Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday voiced confidence of winning the war with Ukraine as he oversaw the Victory Day military parade on Red Square commemorating the defeat of Nazi Germany in the Second World War.
Security was tight in Moscow as Putin and several foreign leaders attended the parade, which was scaled down even as a U.S.-brokered three-day ceasefire eased concerns about possible Ukrainian attempts to disrupt the festivities.
Putin, in power for more than a quarter-century, has used Victory Day, Russia’s most important secular holiday, to showcase the country’s military might and rally support for his action in Ukraine. The war began after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting at the Grand Kremlin Palace in Moscow on Saturday as Russia marks Victory Day. (Ramil Sitdikov/Pool/The Associated Press)
Speaking at the parade, Putin hailed Russian troops fighting in Ukraine, declaring that they “face an aggressive force that is armed and supported by the entire bloc of NATO” and are fighting for a “just cause.”
“Victory has always been and will be ours,” Putin said, as columns of troops lined up on Red Square. “The key to success is our moral strength, courage and valour, our unity and ability to endure anything and overcome any challenge.”
For the first time, Saturday’s parade featured troops from North Korea, a tribute to Pyongyang that sent its soldiers to fight alongside Moscow forces to repel a Ukrainian incursion into Russia’s Kursk region.
No tanks, military equipment at parade
The May 9 parade on Red Square marks Russia’s most revered national holiday, which celebrates the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany and pays homage to the 27 million Soviet citizens, including many from Ukraine, who perished.
Once used to show off Russia’s vast military, including its nuclear-capable intercontinental ballistic missiles, the parade this year had no tanks or other military equipment rolling over the cobbles of Red Square.
Soldiers and sailors, some of whom have served in Ukraine, marched and cheered as Putin sat beside Russian veterans in the shadow of Vladimir Lenin’s Mausoleum.
“In general, everything is as usual, except for the demonstration of military equipment,” Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters.
After Russia and Ukraine accused each other of violating unilateral ceasefires they had each declared over recent days, U.S. President Donald Trump announced a three-day ceasefire from Saturday to Monday that was supported by the Kremlin and Kyiv. The two sides also agreed to exchange 1,000 prisoners.
“I’d like to see it stop. Russia-Ukraine — it’s the worst thing since World War II in terms of life. Twenty-five thousand young soldiers every month. It’s crazy,” Trump told reporters in Washington.
He added he would “like to see a big extension” of the ceasefire. There were no reports of violations of the ceasefire from either Moscow or Kyiv.
Russia had warned that any attempt by Kyiv to disrupt Saturday’s event would lead to a massive missile strike on the Ukrainian capital. Moscow told foreign diplomats that they should evacuate Kyiv staff in the event of such an attack.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy issued a tongue-in-cheek decree “allowing” Russia’s military parade to proceed, saying Ukrainian weapons would not target Red Square.
Security was tight in Moscow. Soldiers with guns could be seen atop pickup trucks and roads blocked around the centre of the capital, which along with the surrounding region has a population of 22 million.
War with Ukraine haunts Russia’s parade
After Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941, the Red Army eventually pushed Nazi forces back to Berlin, where Adolf Hitler killed himself and the red Soviet Victory Banner was raised over the Reichstag in May 1945.
Nazi Germany’s unconditional surrender came into force at 11:01 p.m. on May 8, 1945, marked as Victory in Europe Day by Britain, the United States and France. In Moscow, it was already May 9, which became the Soviet Union’s Victory Day in what Russians call the Great Patriotic War of 1941-45.
But this year’s parade comes amid a wave of anxiousness in Moscow about the ultimate outcome of the war. It has killed hundreds of thousands of people, left swaths of Ukraine in ruins and drained Russia’s $3-trillion US economy while Russia’s relations with Europe are worse than at any time since the depths of the Cold War.
“The crisis is still deepening gradually, but any sharp movement can send the economy (and not only the economy) into a tailspin,” jailed pro-war Russian nationalist Igor Girkin, who has criticized the Kremlin for its conduct of the war, said in a post on the Telegram messaging service.
Military personnel from North Korea march at the Victory Day military parade in Moscow on Saturday. (Alexander Zemlianichenko/Pool/The Associated Press)
Girkin, a former Federal Security Service officer, used a naval analogy to say Russia’s leaders were more worried about being kicked out of their cabins than about a shipwreck.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov this week dismissed CNN and other Western media reports that Putin’s protection had been intensified because of fears of a coup or assassination. Russian officials have dismissed reports of a coup plot as nonsense.
WATCH | Russia’s Victory Day parade in 2025:
Celebrating Victory Day in Moscow
Military vehicles and soldiers parade through Red Square in Moscow to mark Victory Day on May 9, 2025.
CNN cited an unidentified European intelligence agency as saying that Putin’s former defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, now Security Council secretary, was seen as a potential coup leader.
Shoigu, who attended an online meeting of the Security Council chaired by Putin on Friday, was at the parade on Saturday, sitting beside some of Putin’s most powerful officials.
