Free Republic

Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of Russia's Security Council, said on Saturday that President Donald Trump's assertion that the U.S. had done more than any other country to win World War Two was "pretentious nonsense". Trump posted on social network Truth Social late on Thursday that "nobody was close to us in terms of strength, bravery, or military brilliance" in both world wars, and that "we did more than any other country, by far, in producing a victorious result in World War II." -snip- "Trump recently announced that the U.S. made the biggest contribution to victory in World War Two and...

Ukraine's parliament will hold a vote on May 8 to ratify a minerals deal signed with the United States earlier this week, a lawmaker said on Friday, while the prime minister suggested the agreement will help Kyiv with supplies of air defence systems. Ukraine and the U.S. signed a deal on Wednesday that will give the United States preferential access to new investments in extraction of Ukraine's natural resources, and fund investment in Ukraine's reconstruction. According to the deal, new military aid, if provided by Washington to Kyiv, could be scored as the U.S. contribution to the joint fund being...

President Donald Trump late Thursday announced plans to designate May 8 as World War II "Victory Day" in the United States, which coincides with the "Victory in Europe Day" that has been celebrated in most of Europe since the Germans surrendered in 1945. -snip- "We won both Wars, nobody was close to us in terms of strength, bravery, or military brilliance, but we never celebrate anything," the president wrote. "That’s because we don’t have leaders anymore, that know how to do so! We are going to start celebrating our victories again!"

US President Donald Trump on May 1 expressed his intent to rename two US holidays to “Victory Day” in his latest attempt to alter the country’s nomenclature. “I am hereby renaming May 8 as Victory Day for World War II and November 11 as Victory Day for World War I,” he wrote on his Truth Social platform. -snip- “Many of our allies and friends are celebrating May 8 as Victory Day, but we did more than any other country, by far, in producing a victorious result on World War II,” Mr Trump’s post said. - snip- “We won both wars,...

MAD Vladimir Putin has been forced to pad out his pathetic parades with North Korean cannon fodder while Russian troops are being massacred on the frontline. Amongst the pomp, propaganda and weaponry, North Korean troops are to march through Moscow's Victory Day parade for the first time, according to insiders. -snip- Dozens of Putin's North Korean cannon fodder are to join the parade in May as the mad dictator desperately attempts to show a substantial military - despite the total casualties of Russian troops standing at over 771,000. Russian sources revealed news of North Korea's participation in the parade to...

Chinese President Xi Jinping has accepted Russia's invitation to attend the commemorations of the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany in World War Two, TASS state news agency reported on Monday. "Chinese President Xi Jinping has accepted an invitation to take part in the celebrations on May 9 in Moscow on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War," TASS cited Russian ambassador to China, Igor Morgulov, as telling Russian state television.

Russia on Thursday wrapped itself in patriotic pageantry for Victory Day, as President Vladimir Putin celebrated the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II by hailing his forces fighting in Ukraine and blasting the West for fueling conflicts around the world. Even though few veterans of what Russia calls the Great Patriotic War are still alive 79 years after Berlin fell to the Red Army, the victory remains the most important and widely revered symbol of Russia’s prowess and a key element of national identity. Even though few veterans of what Russia calls the Great Patriotic War are still...

For the second year in a row, a lone Soviet-era tank rolled across Moscow's Red Square during Russia's Victory Day parade, prompting social media users to mock President Vladimir Putin's military's procession on a day which is traditionally used to display the country's might. A single T-34 tank participated in the parade in Moscow to mark May 9, or Victory Day, which is the annual commemoration of Nazi Germany's defeat during World War II. Like last year, this year's procession was notably muted in contrast to previous events amid Russia's ongoing war in Ukraine, during which both sides have suffered...

There was a striking lack of military hardware on display after major losses in Ukraine. VLADIMIR Putin has vowed Russia is "always" ready to strike the West and snubbed Britain in a snarling World War 2 rant at Russia's annual Victory Day parade. The Russian tyrant instead lavished praise on China and declared Russia was "combat ready" in these "difficult" times as nuclear missiles rumbled through Moscow's streets. -snip- However, today was a much pared-down parade indicating the strains of war. For the second year in a row, it featured just one measly tank - reportedly an 80-year-old T-34.

Natalia Kruglova last spoke to her husband, Pvt. Ivan Petrov, on Sept. 29. The Russian army conscript told Kruglova he had been ordered back to the front lines in southeastern Ukraine. Then he disappeared. Kruglova wrote to her husband’s commanding officers, the Defense Ministry and even military prosecutors in search of news, but to no avail. Weeks later, the army declared Petrov missing but offered no explanation of what had happened to him. “It’s as if no one owes you anything, no one cares,” Kruglova, 45, said in an interview from her home in the Russian far eastern city of...

