A battle for truth and glory as Russia marks

Victory Day

Society set up by Vladimir Putin aims to combat

falsification of history but it has its own selective memory

Russian servicemen drive BTR-82A armoured personnel carriers (APC) during the drive through

Red Square

By Tom Parfitt, Moscow

10:01AM BST 09 May 2015

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/russia/11594290/A-battle-for-truth-and-

glory-as-Russia-marks-Victory-Day.html

As Moscow marks the 70th anniversary of the end of the Second World War with a grandiose

military parade on Saturday, lines are being drawn in a battle for historical truth.

Politicians, historians and ordinary citizens in Russia believe the West is engaged in a campaign

to blur the Soviet Unions pre-eminent role in winning the war.

Some think the attempt is orchestrated by foreign governments and intelligence agencies, while

many see it as part of a wider political attack, motivated by divisions between Moscow,

Washington and European capitals over the war in Ukraine.

Kremlin-backed efforts to counter the perceived campaign to twist history and blight Soviet

glory are in turn vulnerable to accusations of manipulation and selective memory.

Meanwhile, symbols of past military valour in Russia such as the black and orange St Georges ribbon have been appropriated by Moscow-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine, as the Kremlin

frames its modern-day struggles as a natural extension of the heroic fight against fascism between 1941 and 1945.

Vladimir Putin, Russias president, set the tone in March at a Kremlin meeting to discuss preparations for Saturdays Victory Day events.

Brazen defamation of Russia

Today we unfortunately see not only attempts to misrepresent and distort events of the war, but cynical, open lies and the brazen defamation of a whole generation who gave up everything for

the victory, Mr Putin said. Their goal is clear: to undermine the power and moral authority of modern Russia and deprive it of the status of a victorious nation.

Moscow believes the West underplays the huge sacrifice that the Soviet Union made in the war almost 27m people died compared to 400,000 British victims. It was also furious when Arseny

Yatsenyuk, Ukraines prime minister, recently said that the Soviet Union invaded Ukraine and Germany during the war.

More widely, Mr Putin and his allies doubt the very existence of Ukraine as a separate nation,

and are incensed by any suggestion that Communist and Nazi terror in Europe were as bad as

each other.

On Thursday, Dalia Grybauskaite, the president of Lithuania, angered Moscow by saying that,

"for Lithuanians, Poles and others in Central Europe the war did not end on May 8. We suffered

from a new occupation, a new dictatorship and new atrocities.

Combating distortion

In an attempt to combat such alleged calumnies, Mr Putin issued an order in 2012 to set up the

Russian Military-Historical Society (RVIO), and charged it with popularising academic research,

fostering patriotism and resisting attempts to distort military history.

The society has become well-known for erecting at least 30 new monuments to military heroes,

excoriating Hollywood films and supporting the controversial victory ride this month to Berlin by members of Mr Putins favourite biker group, the Night Wolves.

Its chairman, is Vladimir Medinsky, Russias culture minister, who authored a series of popular books titled myths about Russia before joining the cabinet three years ago.

This week, Mr Medinsky gave a lecture on the historical significance of the 70th anniversary of the Great Patriotic War at Moscows Plekhanov University.

The talk focused on the statistics of casualties during the war, demonstrating the Soviet Unions heavy losses and the corresponding damage the Red Army caused to German forces. British

deaths were displayed as a fraction one sixty-seventh of those suffered by the Soviet Union.

Allies helped Soviet victory

The help of the Allies was important but the Soviets played the overwhelming role in victory over the Nazis, Mr Medinsky stressed. Seventy five per cent of all German losses were on the Eastern Front, he told an audience that included history students. This is the answer to all questions.

Speaking to the Telegraph after the lecture, Mr Medinsky said wartime leaders such as Winston

Churchill and Dwight Eisenhower had never doubted the enormous Soviet contribution but it

was now being belittled abroad. There is no single person ordering this but it is the result of a conflict of political interests, he said.

