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 Motherland’s 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 tranquility 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!
“We are grateful to the peoples of Great Britain, France and the United States of America for their contribution to the Victory. ” – Russian President, Vladimir Putin, May, 2015.
I don’t know about you, but these words really humble me [in a very positive way].
This man has been literally p****d upon by the entire western media on behalf of their masters, yet here he is; unscathed and making the west [and its joined@thehip MSM] look like the idiots they truly are [or sadly, have become].
A true ‘WOW-factor’ moment.
Kudos to you, Mr President.
Russian Victory Day Parade in Bathurst Canada with 1000s of people attending
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObZClHifQTE&feature=share&app=desktop
Putin does not let others control his behavior. He remains himself. When someone tries to insult him or to insult Russia he realizes that this is impossible: A person who behaves badly only insults himself.
Quite right , Daniel
True sportsmen, true gentlemen, elevates himself and his opponents to a higher level of spirituality.
Consistent with the simple rule that the first and the last act in Judo, Aikido etc is bowing to
your opponent.
Regards, Spiral
OT
Here’s an example of how MSM [via their masters] spin things.
You don’t say ‘Natalie Portman, the actress,’ of course not, that just doesn’t ram home the real [hidden] message, thus you hash it up a little and write;
“Israeli-born, Jewish actress, Natalie Portman, is nervous about living in Paris.”
Touched all [3] bases, in one swing.
How about the condescending and arrogant spin in this headline from the Hegemon’s poodle daily bullhorn:
Russia to stage massive WW2 parade despite Western boycott
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32668511
As if…….
@ SanctuaryOne
Q; Russia to stage massive WW2 parade despite Western boycott.
R; But you gotta keep The Boss’ happy, don’t you?
In fact, AMAZINGLY, coverage of the BBc was very respectful and, at certain times, laudatory, the 09 Day Parade.
The air show has been described as ‘spectacular’, and a report on the Parade in Donetsk, the reporter gets emotional when receiving flowers of a veteran.
I repeat – I was surprised at the BBC posture, waiting rabid attacks on Putin and the “Russian belligerence” and not realize it.
A pitty that we know is just for now…
And the gesture of the nobody-knows-why-he`s-called-prince?! Refusing to take the hand of a WWII veteran?!?! DESPICABLE TO THE CORE!!! Compare that to the REAL President`s speech… Sorry, impossible!!!
9.Mai 2015 – How we in Berlin celebrated the Soviet Victory over Fascism
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lgPOrkwtxo&feature=em-subs_digest
But with the fight against Zionazis it is like with taking a shower: It needs to be continuously repeated.
I thank the Soviet Union that they freed the World from barbarian Faschism. Unfortunately the same “international” banks that financed Hitler’s rise to destroy both Germany and Russia at once are still running the Western “democracies” until this day. LONG LIVE RUSSIA, LONG LIVE THE CCCP!!! I can proudly say: By birth I’m an East-German. In my heart I’m a Soviet Russian :):):) Алсу и другие артисты – Широка страна моя родная https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwCso4l-bcs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8OIGCkfmK8w
None dare call it conspiracy: Origin of evil; The Money Masters
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FosVI_XNhVc
Thank you Martin. I only visited and then worked briefly both in the CCCP and in East Germany. But my impression is 180 degrees from the vilifying propaganda with which these noble countries have been assaulted. And, based on what I read, many, if not the majority of Germans who lived in East Germany, maintain that it was better then. Which I do not find at all surprising.
I was lucky enough to visit Berlin right at the beginning of die Wende, in 92, and had a glorious time visiting with East Berliner fast friends on the Muggelsee near Friedrichshagen. Two of the coolest people I met in Berlin, which is saying a lot. I hope Friedrichshagen hasn’t been completely yuppified… And they said a lot of the same things… like: “Why do we have to suddenly change everything one way”, i.e., just the mega-capitalist way? They spoke Russian and I spoke bad German, so we communicated via sign language, choppy German, and the universal language of music. I enjoyed very much riding in the Trabi. Berlin must be so different now, I’m almost afraid to go back. Prost!
I found this on Washington post. It gives credit for the sacrifice that russia made in WWII.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2015/05/08/dont-forget-how-the-soviet-union-saved-the-world-from-hitler/
What many in the west forget is that Russia tied up some 220 German divisions whilst the allies were met by some 12 divisions when the Normandy invasion started.
