What's up with May 9th?
"We can do it again"
Mo: Happy Sunday! We’re taking a break from our ‘Documenting History’ series to bring you some information about Russia’s Victory Day parade, its significance, and what is happening in Mariupol in preparation for the parade there.
What happens on May 9th in Russia?
Russia's Victory Day is an annual event - the military parade in Red Square in Moscow and cities across Russia on 9 May - when the country marks its victory over Nazi Germany in 1945 and remembers the 27 million Soviet citizens who died in the Second World War.
“In modern Russian accounts of the Soviet war effort, inconvenient elements, such as the Nazi-Soviet non-aggression pact of 1939 and subsequent carving-up of Europe, or the internal deportation of whole ethnic groups by Stalin’s regime during the war are quietly ignored,” says Shaun Walker, as are the Holodomor in Ukraine and the extermination of colonial dissidents in other parts of the Soviet Union as well.
During the Cold War, and then afterwards, Russia watchers and analysts listened carefully to the speeches of Russian leaders to garner hints about where Russia’s domestic and foreign policy was headed. Under Vladimir Putin, Victory Day has become a show of military strength.
Besides the fanfare of military kit and goosesteps, the Victory Day parade will feature a flight by the Il-80 Eimak command and control plane, which wisks Russia’s top brass away in the event of a nuclear war, supersonic fighters and Tu-160 strategic bombers.
This year, it’s not just about new aircraft: the parade has taken on a significance of its own.
Russian propaganda has repeadly used the language and imagery of the second world war to describe the attack on Ukraine.
Putin, when launching the invasion, described one of its main goals as the ‘denazification’ of the country. In mid-March, when he addressed a flag-waving crowd at the Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow, banners promised a ‘world without fascism.’ His soldiers often wear the orange-black St George’s ribbon, which has become the symbol of both the second world war victory and of the war in Ukraine.
That said, the Russian forces have not gained any form of military victory that it can celebrate. Instead, it will have to settle for most of Mariupol.
The UK Ministry of Defence believes that the Russian continued assault is connected to the May 9th celebrations. According to General Budanov, head of Ukrainian intelligence for the MoD, the Russians had planned on taking Donbas by April 26, but their plans have been thwarted by robust Ukrainian resistance.
Putin sent his presidential aid Sergey Kiriyenko to Mariupol this week for the Victory Day preparation as well as renown Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyev. The latest Ukrainian intelligence reports reveal that the Russians are forcing citizens of Mariupol to “urgently [clean] the central streets from rubble, bodies of dead and unexploded Russian ammunition,” in exchange for food.
The parade is so important to the Kremlin that according to Ukraine's intelligence, Russian officers will be leaving combat positions to protect the May 9 parade in Mariupol. The recent report said that the members of Russia’s 71st Motorized Rifle Regiment are going to provide round-the-clock protection to Russian personalities in the occupied territory.
Putin and his war party will attempt to spin the event as their victory over what they have falsely claimed are Ukrainian ‘nazis’ of the Azov battalion and that Russia has been successful in its martial efforts at ‘demilitarising’ Ukraine.
Just a side note here: the term ‘nazi’ has been blurred over the course of Putin’s leadership and is in no way connected to historical coherence. In current Kremlin logic, anyone or any state that threatens Russia are ‘nazis’.
For all the twisted bluster of Russian propaganda, Ukrainians are not ‘nazis’ and they have certainly proven their mettle against Russian forces,.
The Guardian- How Victory Day Became Central to Putin’s Russian Identity, Shaun Walker
Across Russia, some families will quietly remember the ancestors who gave their lives in the fight against Nazism, or toast the few veterans still alive. Others will take a more bombastic approach in line with the official messaging, perhaps adding a papier maché turret to their child’s pushchair to make it look like a tank, or daubing “To Berlin” on their cars.
Could Putin declare all-out war on 9 May?
Up until now Moscow has denied it is at war, instead referring to its invasion of Ukraine as a "special military operation".
But Western officials have speculated that President Vladimir Putin could use Russia's annual Victory Parade on 9 May to announce an escalation of military action. He of course is keeping his cards close to his chest and until then we should take Moscow’s denials with a hefty pinch of salt.
In the days leading up to the invasion on 24 February, Russian officials queued up to ridicule suggestions of an imminent invasion as ‘Western hysteria and propaganda’.
Yet invade they did, catching even many Ukrainians by surprise.
So the very least we can expect is some triumphant announcements of objectives achieved and enemies (real or imagined) vanquished.
Blame for the slow pace of Russian advance in the Donbas will likely be placed on Nato and there will probably be further warnings to the West to stop helping Ukraine defend itself.
Whatever happens on 9 May it is hard to see this war ending any time soon.
In the meantime…
Official stats published by Russia’s federal security service (FSB) show that nearly four million Russians left the country in the first three months of 2022. Arrivals to former Soviet countries saw a significant spike after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on 24 February. These numbers tell us how many Russian citizens chose to leave their homeland, but they don’t tell us how many have since returned.
Stop funding Russia…
Putin, his generals and the military establishment can’t wage war or put on a Victory Parade without funds in the coffers. Various tranches of sanctions have been levelled by the US, UK, the EU and states around the world. In order to prevent that Russia’s aggression continue and develop into a protracted war with the likelihood of over-spill into EU nations and others, activists have called for a total embargo on Russian oil, gas and coal.
The EU has announced a gradual reduction of Russian oil, and many EU states have undertaken measures to reduce gas imports, thus reducing their dependency on Russian energy.
President Zelensky is also asking for further measures: breaking business ties. Have a listen.
Thanks for reading…
Mo