A YouGov poll published earlier this month found that 50 per cent of respondents in the UK

thought Britain did the most to win the war while only 15 per chose the Soviet Union.

Mr Medinsky said that every one of the 250,000 British officers and soldiers who died was a hero, full stop. But Russian authorities have been charged with their own attempts to play down the role of wartime partners. Last month, the Federal Security Service (FSB) was reportedly

behind the closure of a museum that was about to open an exhibition in Yekaterinburg called

Triumph and Tragedy: Allies in the Second World War.

The exhibition, which was party organised by the British consulate in the city and featured

photographs from the Imperial War Museum, later reopened at a different venue in the city. The

reporter who revealed the FSB closure in the local government newspaper was fired.

Spies at work

Vladislav Kononov, the deputy director of the RVIO suggests the Wests own intelligence agencies are behind attempts to denigrate Russias role in the war. He cited reports that the CIA and US officials act to influence Hollywood releases.

US films are a bugbear for the truth-seekers. Last month, Russia banned Child 44, a thriller set in

the late Stalin era that was produced by Ridley Scott and stars Gary Oldman, after it was deemed

historically inaccurate. Mr Medinsky said the film made the Soviet Union out to be not a country but Mordor, populated by physical and moral subhumans, a bloody mass of orcs and ghouls.

Mr Kononov was upset by the opening scene in which Soviet soldiers raise a flag over the

Reichstag and ones arm is all hanging with watches.

I remember well a photograph from a Soviet history schoolbook in which an SS officer in a helmet with rolled-up sleeves was wearing many looted watches, he said. And here that is turned on its head so that our victorious soldier is portrayed like a demon.

In another case, the military-historical society accused the makers of a German World War Two

documentary called Our Mothers, Our Fathers of painting a distorted picture. We are particularly outraged at an episode in which Soviet soldiers burst into a German hospital, kill the

injured and rape the nurses," it said in a statement, adding that there were just a handful of

instances of Red Army soldiers' inhuman treatment of German citizens, and these soldiers were

severely punished by the Soviet authorities.

Antony Beevor, the British historian, has estimated that two million German women were raped

by ill-disciplined Soviet soldiers at the end of the war.

A turn to selective Soviet history

What is called the falsification of history in Russia today is often, in fact, the contrary a fuller, more effective representation of history than there was in Soviet times, said Andrei Zubov, a historian, in a telephone interview.

Mr Zubov was sacked from his job at Moscows prestigious State Institute of International Relations last year after writing an article comparing a possible Russian invasion of Ukraine with

Nazi Germany's Anschluss with Austria in 1938.

In Soviet times a huge number of facts about the Second World War were hidden, he added. The classic examples are the secret protocols of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact and the killing by the NKVD of thousands of Polish officers at Katyn, which Soviet authorities blamed on the

Nazis.

What our state is doing now is a struggle to preserve an incomplete and in some ways false history, the hiding of some facts in order to retain the Soviet vision of the Second World War.

And that of course contradicts the scholarly approach that every new piece of knowledge

develops, widen and changes academic thinking. In a word, it is obscurantism.

Stalin: tyrant or military genius?

One charge is that Russias warriors against distortion are themselves downplaying the tyranny of Joseph Stalin, who was commander in chief during the war.

The dictator has once again begun to appear on patriotic billboards in Russia and a bust of him

was erected in the town of Lipetsk this week (it was later doused in paint by a protester).

Mr Kononov repeated a familiar argument that it was too early to judge Stalins legacy, which might only become apparent in hundreds of years despite exhaustive evidence of his crimes.

This week, Memorial, the organisation dedicated to preserving the memory of the millions who

were shot, tortured or sent to the gulag in Stalins times, said any attempts to put up monuments in his honour were blasphemous and should be banned by law.

Mr Medinsky said he was personally against statues of Stalin because they split society but argued they should be erected in places where the majority of local people were in favour.

In front of the British parliament there is a wonderful monument to Oliver Cromwell who was such a butcher that he makes Ivan the Terrible look like a monk in a white habit, he said. Cromwell was the Stalin of his times. But he is a complex and remarkable figure and the English are right, having erected that monument, not to remove it.