The Soviet Union had some 15% of its entire population wiped out compared with around 400,000 for the USA and 220,000 for the UK.
It does seem rather churlish that western countries led by America failed to attend Russia honouring its dead
USA lost 420,000 including a few thousands merchant marine. They’re the only combatant country with a death count so low that they can know every single one.
Total 420,000. The Soviet Union lost more than than TWICE that many civilian CHILDREN.
The USSR lost at least 65 men for each American casualty. 65 to 1. Sixty-five times more Russkis died in WWII than Americans. Any informed person knows who won the war.
“What many in the west forget is that Russia tied up some 220 German divisions whilst the allies were met by some 12 divisions when the Normandy invasion started”.
Yes, getting sent to the eastern front was practically a death sentence for the average German soldier at the time and they were all simply terrified of the prospect as the chances of returning were more or less non existent. Remember the scene from Schindlers list where Oscar Schindler was trying to save one of his workers from deportation on a train to a death camp and he was being given the run around by the guards and their superiors ?, but as soon as he said he would make sure they were all sent to the eastern front everything changed in the blink of an eye and the man was produced for him, well this was the reality, and German soldiers would rather surrender to American or British troops than to Soviet troops.
My apologies Saker for the capitals but I just got to say :
VIVA RUSSIYA !! VIVA NOVORUSSIYA !!
Amen!
26,000,000 Russian victims [military and civilians combined] translates into the following countries having been emptied out [singularly] and cease to exist at the end of WWII [tridecistates, henduodecistates, centistates and millistates not included = 68 more countries];
Iraq
Nepal
Peru
Venezuela
Malaysia
Afghanistan
Uzbekistan
Saudi Arabia
North Korea
Ghana
Yemen
Taiwan
Australia
Syria
Romania
Côte d’Ivoire
Sri Lanka
Mozambique
Madagascar
Cameroon
Angola
Chile
Netherlands
Kazakhstan
Burkina Faso
Niger
Malawi
Cambodia
Mali
Ecuador
Guatemala
Zambia
Senegal
Zimbabwe
Greece
Chad
Cuba
Belgium
Portugal
Czech Republic
Tunisia
Dominican Republic
Guinea
Haiti
Hungary
Orthostates (Midicountries: countries with at least 1 million but less than 10 million people)
Rwanda
Bolivia
Serbia
Belarus
Sweden
Somalia
Benin
Azerbaijan
Austria
Burundi
Switzerland
Bulgaria
Israel
Honduras
Hong Kong
Tajikistan
Papua New Guinea
Togo
Libya
Paraguay
Laos
Jordan
El Salvador
Nicaragua
Sierra Leone
Denmark
Kyrgyzstan
Slovakia
Finland
Turkmenistan
Eritrea
Singapore
Norway
United Arab Emirates
Costa Rica
Ireland
Croatia
Central African Republic
Georgia
New Zealand
Lebanon
Puerto Rico
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Palestine
Republic of the Congo
Moldova
Liberia
Panama
Uruguay
Lithuania
Mauritania
Armenia
Albania
Kuwait
Oman
Jamaica
Mongolia
Latvia
Namibia
Lesotho
Slovenia
Macedonia
Botswana
Gambia
Guinea-Bissau
Gabon
Qatar
Estonia
Trinidad and Tobago
Mauritius
Swaziland
East Timor
I think it appropriate to consider that those countries that did not attend support fascism.
Nothing more need be said.
I agree.
I didn’t see a link to the full parade in Moscow, but found this from Ruptly. It’s one hell of a parade!!
I hope the fascists watch this and see what they are up against.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcFMuLr7TRs
LIVE: Moscow hosts Victory Day Parade on 70th anniversary of the Great Patriotic War
[1:53:49]
Streamed live on May 9, 2015
A military parade is due to be held on Moscow’s Red Square to commemorate the 70th anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945.
A total of 16,000 soldiers from all over the world, including Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan along with India, Mongolia, Serbia, and China, will take part in the Victory Day parade. New technology of the latest models of weapons for the Russian Airborne Troops is set to be presented during the Parade including the Rakushka multi-purpose armored vehicle, as well as the Yars mobile missile launch system.
This year Russia’s state-of-the-art heavy armaments, the ArmataT-14 tank and the Koalitsiya (Coalition) self-propelled artillery system, will be presented to the public for the first time during the parade.
