Russian President Vladimir Putin told his country’s Victory Day parade in Moscow’s Red Square that “a real war” has been unleashed against Russia by the West’s “untamed ambitions”, as the Kremlin launched a barrage of cruise missiles on Ukrainian targets hours before the start of the parade. Putin framed the war in Ukraine as a proxy conflict with the West, painting a picture of an existential conflict with the West using Russia as a tool to destroy the country, rewrite its history, and crush its traditional values. The Kremlin’s official narrative has dominated state media coverage of the war, with Putin welcoming soldiers fighting in Ukraine who were present at the parade and concluding his speech with “To Russia! To our brave armed forces! To victory!”
The parade took place amid tight security measures, as the Kremlin launched 25 missiles overnight in a wave of attacks across Ukraine, with air defense successfully destroying 23 of them. Moscow’s forces launched the missiles from carriers in the Black Sea and strategic aircraft, targeting Ukrainian positions. The barrage came as Moscow and other cities hosted military parades and festivities marking Victory Day, Russia’s biggest secular holiday.
Vladimir Putin (Via Vladimir Putin/Twitter)
However, this year’s celebrations have been significantly overshadowed by the war in Ukraine, with at least 21 Russian cities canceling their military parades, a staple of the holiday, for the first time in years. The Immortal Regiment processions, where crowds take to the streets holding portraits of relatives who died or served in the Second World War, have also been canceled in dozens of cities. Regional officials blamed “security concerns,” but some speculated that the real reason behind the cancellations was the fear that Russians might take portraits of relatives who died in Ukraine, illustrating the scale of Russia’s losses in the drawn-out conflict.
As the celebrations unfolded, Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Russian private military contractor Wagner, said his fighters had yet to receive ammunition promised to them by the military but would continue to fight in the embattled eastern city of Bakhmut despite earlier threatening to withdraw.