Mr Medinsky also drew a comparison between the percentage of Soviet citizens in labour camps

and Americas current prison population, saying the latter was greater. When it was suggested to

him the US system was not the gulag, the minister made a noise expressing doubt and said: Ask an inmate in the US, is it good or bad to be a prisoner in the US.

Despite Stalins faults, Mr Medinsky added, if he had fled from Moscow like the leaders of other states such as Poland fled [their cities], if he had capitulated, we would still have won but

there would have been millions more victims. So his personal courage saved millions of lives.

Ukrainians and Russians are one

The culture minister reserved his most scathing remarks for the leadership of Ukraine.

Russian patriotic rhetoric today sees a thread running through the Second World War to the

current conflict in eastern Ukraine, where pro-Moscow separatists are fighting what they call the

fascist junta the Western-backed government in Kiev.

The St Georges ribbon now worn by hundreds of thousands of Russians for Victory Day is also pinned on the rebels uniforms.

Last month, Dmitry Kiselev, the state television executive often called Vladimir Putins propagandist-in-chief, said the ribbon had become a symbol of the struggle against dominance of any single power or regime meaning the United States - and of a multipolar world.

The Kremlin also cries foul at politicians in Kiev who say that Ukrainian nationalists like Stepan

Bandera who collaborated with the Nazis to fight Soviet forces were heroes.

Ukraines deeper roots remain a subject of bitter debate. Andrew Wilson, the British historian who is an authority on the country, argues that a truly separate Ukrainian identity began to

emerge in the 17th century.

Mr Medinsky, like Mr Putin, doubts the very existence of a Ukrainian nation, saying Ukrainians

and Russians are one people.

He poured scorn on a recent decree issued by Petro Poroshenko, in which the Ukrainian

president called the 10th century prince, Vladimir the Great, the creator of the medieval European state of Rus-Ukraine.

Rus was in fact a loose federation of Slavic tribes and Ukraine did not exist as a word at the time.

This is fantasy history, like something from Game of Thrones or Lord of the Rings, said Mr Medinsky with a derisive cackle. Tolkien, George Martin and Petro Poroshenko three greats of world historiography.

geogibsonenfloride Wymington 2 hours ago

It is false to say that the USSR/Russia had become Hitler's ally. As the German

invasion of

June 1941 (Operation Barbarossa !) proved, the Nazi's were planning to invade and

carve up

Eurasia (=Russia/USSR) well before August, 1939. This fact is suppressed-- for some

reason -- in Anglo-American chronology of events. The Nonaggression Pact between USSR

& Hitler pledged no war as of August, 1939. What, exactly, the 'West' wanted is

profoundly contradictory: to stymie Hitler, but do so without in any way 'helping' the

Russian Bolsheviks (!). This was not possible at the time: France had a defence pact

with Poland, but refused one with USSR. Muddled thinking, surely. The August 1939

Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact bought precious time for the Russians; when in June 1941 the

Wehrmacht invaded, by then, new armament factories had been built East of the Urals

and were able to supply the USSR armies that, eventually, reversed and defeated Nazi

Germany.

Vladimir Putin: US trying to create 'unipolar world'

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/09/vladimir-putin-us-trying-to-create-unipolar-

world

Russian president uses Moscows annual Victory Day parade to accuse the US of ignoring principles of international cooperation

Thousands of Russian troops march across Red Square in Moscow on Saturday to mark the 70th

anniversary of victory over Nazi Germany

Damien Gayle and agencies

Saturday 9 May 2015 11.05 BST Last modified on Saturday 9 May 2015 16.42 BST

Vladimir Putin has used an address commemorating the 70th anniversary of victory over Nazi

Germany to accuse the US of attempting to dominate the world.

Speaking at Moscows annual Victory Day parade in Red Square, which this year has been boycotted by western leaders over the continuing crisis in Ukraine, the Russian president berated

Washington for attempts to create a unipolar world.