May 9 parades across other regions in Russia have been cancelled this year over 'security concerns'. VLADIMIR Putin paraded nuclear missile launchers, tanks and thousands of war-ready troops this morning ahead of his triumphant Victory Day event. -snip- Ahead of the patriotic event, Russia's fearsome intercontinental nuclear missiles were pulled through the capital's streets in a show of force to the West. Huge columns of troops marched towards the Red Square and even children in oversized battledress joined in the military festivities. The real events will be held on Thursday under intense security, with reports suggesting that Moscow's centrepiece show...

This is the moment more than 100 Russian troops are believed to have been killed in an ATACMS tactical ballistic missile strike on occupied Luhansk. A military training ground was seen being hit by multiple explosions typical of an ATACMS strike in footage captured by a drone flying high above. The strike targeted a group of 100-plus soldiers who were seen in aerial images, say OSINT analysts in what would be the single largest loss of Russian stories in months. The ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile System) showered the troops with hundreds of M74 APAM mini-bombs which are carried by the...

Ukraine's top commander said on Sunday Russian forces aimed to capture the town of Chasiv Yar by May 9, setting the stage for an important battle for control of high ground in the east where Russia is focusing its assaults. The fall of the town west of the shattered city of Bakhmut by the date Moscow marks the Soviet victory in World War Two would indicate growing Russian battlefield momentum as Kyiv faces a slowdown in Western military aid. Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi, who warned this weekend that the situation in the east had deteriorated, said Russia was focusing its...

Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Wagner mercenary group that leads the ongoing assault on Bakhmut, on Tuesday accused the Russian army of fleeing its positions around the city. "Today one of the units of the Defense Ministry fled from one of our flanks ... exposing the front," said Prigozhin. Prigozhin, popularly known as Putin's chef because of the lucrative catering contracts he once held with the Kremlin, accused the Russian Defense Ministry of "scheming all the time" instead of fighting. Prigozhin said soldiers were abandoning their positions because of the "stupidity" of Russian army commanders, who he said were giving...

The head of Russia's Wagner mercenary force fighting in eastern Ukraine said on Tuesday he had been told he and his men would be regarded as traitors if they abandoned their positions in the city of Bakhmut. But Yevgeny Prigozhin said for the second time in a matter of days that his forces would leave Bakhmut if they did not receive the ammunition they needed to press the battle. He delivered his latest tirade in a profanity-laced audio message which coincided with Russia marking the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany in World War Two with its traditional parade on Moscow's...

Traditional military parades set to take place next month have been called off in Crimea due to security concerns, according to Sergey Aksyonov, the Russian politician acting as head of the Russia-annexed Crimea since 2014. In a statement on his Telegram channel on Wednesday, Aksyonov said authorities in both Crimea and Sevastopol have decided not to hold parades or marches to mark Victory Day on May 9. Marches to mark Labor Day on May 1 have also been scrapped in the region, he said. The move comes as Ukraine has signaled it intends to recapture Crimea as part of its...

A Ukrainian fintech founder and drone developer is offering about $540,000 in prize money to the winner of a race to land a drone on Moscow's Red Square. Volodymyr Yatsenko, the co-founder of Monobank, a Ukrainian online banking service, announced the competition in a Facebook post last week. The competition is open to any Ukrainian drone developers and will take place on May 9, according to the Ukrainian Military Center, a Ukrainian news outlet covering defense. May 9 in Russia is Victory Day, a time when the country celebrates the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany. Yatsenko himself is the developer...

Vladimir Putin scrapped his Victory Day flypast at the last minute because 'he was afraid of an aerial strike', it has been claimed. The military parade was scheduled to include 77 planes in the display of military might over Moscow's Red Square yesterday. Among the planes were his 'Doomsday' Ilyushin Il-80 which allows the Kremlin leader to continue ruling Russia during a nuclear war. But Putin pulled the plug onthe flypast abruptly before the parade, blaming poor weather. Airshows were also aborted or curtailed in at least ten other cities. Yet the sun came out in Moscow during the parade,...

It is now May 9, and the speculation about what Russian President Vladimir Putin will do on the occasion of the 2022 Victory Day Parade has been answered.Due to the war raging in Ukraine, a lot of SmartSet™ types had been speculating that Putin would use the Victory Day Parade as the catalyst to mobilize Russia for his war in Ukraine, if not declare war outright. Read my coverage of Putin’s possible courses of action at Tomorrow Is ‘Victory Day’ in Russia but Vladimir Putin Is Losing, So What Does He Offer Russia?.The preliminaries of the parade are in the...

Russia has stumbled again. Its southern offensive, the second phase of the Ukraine war, has failed to be the "biggest tank war since World War II," as some analysts were predicting. Instead, Russia's ground forces have shown the same lackluster performance on the ground, unable to break through anywhere. The towns and villages of the south, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Friday, "are the places where the fate of this war and the future of our state is being decided, now." Experts point to May 9th—Victory Day in Russia commemorating the surrender of Nazi Germany in 1945—as the next decisive...