Russia is wrapping itself up in patriotic extravaganza for Victory Day, which celebrates the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II. President Vladimir Putin has become a pillar of power for nearly a quarter of a century, justifying his every move…
MOSCOW — Russia is wrapping itself in patriotic extravaganza for Victory Day, which celebrates the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II. President Vladimir Putin has made the day a pillar of power for almost a quarter of a century and a legitimization of his expansion into Russia. Ukraine.
Seventy-nine years after Berlin fell to the Red Army, few veterans of what Russia calls the Great Patriotic War remain, but the victory over Nazi Germany remains one of the country’s most important acts of valor. It is a widely respected symbol and an important element of national identity.
Celebrations across Russia on Thursday, led by President Vladimir Putin, who began his fifth term in office this week, are a reminder of wartime sacrifices that have become Russia’s most important secular holiday.
The Soviet Union lost about 27 million people in the war, an estimate that many historians consider conservative, and it scarred virtually every family.
When Nazi forces invaded in June 1941, they captured much of the western part of the Soviet Union before being driven back to Berlin, where the Soviet hammer and sickle flag was hoisted over the ruined capital. The United States, Britain, France, and other allies celebrate the end of the war in Europe on May 8th.
The immense suffering and sacrifice in cities such as Stalingrad, Kursk, and Putin’s hometown of Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) still serves as a powerful symbol of the country’s ability to overcome seemingly overwhelming challenges. There is.
Since taking power in late 1999, President Putin has made May 9 a key part of his political calendar, which features shows of military force. Columns of tanks and missiles rolled across Red Square, squadrons of fighter jets roared overhead, and medal-wearing veterans joined him to watch the parade. Many wear the black and orange St. George’s ribbon, traditionally associated with Victory Day.
Putin, 71, has frequently spoken about his family’s history, recalling memories of his father, who was seriously injured fighting on the front lines during the Nazi siege of the city.
Putin said his father, also named Vladimir, returned home from a military hospital during the war and saw workers trying to take away his wife, Maria, who was declared dead of starvation. . But Putin did not believe she had died, saying she had simply become weak from hunger and lost consciousness. Their first child, Viktor, died at the age of three during the siege, one of more than a million Leningrad residents who died during the 872-day blockade, most of them from starvation.
For several years, President Putin held up a photo of his father, who served in a unit known as the “Immortal Regiment,” at Victory Day marches, like others honoring relatives who were veterans.
These demonstrations were canceled during the coronavirus pandemic and again after fighting began in Ukraine amid security concerns.
In an effort to burnish the Soviet Union’s legacy and trample on any attempts to question it, Russia has moved to punish the “desecration” of monuments and challenge the Kremlin’s version of World War II history. Introduced a law criminalizing “reconstruction of Nazism,” including
When he dispatched troops to Ukraine on February 24, 2022, President Putin invoked World War II to try to justify his actions, which Kiev and its Western allies denounced as an unwarranted war of aggression. Putin has cited the “denazification” of Ukraine as his main goal in Moscow, incorrectly describing the government of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who is Jewish and lost relatives in the Holocaust, as neo-Nazi.
Putin has tried to cast Ukraine’s respect for some nationalist leaders who collaborated with the Nazis in World War II as a sign of Kiev’s sympathy for the Nazis. He regularly makes unsubstantiated references to Ukrainian nationalist figures such as Stepan Bandera, who was killed by Soviet spies in Munich in 1959, as the underlying justification for Russian military action in Ukraine. I was going.
Many observers see Putin’s focus on World War II as part of an effort to restore Soviet influence and prestige, relying on Soviet practices. .
Nikolai Epley writes, “The continued identification of the Soviet Union with the victors of Nazism, and the lack of any other strong legitimacy, led the Kremlin to declare “denazification” as a war goal.” “This is the cause,” he said in a commentary in Carnegie Russia Eurasia magazine. center.
He said the Russian leadership “confines itself to a worldview limited by the Soviet past.”