Putin said despite the importance of international cooperation, in the past decades we have seen attempts to create a unipolar world. That phrase is often used by Russia to criticise the US for purportedly attempting to dominate world affairs.

The US president, Barack Obama, has snubbed the festivities, as have the leaders of Russias other key second world war allies, Britain and France, leaving Putin to mark the day in the

company of the leaders of China, Cuba and Venezuela.

The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, has likewise ducked out of attending the parade but will

fly to Moscow on Sunday to lay a wreath at the grave of the Unknown Warrior and meet the

Russian president.

As western sanctions on Russia over its actions in Ukraine continue to bite, Moscow has

increasingly appeared to pivot away from Europe and focus more on developing relations with

China. The Chinese leader, Xi Jinping, will be the most high-profile guest on the podium next to

Putin. Other presidents in attendance include Indias Pranab Mukherjee, president Abdel Fatah al-Sisi of Egypt, Ral Castro of Cuba, Nicols Maduro of Venezuela, Robert Mugabe of

Zimbabwe and Jacob Zuma of South Africa.

Russia used the parade to show off its latest military technology including the Armata tank in the parade, which included 16,000 troops and a long convoy of weapons dating from the second

world war to the present day. Also on show for the first time was a RS-24 Yars ICBM launcher,

which Moscow has said described as a response to US and Nato anti-missile systems.

Russia's Victory Day military parade in

pictures

View gallery

The celebrations stand in contrast to the festivities a decade ago, when Putin hosted the leaders

of the US, France, Germany, Italy and Japan.

The Soviet Union lost about 27 million soldiers and civilians more than any other country in what it calls the great patriotic war, and the Red Armys triumph remains an enormous source of national pride.

On Saturday morning, many Muscovites sported garrison caps and black and orange striped

ribbons that have become a symbol of patriotism in recent years. More than 70% of Russians say

a close family member was killed or went missing during the war, making Victory Day an

emotional symbol of unity for the nation.

In recent years, victory in what Russians see as a 1941-1945 conflict has been raised to cult

status and critics accuse Putin of seeking to co-opt the countrys history to boost his personal power.

The Kremlin has also used second world war narratives to rally support for its current political

agenda, for example painting the Ukrainian government as Nazi sympathisers.

Later in the day around 200,000 people were expected to march through Red Square with

portraits of relatives who fought in the war, in a Kremlin-backed campaign dubbed the

immortal regiment.

The parade will also see more than 100 military planes including long-range nuclear bombers swoop over Moscow in a spectacular flyby.

Smaller parades in 25 other cities will involve 25,000 soldiers and even nuclear submarines,

according to the defence ministry.

Russian S-400 Triumph medium-range and long-range surface-to-air missile systems drive during the

Victory Day parade at Red SquarePicture: Reuters

Russia also has its Victory Day but nobody

else wants to share it

Western leaders will stay away from parades for the 24 million who died in the

Second World War

Jennifer Monaghan

Moscow

Friday 08 May 2015

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russia-also-has-its-victory-day--but-nobody-

else-wants-to-share-it-10237242.html

At a pop-up stall in central Moscow, street vendor Alexei Mendeleyev sells mugs emblazoned

with images of President Vladimir Putin as he looks to capitalise on the patriotic fervour

generated ahead of Russias Victory Day celebrations.

Marked on 9 May as opposed to 8 May as in western Europe Victory Day was, is and always will be a celebration in Russia, says Mr Mendeleyev, who fled to Moscow last year from Ukraines war-torn Donetsk region. Across the street, a woman tries to peddle Soviet pilot hats to passers-by some of whom wear the orange and black-striped St George ribbon, a symbol akin to the red poppy, in their lapels or tied to their handbags and rucksacks.

Victory Day is a public holiday in Russia, marked by large parades and firework displays in

cities across the country. The scale of the celebration is unsurprising: the Soviet Union suffered

up to 24 million civilian and military casualties during the war about 50 times greater than the losses incurred by Great Britain, according to statistics cited by the US National World War II

Museum.

