Por German Palenty
Almost six years after the first German tanks crossed the border to invade Poland, world war II came to an end in Europe while Soviet troops celebrated the capture of Berlin and the forces of the United States and the United Kingdom advanced on the north and southern Germany.
It was on May 8, 1945 (May 9 for countries in Eastern Europe), and the date is held every year by all victorious countries in World War II, especially in Russia.
The German dictator Adolf Hitler had committed suicide on April 30, 1945, and his representatives finally agreed to sign the unconditional surrender on May 7 in the French city of Reims and before General Dwight Eisenhower, commander of the allied troops.
The final capitulation was signed, however, on May 8, 1945 in Berlin, the capital of the defeated Nazi regime in Germany, in front of representatives of the Soviet Union, the United States, United Kingdom and France.
Although the surrender ceremony took place on May 8, some countries, such as Russia and Belarus, commemorate it on May 9. This is because when the war in Europe formally concluded, according to the signed document, on May 8 at 11:01 pm (Berlin time), it was already May 9 in Moscow and other time areas in the east.
The act ended the war in Europe after almost six years and dozens of millions of deaths, but did not lower the curtain to World War II. Japan, ally of Germany, continued to fight until September 2, 1945.
A military parade is held every year in Moscow and since the time of the Soviet Union for victory day, and even today Russian leaders traditionally stop on the stairs of Vladimir Lenin’s tomb in the Red Square to observe it, while inviting world leaders to contemplate their military power.
The scale is usually impressive. In the 2015 parade, 16,000 soldiers participated, along with 200 armored vehicles and 150 aircraft, while in 2020, when the Covid-19 pandemic forced it to be postponed and reduced in size, 14,000 soldiers participated.
“May 9 is designed to boast before the local public, to intimidate the opposition and to please the dictator of the time,” James Nixey, director of the Russia-Eurasia program at Chatham House, told CNN.
This is especially true since the president of Russia, Vladimir Putin, promotes the vision that the Soviet Union was the main responsible for the victory over Germany in 1945.
In a 2020 Putin article he said that it is “essential to transmit to future generations the memory that the Nazis were first defeated by the Soviet people and that the representatives of all the republics of the Soviet Union fought together in that heroic battle, both in the front and in the rear”.
The expert of the Carnegie Center of Moscow Andrei Kolesnikov wrote in an essay that “the regime (Russian) intends to be the direct successor of all the glorious victories of Russia, the main one of which is the defeat of Nazism in the great patriotic war of 1941-1945, and with it it becomes immune to criticism,” he wrote last year in one essay
In the first parade of May 9 after the beginning of the Ukraine War, in February 2022, Western officials believed that Putin would take advantage of the symbolic meaning to make an announcement about conflict. After all, the Russian invasion had occurred 24 hours after the day of the defender of the homeland, another crucial military day in Russia.
But, finally, that May 9, 2022 there were no major ads.
In 2023, after a year of war, several Russian regions announced much more modest plans than in the past for the celebrations due to the lack of personnel and military team for the parades. Something similar happened in 2024.
Now, the looks are placed on the parade this Friday, May 9, 2025 and Putin’s attempts to preserve the celebration by means of a unilateral fire. Ukraine, however, alleges that Russia has already broken that same fire.
In the United States, Victory Day in Europe (VE Day) is observed on May 8 but is overshadowed by Victory Day, when Japan’s defeat and the final end of World War II are commemorated.
This is because the United States faced both Germany and Japan during the conflict, and even after the German surrender continued fighting bloody battles in the Pacific, such as Okinawa, and then launched the first two atomic bombs against the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
On the other hand, the Soviet Union, whose achievements continues to commemorate Russia, fought almost exclusively against Nazi Germany.
In Europe on May 8 it is commemorated by all countries that suffered war, between these United Kingdom, France, Poland and Belgium.
Although Germany does not observe this day, the extinct German democratic republic in the east – and under Soviet influence – celebrated the day of liberation until its fall in 1990, and in some cities, such as Berlin, it continues to commemorate.
The-CNN-Wire
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With information from Brad Lendon, Matthew Chance, Laura Smith-Spark, Mary Ilyushina, Nathan Hodge, Jack Guy and Anna Chernova.
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