With the Ukrainian counteroffensive on the brink of candy, according to his own defense minister, tension is chewing in Russia. After fourteen months of military intervention, bombings and deaths against Ukrainian territory, now in Moscow there are fears that there will be a boomerang effect and that Ukrainian sabotage and attacks will spoil their patriotic holiday par excellence, Victory Day, on May 9. Faced with this possibility, the Kremlin has increased security measures, its spokesman, Dimitri Peskov, said on Tuesday.
“Of course we are aware that the Kyiv regime, which is behind a series of terrorist attacks, plans to continue its line,” Peskov said, answering the question of whether the Kremlin expects sabotage on Victory Day.
Russian President’s press secretary Vladimir Putin added that the “special military operation,” as it is officially called here, “is aimed at fundamentally eliminating the threat” to Russia.
In early April, Peskov promised that enhanced security measures would be taken during the May 9 military parade.
10,000 soldiers will participate in the military parade in Moscow, accompanied as usual by tanks and intercontinental missile launchers.
The Presidential Guard, in charge of the security of senior Russian officials, including the head of state, announced last week the closure of Red Square to the public for two weeks. This is an exceptional measure, since its access has never been restricted for such a long period before.
In addition, in Moscow the massive concentrations of this month of May have been suspended. There was no demonstration on Workers’ Day, on May 1, and on the 9th the march of the “Immortal Regiment” will not be held, in which thousands of people take to the streets with the portrait of their relatives who fought in the World War II and in which Putin usually participates.
But the Victory Day military parade on May 9 in the Russian capital is a must for Russian power. In addition to showing muscle to the whole world, we must not forget its propaganda effect.
In his speech before the troops, and broadcast live by all the country’s media, Putin often evokes the spirit of sacrifice that helped the Soviet Union repel the invasion of Hitler’s Germany and the human cost of 27 million lives. He also usually takes the opportunity to make Russia’s position clear to Western countries, today determined to help Ukraine repel Russian aggression with military support for Kyiv and sanctions against Moscow.
The military parade is also traditional in many Russian cities. Last month, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said that this year it was planned to hold more than 25.
But some cities and regions, however, have preferred to suspend the main event on May 9 “for security reasons.”
Since Putin sent his troops and tanks to Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Russia’s energy and military infrastructures have been under attack. Ukraine has never claimed responsibility for these attacks, but its leaders have occasionally made sarcastic comments or expressed satisfaction at the damage caused.
The arrival last year of two drones at two Russian military airfields in Ryazan and Saratov, the latter more than 600 kilometers from the border with Ukraine, demonstrated the ability of the Ukrainian Armed Forces to hit targets inside Russia.
Last February a drone was found near the city of Kolomna, about a hundred kilometers from Moscow. And last week a crashed one was found in the Bolgorodski district, 30 kilometers east of the Russian capital. According to the local press, it was the third in two days.
Attacks and sabotage in Russian regions have also increased in recent days, as well as in the Crimean peninsula, annexed by Russia in 2014.
In the early hours of Saturday morning, a drone attack caused a fire in a fuel tank in the port of Sevastopol, the base of the Russian Black Sea Fleet. From Ukraine, what happened was described as a “punishment from God”, a response to the deaths on Friday of 23 civilians in the Ukrainian city of Uman after a Russian missile attack.
This Monday, May 1, a train heading to Belarus derailed in Russia’s Briansk region, bordering Ukraine, after an explosive device exploded on the railway.
A day earlier there was an explosion in a high tension tower in the Leningrad Oblast, which maintains the Soviet name and surrounds the city of Saint Petersburg.
The first regions that renounced celebrating the Victory Day parade this year were those bordering Ukraine in Belgorod and Kursk, which over the months have regularly suffered artillery hits from Ukrainian territory.
“There will be no parade in order not to provoke the enemy with a large number of military equipment and personnel in the center of Belgorod,” Belgorod Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said.
Neither will the military parade be organized in the Republic of Crimea and in Sevastopol, nor in the farthest regions of Oryol and Pskov.
The last to renounce the traditional parade has been the Saratov Oblast (on the Volga). Its governor, Román BusarguÃn, announced this May 2 on his Telegram account that “the safety of the participants in mass events and of our veterans is a priority. For this reason, we have decided not to celebrate this year the solemn passage of the troops of the Saratov garrison on Theater Square”.
Rather than remember past war glories, many parts of Russia are now more aware of the current conflict.
Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov said on Monday that “everything is ready” for the counteroffensive with which Kyiv will try to retake the territory occupied by Russian forces. Its start now depends, he assured, on the General Staff and the commander-in-chief, Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelensky.
Ukraine’s ability to reach Russian territory would be enhanced if its Western partners provided it with capable weapons to do so. But both the United States and the European countries are avoiding it, aware that this could escalate the conflict or even provoke a direct confrontation between Russia and the NATO countries.
In this regard, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Monday that Germany and other Alliance countries had insisted that the weapons supplied to Kyiv should not be used against Russian territory.
Peskov responded yesterday Tuesday, saying the German involvement in the war in Ukraine is increasing day by day with the supply of weapons. And he assured that Berlin has no way of guaranteeing that the weapons he had delivered to Ukraine would not be used against Russian territory.
In addition, he accused Ukrainian troops of already using them in the Donbass region (eastern Ukraine), which Russia considers its own. In September 2022 Putin annexed the Ukrainian provinces of Luhansk and Donetsk (the Donbass) and Kherson and Zaporizhia (south), without caring that his troops have never controlled them one hundred percent.