Children wear Red Army caps (Getty Images)

The pice de rsistance of this years Victory Day, which marks 70 years since the Allied victory over Nazi Germany, will be a military parade through the centre of Moscow. About 200 vehicles

will proceed along the citys main thoroughfare, Tverskaya Ulitsa, and onto Red Square outside of the Kremlin. A fly-by involving 150 planes and helicopters will take place overhead.

At a rehearsal on Monday, the crowd gave out a loud cheer as a RS-24 Yars intercontinental

ballistic missile, which is capable of delivering three nuclear warheads, rumbled down

Tverskaya Ulitsa. Russia will also use the parade to publicly unveil its new Armata T-14 tank described on Twitter this week as a beauty by Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, who oversees the countrys military-industrial complex. Organisers will be hoping the tank doesnt break down, as it appeared to do in a dress rehearsal on Thursday. The tanks driver raised a small red flag to show he had problems but managed to drive on about 30 minutes later after an

attempt to tow it away was abandoned.

The parade announcer later announced that the stoppage had been planned to demonstrate how

military equipment could be evacuated from the battlefield, prompting laughter from the

audience. It will be the first new main battle tank deployed by Russia in 40 years, part of plans to

produce 2,300 new tanks in the next five years under a costly programme to replace ageing

Soviet-era military vehicles.

Victory Day is a public holiday in Russia, marked by large parades (AFP)

Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Cuban leader Raul Castro will be among the 27 foreign dignitaries

who will travel to Moscow for celebrations marking Victory Day, presidential aide Yury

Ushakov was cited as saying Wednesday by the Interfax news agency.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un was also due to visit the capital in what would have marked

his first foreign visit since taking power, though the countrys titular head of state Kim Yong-nam will now travel in his place. There will however be noticeable absences at this years parade on Red Square as many Western leaders have decided to shun the celebrations in protest at

Russias actions in Ukraine.

Barack Obama, David Cameron and French President Franois Hollande have all chosen not to

attend the celebrations in Moscow. German Chancellor Angela Merkel will lay a wreath at the

Tomb of the Unknown Soldier on Sunday, but will skip the main parade on Saturday, her

spokesman Steffen Seiber said, according to Deutsche Well.For many, the decision by Western

leaders to snub the ceremony is an affront to the memory of the war dead, who died in a conflict

known as the Great Patriotic War.

For many the true meaning of the day has become lost in the furore surrounding contemporary

politics (AFP/Getty)

In my view it is very disrespectful, and childish. If the West wanted to win the hearts and minds of Russians, they would have done right the opposite attend the celebrations with the Russian citizens for whom 9 May is the holiest day of the whole year, says Guennadi Moukine, who was born in Russia but now works in Australia.

The most prominent absentee will be Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, the head of a one-

time brotherly nation whose relations with Russia have soured following the Crimean annexation

and the conflict in Ukraine.

There will be a parade in Moscow on 9 May, in which the weapons that are being used today in Donetsk will be displayed. Ukraine has rejected an offer to take part in this parade, Mr Poroshenko said.

For others in Russia, the true meaning of Victory Day a chance to commemorate the sacrifices made by soldiers and civilians alike has been lost in the furore surrounding contemporary politics. Why politicise and dramatise the attendance or non-attendance [of world leaders]? asks Aislu Van Rain, a Russian teacher whose father was injured in the defence of Moscow and

suffered from war trauma for the rest of his life.

They would do better to think how to thank their own veterans, she adds.

A Russian T 14 Armata tank rides through Red Square in Moscow, on 7 May 2015, during a rehearsal for the Victory Day military parade. Russia will celebrate the 70th anniversary of the 1945 victory over Nazi Germany.

Poland: Europes victims of Soviet

occupation find no reason for celebrations

Central European countries gather in Poland for sombre ceremony

Matthew Day

Warsaw

Friday 08 May 2015

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/poland-europes-victims-of-soviet-occupation-

find-no-reason-for-celebrations-10237256.html

The leaders of a swathe of Europe freed from Nazi occupation by the Red Army gathered in

Poland to commemorate the end of the war, but there was little in the way of celebration.