Leaders from 26 countries have confirmed their readiness to arrive in Moscow for Victory Day celebrations, among them the leaders of CIS, BRICS and a number of European, Asian, African and Latin American countries.
Blue, that video was a thrill to watch, thank you!
Well said.
Here is Zahrazenko’s speech
https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=23&v=bJ-RlyKnOXI
Today’s must read – comes from Patrick L. Smith.
The New York Times does its government’s bidding: Here’s what you’re not being told about U.S. troops in Ukraine – Take a deep breath and consider that 1,000 American folks, as Obama will surely get around to calling them, are conducting military drills with troops drawn partly from Nazi and crypto-Nazi paramilitary groups…. Sorry, I cannot add anything more to this paragraph. Speechless.
Last December, John Pilger, the noted Australian journalist now in London, said in a speech that the Ukraine crisis had become the most extreme news blackout he had seen his entire career. I agree and now need no more proof as to whether it is a matter of intent or ineptitude. (Now that I think of it, it is both in many cases.)
Have you read much about the wave of political assassinations that erupted in Kiev in mid-April? Worry not. No one else has either—not in American media. Not a word in the Times.
The number my sources give me, and I cannot confirm it, is a dozen so far—12 to 13 to be precise. On the record, we have 10 who can be named and identified as political allies of Viktor Yanukovych, the president ousted last year, opponents of a drastic rupture in Ukraine’s historic relations to Russia, people who favored marking the 70th anniversary of the Soviet defeat of the Nazis—death-deserving idea, this—and critics of the new regime’s corruptions and dependence on violent far-right extremists.
These were all highly visible politicians, parliamentarians and journalists. They have been murdered by small groups of these extremists, according to reports readily available in non-American media. In my read, the killers may have the same semi-official ties to government that the paramilitary death squads in 1970s Argentina—famously recognizable in their Ford Falcons—had with Videla and the colonels.
Read more here:http://www.salon.com/2015/05/07/the_new_york_times_does_its_governments_bidding_heres_what_youre_not_being_told_about_u_s_troops_in_ukraine/
I think people who read this blog know about these assassinations.
But it never hurts to remind everyone of exactly who has been assassinated.
Glad to see that Salon has written something about this. A lot fo people read Salon.
But, I wonder. Does it matter?
Even when hundreds of thousands–millions– demonstrated to protest the imminent invasion of Iraq, it was as if that had never happened. There were also press blackouts or trivialization of the demos. I think that is part of the reason why people stopped lawfully demonstrating.
What will it take for any mass protest to get any traction and to get any notice? Possibly it takes the kind of external organization that the USA sics on Russia, etc., to steer the magnifcation and propaganda utilization of any perceived opportunity to create a story about dissatisfaction and protest there.
Katherine
I wish Putin was more forcefully direct and precise here, ” However, in the last decades, the basic principles of international cooperation have come to be increasingly ignored.” Deliberately broken and unpunished at the very least; I would employ harsher, more explicit rhetoric. Using The Outlaw Empire’s own words for its quest–Full Spectrum Dominance–would surely be appropriate. It’s just a tad too diplomatic for my taste. I would be curious as to how the native language press within the Empire’s satrapies reported on the speech, or if they just ignored it as was done in my local propaganda sheet.
Through great suffering, beyond what most in the West could ever imagine, the people of the Soviet Union saved us & the whole world from an evil so great, that, had it not been stopped, would have dominated the world for a Millenium. Then, God Almighty would have had to destroy the Earth.
Yes, Britain, France & the USA helped in this struggle as did the Partisans in many countries in Europe as Mr Putin stated. In fact Britain mounted the only glorious chapter in her long colonial history in fighting Nazism. But it is a fact, frequently discounted in the West that Russia overwhelmingly gave the most, suffered the most, made the decisive victories that determined the outcome of the war.
The President of Russia attended the recent VE celebrations in Normandy to give tribute to the European nations & the USA for this.
It is nothing short of blasphemy that this was not reciprocated by the former Allies declining their invitations to this 70th Victory Parade in Russia.
And the silence from these former Allies about the wicked attempts to rewrite the truth of history
coming from the Ukraine, Baltic States & Poland is to be utterly condemned.
Please do not use all caps. It is against the Blog rules. I corrected it this time only.(Mod. on duty)
Putin is a great man..I am an Indian I want long live Indo-Russian Friendship….
Long live Russia
Long live Putin
Long live Soviet people
Death to Nazism to nationalism