nazi Germany remains the most important and most important symbol revered for the country’s prowess and a key part of national identity.

Thursday’s festivities across Russia, led by Putin who this week began his fifth termrecall this war sacrifice in what has become its most important secular holiday.

“Victory Day unites all generations,” Putin said in a speech at the parade on Red Square, held in freezing cold and snow showers. “We are moving forward, building on our centuries-old traditions and are confident that together we will guarantee a free and secure future for Russia.”

He praised the courage of troops fighting in Ukraine and castigated the West, accusing it of “fueling regional conflicts, inter-ethnic and inter-religious conflicts and trying to contain the sovereign and independent centers of global development.”

Amid tensions between Russia and the West that have reached their highest level since the Cold War over Ukraine, Putin also offered a stark reminder of Russia’s nuclear power.

“Russia will do everything to prevent a global confrontation, but will not allow anyone to threaten us,” he said. “Our strategic forces are combat ready.”

The Soviet Union lost approximately 27 million people in the war, an estimate that many historians consider conservative, leaving traces in virtually every family.

Nazi troops overran much of the western Soviet Union during their invasion in June 1941, before being pushed back to Berlin, where the hammer and sickle flag of the USSR was raised. hoisted above the ruined capital. The United States, United Kingdom, France and other allies mark the end of the war in Europe on May 8.

The immense suffering and sacrifice in cities like Stalingrad, Kursk and Putin’s hometown of Leningrad – now St. Petersburg – still stands as a powerful symbol of the country’s ability to overcome seemingly insurmountable challenges.

Since coming to power on the last day of 1999, Putin has made May 9 an important part of his political agenda, marked by displays of military power. Columns of tanks and missiles roll into Red Square and squadrons of fighter jets roar overhead as medal-decorated veterans join in to review the parade. Many wear the black and orange St. George ribbon, traditionally associated with VE Day.

About 9,000 soldiers, including a thousand who fought in Ukraine, took part in Thursday’s parade.

Putin, 71, frequently speaks about his family history, sharing memories of his father, who fought on the front lines during the Nazi siege of the city and was seriously injured.

According to Putin, his father, also named Vladimir, returned home from a military hospital during the war to see workers trying to take away his wife, Maria, who had been declared dead of starvation. But the elder Putin did not believe she was dead – saying she had only lost consciousness, weakened by hunger. Their first child, Viktor, died during the siege when he was 3, one of more than a million Leningrad residents who died during the 872 days of blockade, most of them from starvation.

For several years, Putin carried a photo of his father during Victory Day marches – as did others honoring his close veterans – in what was called the “Immortal Regiment”.

Those protests were suspended during the coronavirus pandemic and then again due to security concerns after fighting began in Ukraine.

As part of its efforts to restore Soviet heritage and trample any attempts to challenge it, Russia has introduced laws that criminalize the “rehabilitation of Nazism”, including punishing the “desecration” of memorials or contesting the Kremlin’s versions of World War II history.

When he sent troops to Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Putin invoked World War II to seek to justify his actions, which kyiv and its Western allies denounced as an unprovoked war of aggression. Putin has cited the “denazification” of Ukraine as one of Moscow’s main goals, falsely characterizing the government of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who is Jewish and lost loved ones in the Holocaust, as neo-Nazis.

Putin has attempted to present Ukraine’s reverence for some of its nationalist leaders who cooperated with the Nazis during World War II as a sign of kyiv’s supposed Nazi sympathy. He regularly made unfounded references to Ukrainian nationalist figures such as Stepan Bandera, killed by a Soviet spy in Munich in 1959, to justify Russian military action in Ukraine.

Many observers see Putin focuses on World War II as part of his efforts to revive the influence and prestige of the USSR and its dependence on Soviet practices.

“It was the continued self-identification with the USSR as the victor of Nazism and the absence of any other strong legitimacy that forced the Kremlin to declare ‘denazification’ as the goal of the war,” Nikolay Epplee said in a commentary for Carnegie Russia Eurasia. Center.

Russian leaders, he says, have “locked themselves into a worldview limited by the Soviet past.”