At the official ceremony at Westerplatte, the spit of land in Gdansk where the very first shots of

the Second World War were fired, as the clock struck midnight and ushered in 8 May, Polish

artillery fired a salvo in salute, trumpets sounded a fanfare and that was that.

Devoid of pomp, the sombre atmosphere reflected central Europes ambivalent attitude to the end of the European war. While Poles, Czechs and other nationalities recognise the huge cost

Soviet forces endured in their defeat of Germany, they resent the fact the same forces brought

with them another form of occupation and a system of political subjugation that remained in

place till the Berlin Wall came crashing down in 1989.

For Lithuanians, Poles and others in central Europe, the war did not end on 8 May. We suffered from a new occupation, a new dictatorship and new atrocities, Dalia Grybauskaite, the Lithuanian President, told the Polish press before the ceremony, adding that some 300,000

Lithuanians had been imprisoned or sent to the gulags by the Soviet liberators.

In recognition of some of the victims of Communist repression, earlier on 7 May, a group of

leaders, including the presidents of the Czech Republic, Romania, Ukraine, Estonia and

Bulgaria, visited a memorial in Gdansk to 42 shipyard workers massacred by state security

forces in 1970.

The Ukraine war and Russias annexation of Crimea have also added poignancy to commemorations in Poland. The country has always viewed their giant neighbour with

suspicion, and now fears of an apparently revanchist Russia under Vladimir Putin make for an

unsettling combination when mixed with memories of the war and post-war repression.

The war in Ukraine does not let us forget that in Europe there are still forces reminiscent of the darkest days of the 20th century, which do not respect the rule of law and civilised relations

between nations, said Bronislaw Komorowski, the Polish President and a former anti-Communist dissident, during a speech at Westerplatte.

Ukraine expressed its desire to forge closer ties with Europe, for its people to live a normal life in dignity and freedom, but its stronger neighbour responded through the use of force and

changing borders, he continued.

This is something we have not seen in Europe since 1945. That is why it is hard for us to celebrate with joy the end of the war in Europe 70 years ago.

Across Poland, Soviet-era statues and memorials are slowly being removed from public places

and relocated in museums and war cemeteries. Earlier this year, the Russian embassy in Poland

protested after Warsaws government voted against the return of a statue featuring four Soviet soldiers to a prominent square in the city.

We pay tribute to all those who fought to the bitter for every street, every house and every frontier of our Motherland

Vladimir Putin delivers Speech at military parade on Red Square

in Moscow to mark the 70th anniversary of Victory in the 19411945

Great Patriotic War.

May 9, 2015 10:20

Fellow citizens of Russia,

Dear veterans,

Distinguished guests,

Comrade soldiers and seamen, sergeants and sergeant majors, midshipmen and warrant officers,

Comrade officers, generals and admirals,

I congratulate you all on the 70th Anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War!

Today, when we mark this sacred anniversary, we once again appreciate the enormous scale of Victory over Nazism. We are proud that it was our fathers and grandfathers who succeeded in prevailing over, smashing and destroying that dark force.

Hitler's reckless adventure became a tough lesson for the entire world community. At that time, in the 1930s, the enlightened Europe failed to see the deadly threat in the Nazi ideology.

Today, seventy years later, the history calls again to our wisdom and vigilance. We must not forget that the ideas of racial supremacy and exclusiveness had provoked the bloodiest war ever. The war affected almost 80 percent of the world population. Many European nations were enslaved and occupied.

The Soviet Union bore the brunt of the enemy's attacks. The elite Nazi forces were brought to bear on it. All their military power was concentrated against it. And all major decisive battles of World War II, in terms of military power and equipment involved, had been waged there.

And it is no surprise that it was the Red Army that, by taking Berlin in a crushing attack, hit the final blow to Hitler's Germany finishing the war.

