IN COMMEMORATION OF THE VICTORY OF THE RED ARMY AGAINST NAZISM (9.5.1945), VLADIMIR PUTIN MADE AN IMPORTANT SPEECH ON 9.5.22 WHICH WE PUBLISH BELOW.
Presentation:
During the parade on May 9, 2022 in Moscow, for the 77th anniversary of the Day of Victory of the Red Army in the fight against Nazism (1941-1945), Vladimir Putin made a speech which is important and which we publish below.
He brought back to mind the historic memory of the atrocities of Nazi expansion and the conscious defence that the Russian and Soviet peoples made then of the Soviet Union.
This speech forms part of Russia’s current resolve to intervene in Ukraine against NATO’s expansion, to prevent the destruction of what has been the foundation of one of mankind’s greatest achievements: the Russian Revolution in October 1917.
Even though the USSR collapsed from 1991, the experience of the Soviet Workers State could not disappear overnight. This is why American imperialism and its armed instrument NATO still consider Russia as the enemy to be defeated.
Posadists Today, 3.7.2022
President of Russia Vladimir Putin:
Dear Russian citizens, dear veterans,
Comrade soldiers and seamen, sergeants and sergeant majors, midshipmen and warrant officers,
Comrade officers, generals and admirals,
I congratulate you on the Day of Great Victory!
The defence of our Motherland when its destiny was at stake has always been sacred. It was the feeling of true patriotism that Minin and Pozharsky’s militia[1] stood up for the Fatherland, soldiers went on the offensive at the Borodino Field[2] and fought the enemy outside Moscow and Leningrad, Kiev and Minsk, Stalingrad and Kursk, Sevastopol and Kharkov.
Today, as in the past, you are fighting for our people in Donbass, for the security of our Motherland, for Russia.
May 9, 1945 has been enshrined in world history forever as a triumph of the united Soviet people, its cohesion and spiritual power, an unparalleled feat on the front lines and on the home front.
Victory Day is intimately dear to all of us. There is no family in Russia that was not burnt by the Great Patriotic War. Its memory never fades. On this day, children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of the heroes, march in an endless flow of the Immortal Regiment. They carry photos of their family members, the fallen soldiers who remained young forever, and the veterans who are already gone.
We take pride in the unconquered courageous generation of the victors – we are proud of being their successors. It is our duty to preserve the memory of those who defeated Nazism and entrusted us with being vigilant and doing everything to thwart the horror of another global war.
Therefore, despite all controversies in international relations, Russia has always advocated the establishment of an equal and indivisible security system which is critically needed for the entire international community.
Last December we proposed signing a treaty on security guarantees. Russia urged the West to hold an honest dialogue in search for meaningful and compromising solutions, and to take account of each other’s interests. All in vain. NATO countries did not want to heed us, which means they had totally different plans. And we saw it.
Another punitive operation in Donbass, an invasion of our historic lands, including Crimea, was openly in the making. Kiev declared that it could procure nuclear weapons. The NATO bloc launched an active military build-up on the territories adjacent to us.
Thus, an absolutely unacceptable threat to us was steadily being created right on our borders. There was every indication that a clash with neo-Nazis and Banderites backed by the United States and their minions was unavoidable.
Let me repeat, we saw the military infrastructure being built, hundreds of foreign advisors starting work, and regular supplies of cutting-edge weaponry being delivered from NATO countries. The threat grew every day.
Russia has launched a pre-emptive strike against the aggression. It was the forced, the timely and the only correct decision to take. The decision of a sovereign, strong and independent country.
The United States began to claim their exceptionalism particularly after the collapse of the Soviet Union, belittling in this way not only the entire world but their own satellites who must pretend to see nothing and put up with it obediently.
But we are a different country. Russia has a different character. We will never give up our love for our Motherland, our faith and traditional values, our ancestors’ customs and our respect for all peoples and cultures.
The West seems ready to jettison these millennia-old values. This moral degradation underpins their cynical falsification of the History of World War II, sharpening Russophobia, praising the traitors, mocking the memory of their victims, sullying the courage of those who won the Victory through suffering ..
We know that US veterans wanted to attend [this] Moscow parade and were actually banned from doing do so. But I want them to know: We are proud of your actions and contribution to our common Victory. We honour all the soldiers of the allied armies – Americans, English, French, Resistance fighters, the brave soldiers and partisans in China – all those who defeated Nazism and militarism.
Comrades,
Alongside the Russian Army, the Donbass militia are fighting today on their land where the servants of princes Svyatoslav and Vladimir Monomakh[3] [fought]; where the soldiers under the command of Rumyantsev and Potemkin[4], Suvorov and Brusilov[5] crushed their enemies, and where the Great Patriotic War heroes Nikolai Vatutin[6], Sidor Kovpak[7]and Lyudmila Pavlichenko[8] resisted to the end.
I am addressing our Armed Forces and Donbass militia. You are fighting for our Motherland, its future, so that nobody forgets the lessons of World War II, so that there is no place in the world for torturers, death squads and Nazis.