Our entire multi-ethnic nation rose to fight for our Motherlands freedom. Everyone bore the severe burden of the war. Together, our people made an immortal exploit to save the country. They predetermined the outcome of World War II. They liberated European nations from the Nazis.

Veterans of the Great Patriotic War, wherever they live today, should know that here, in Russia, we highly value their fortitude, courage and dedication to frontline brotherhood.

Dear friends,

The Great Victory will always remain a heroic pinnacle in the history of our country. But we also pay tribute to our allies in the anti-Hitler coalition.

We are grateful to the peoples of Great Britain, France and the United States of America for their contribution to the Victory. We are thankful to the anti-fascists of various countries who selflessly fought the enemy as guerrillas and members of the underground resistance, including in Germany itself.

We remember the historical meeting on the Elbe, and the trust and unity that became our common legacy and an example of unification of peoples for the sake of peace and stability.

It is precisely these values that became the foundation of the post-war world order. The United Nations came into existence. And the system of the modern international law has emerged.

These institutions have proved in practice their effectiveness in resolving disputes and conflicts.

However, in the last decades, the basic principles of international cooperation have come to be increasingly ignored. These are the principles that have been hard won by mankind as a result of the ordeal of the war.

We saw attempts to establish a unipolar world. We see the strong-arm block thinking gaining momentum. All that undermines sustainable global development.

The creation of a system of equal security for all states should become our common task. Such system should be an adequate match to modern threats, and it should rest on a regional and global non-block basis. Only then will we be able to ensure peace and tranquillity on the planet.

Dear friends,

We welcome today all our foreign guests while expressing a particular gratitude to the representatives of the countries that fought against Nazism and Japanese militarism.

Besides the Russian servicemen, parade units of ten other states will march through the Red Square as well. These include soldiers from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Their forefathers fought shoulder to shoulder both at the front and in the rear.

These also include servicemen from China, which, just like the Soviet Union, lost many millions of people in this war. China was also the main front in the fight against militarism in Asia.

Indian soldiers fought courageously against the Nazis as well.

Serbian troops also offered strong and relentless resistance to the fascists.

Throughout the war our country received strong support from Mongolia.

These parade ranks include grandsons and great-grandsons of the war generation. The Victory Day is our common holiday. The Great Patriotic War was in fact the battle for the future of the entire humanity.

Our fathers and grandfathers lived through unbearable sufferings, hardships and losses. They worked till exhaustion, at the limit of human capacity. They fought even unto death. They proved the example of honour and true patriotism.

We pay tribute to all those who fought to the bitter for every street, every house and every frontier of our Motherland. We bow to those who perished in severe battles near Moscow and Stalingrad, at the Kursk Bulge and on the Dnieper.

We bow to those who died from famine and cold in the unconquered Leningrad, to those who were tortured to death in concentration camps, in captivity and under occupation.

We bow in loving memory of sons, daughters, fathers, mothers, grandfathers, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, comrades-in-arms, relatives and friends all those who never came back from war, all those who are no longer with us.

A minute of silence is announced.

Minute of silence.

Dear veterans,

You are the main heroes of the Great Victory Day. Your feat predestined peace and decent life for many generations. It made it possible for them to create and move forward fearlessly.

And today your children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren live up to the highest standards that you set. They work for the sake of their country's present and future. They serve their Fatherland with devotion. They respond to complex challenges of the time with honour. They guarantee the successful development, might and prosperity of our Motherland, our Russia!

Long live the victorious people!

Happy holiday!

Congratulations on the Victory Day!

Hooray!

Staying Away From Moscows Victory Day Parade

Posted by: Judy Dempsey Monday, May 4, 2015 4 Print Page

http://carnegieeurope.eu/strategiceurope/?fa=59974

Every year on May 9, Russia celebrates Victory Day, the anniversary of the Soviet Unions defeat of Nazi Germany, with a military parade in Moscow. Twicein 1995 and in 2005Western leaders attended. Then, there was a sense of hope for a new relationship between the

West and Russia.

But the West did not have a unanimous view of the parades. Nor, indeed, was the West

unanimous that its relationship with Russia would be based on genuine cooperationperhaps even on shared values.

Old Europe, or Western Europe, perceived the parades as a celebration to mark the end of

Nazism and fascism. The Red Armys march into Berlin in 1945 ended a horrific and cataclysmic era of European history.

Judy Dempsey

Nonresident Senior Associate

Carnegie Europe

Editor in chief

Strategic Europe

It is estimated that about 36.5 million Europeans died between 1939 and 1945. Nearly half that

number consisted of noncombatant civilians.

Nazism managed to destroy Europes rich and old Judeo-Christian heritage, despite attempts after 1945 to build Jewish communities and life in some parts of Europe. Over 5.7 million Jews

were sent to the Nazi death camps. In the Soviet Union, an estimated 16 million people died, half

of whom were soldiers.

Rereading British historian Tony Judts Postwar and American historian Timothy Snyders Bloodlands on the war and its aftermath is a salutary reminder of the original and noble

intentions of the founding fathers of the European Union.

New Europes view of the Victory Day Parades was completely different. The Soviet Unions Red Army was seen not as a liberator but as an oppressor. As soon as the Nazi yoke was lifted in

1945, populations across Eastern, Central, and Southeastern Europe were saddled with an

oppressive totalitarian system that was to last until 1989.

Even after regaining its independence, with few exceptions, New Europe never shook off its

suspicion of Russia. New Europe, particularly Poland and the Baltic states, craved security. That

is why joining the Euro-Atlantic structures of NATO and the EU was their goal. Entering those

organizations meant being reunited with Europe. It meant feeling safe.

Russian President Vladimir Putins annexation of the Crimean Peninsula in March 2014 and Russias military support for pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine punctured that sense of security.

This interference was in sharp contrast to the wars in the former Yugoslavia during the 1990s

and Russias quick war in Georgia in 2008. Those conflicts didnt disturb New Europes sense of security, but in the case of Georgia, the warnings by some governments in New Europe of

Russias intentions were vindicated. Old Europe had not taken those warnings seriously.

But it was Putins attempts to destabilize Ukrainein a bid to jeopardize the countrys chances to become a vibrant democracy with a market economy and tied to Europe that changed Old Europes view of Putins Russia.

The decision by most EU leaders or heads of state, with the exception of those of the Czech

Republic and Slovakia, to stay away from this years May 9 Victory Day Parade signifies a shift by Old Europe. Old Europe doesnt want to be associated with Putins triumphant nationalism and with a Kremlin that has manipulated history by invoking an antifascist narrative to justify its

war against Ukraine.

The Kremlin has already blamed the United States for being behind Europes refusal to attend the paradeas if the United States had that much influence.

Some of Putins closest allies havent made any travel arrangements. Viktor Orbn, the prime minister of Hungary, is staying at home, and so is the countrys president, Jnos der. Aleksander Lukashenko, the president of Belarus, a member of Russian-led Eurasian Economic

Union, isnt going to turn up either. And Kim Jong-un, the leader of North Korea, has canceled, apparently after first accepting the invitation.

Still, the leaders of China and India will attend, as will Islam Karimov, the president of

Uzbekistan, and his Turkmen counterpart, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow, both of whom have

appalling human rights records.

But there is one European leader who had to weigh up particularly carefully what decision to

make: Angela Merkel. The German chancellor knows all too well the historical and present

complex relationship between Berlin and Moscowand Germanys responsibility and culpability. She could not attend the Victory Day Parade because of how Putin has manipulated

it. But nor could she stay away.

Instead, Merkel, whose discovery of diplomacy and foreign policy has been the hallmark of her

third term in office, found a compromise worthy of war veterans and the huge suffering of the

people of the Soviet Union. Merkel will travel to Moscow on May 10.

We now have very deep differences of opinion with Russia, especially in connection with the events in Ukraine, the chancellor said. And yet it is important for me to lay a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier on May 10, together with the Russian president, to honor the

memory of the millions who died during the Second World War and for whom Germany is

responsible.