Today, we bow our heads to the sacred memory of all those who lost their lives in the Great Patriotic War, the memory of sons, daughters, fathers, mothers, grandfathers, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, relatives and friends.
We bow our heads in memory of the martyrs of Odessa who were burned alive in the House of Trade Unions in May 2014[9], in memory of the elderly, women and children of Donbass who were killed in atrocious and barbaric shelling by neo-Nazis. We bow our heads to our fighting comrades who died a brave death in the righteous battle – for Russia.
I declare a minute of silence – (A minute of silence)
The loss of each officer and soldier is painful for all of us, and an irretrievable loss for the families and friends. The government, regional authorities, enterprises and public organisations will do everything to take care of these families and help them. Special support will be given to the children of the killed and wounded comrades-in-arms. The Presidential Executive Order to this effect was signed today.
I wish a speedy recovery to the wounded soldiers and officers, and I thank doctors, paramedics, nurses and staff of military hospitals for their selfless work. Our deepest gratitude goes to you for every life saved, often sparing no thought for yourselves under the shelling on the frontlines.
Comrades,
Soldiers and officers from many regions of our huge Motherland, including those who arrived directly from Donbass, from the combat area, now stand shoulder-to-shoulder here, on Red Square.
We remember how Russia’s enemies tried to use international terrorist gangs against us, how they tried to sow inter-ethnic and religious strife to weaken us from within, and divide us. They failed completely.
Today, our warriors of different ethnicities are fighting together, shielding each other from bullets and shrapnel like brothers. Therein lies the power of Russia, the invincible great power of our united multi-ethnic nation.
You are defending today what your fathers, grandfathers and great-grandfathers fought for. The welfare and safety of their homeland was their top priority in life. Loyalty to our homeland is the main value and a reliable foundation of Russian independence for us, their successors too.
Those who crushed Nazism during the Great Patriotic War showed us an example of heroism for all ages. This is the generation of winners, and we will always admire them.
Glory to our heroic Armed Forces!
For Russia! For Victory!
Hooray!
[1] A militia under that name was created in Russia in Feb 2009 as an unregistered Russian public organisation. It may symbolise today not only the union of Russians against invaders, but their union against the Nazism of the world capitalist regime today, as expressed in the Donbass where its targets are Lenin’s statues, Karl Marx’s name and the Communist Party which it has banned.
[2] Borodino is the site where Napoleon Bonaparte won a battle in Sept 1812, but failed to gain a decisive victory.
[3] The period between those two princes goes from 945-972 to 1113-1125. Note we are dealing here with the servants of the princes.
[4] The soldiers under those princes are said to have fought in these geographical areas between 1775-1779.
[5] Suvorov was a general who helped deliver great blows against Napoleon Bonaparte, 1796-97. Brusilov, also a general, fought major battles against Austria-Hungary in the Liv, Lutsk and Kovel areas around 1916.
[6] Nikolai Vaturin, 1901-1944, was a Soviet military commander in the Red Army. In WW2, he fought on the South East and the Yoronezh Fronts during the Battle of Kursk. He was one of the commanders at Stalingrad in 1943. In 1944, he was ambushed by the Nazis in Ukraine and mortally wounded.
[7] Sidor (or Sydir) Kovpak, 1887-1967, was one of most accomplished leaders of the Soviet Partisans in Ukraine during WW2. He mastered guerrilla tactics and was twice awarded the Hero of the Soviet Union prize, in 1942 and 1944. He led a guerrilla war against the forces of the AXIS in the Sumy and Bryant regions, amongst others. His forces extended their reach deep into German-held territory, Kiev included. They fought the Nationalist Ukrainian Insurgent Army which collaborated with the Germans to defeat the Partisans. In 1944, Kovpak’s Partisans raided the Nazis more widely in Western Ukraine (as in the Carpathian Raid) pressing forward all the way into Belarus and over to the Rumanian border. One of his partisan followers Pedro Vershigora became a writer after the war; he dedicated his books to the Kovpak’s Underground Resistance.
[8] Lyudmila Pavlichenko:
Lyudmila Mikhailovna Pavlichenko, 1916-1974, was a Soviet sniper in the Red Army in WW2. She is generally recognised as the most successful female sniper in recorded history.
[9] There were protests in the UK against the pro-Nazi killings of Ukrainian workers (as well as Romas and other ‘ethnics’). These protests remained few and almost unreported. Today, neither Zelensky nor his Nato allies want to know about the 2014 Coup in Ukraine, because that was the time when US imperialism, with its secret services and NATO, rebuilt the Ukrainian government on an anti-Russian basis. The significance of Putin’s speech is that he looks back into history to prepare the population he addresses against the new confrontation that world capitalism prepares. Once again Russia finds itself faced with the war of capitalism. Only this time, it is not just through a war with Nazi Germany, but a direct confrontation with capitalism and Nazism on a world scale, as a regime.
