Over a quarter-century in power, President Vladimir Putin has used Russia’s Victory Day parade to show off its military might, accentuate his dominance, and deliver belligerent narratives on World War II and the current geopolitical landscape, often suggesting that Moscow is fighting off a threat from the West that mirrors that of Nazi Germany.
Last May 9, marking 80 years since Nazi Germany’s defeat, Putin watched from a grandstand in front of Lenin’s Tomb as soldiers marched and gun-turreted military vehicles, truck-mounted missiles, and other heavy weapons rolled across Red Square.
Even given the fact that Putin made scant mention of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in his 10-minute address in 2025, focusing on a long-ago war in which Moscow was a winner rather than an ongoing conflict in which it is suffering massive casualties while gaining little ground, this year seems certain to be different.
The military parade on Moscow's Red Square on May 9, 2025, 80 years after Nazi Germany's defeat.
Most strikingly, that’s because the Defense Ministry announced last week that the traditional “column of military equipment” would be absent from this year’s parade – suggesting that for the first time since 2009, no military vehicles or heavy weapons will be on display.
What will be on display, this year more dramatically than last, is Russia’s inability to prevail in a war that Putin, when he ordered the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, believed would bring the neighboring country to its knees in a few weeks.
Instead, as of January, Russia's all-out war against Ukraine has already dragged on longer than the 1,418 days the Soviet Army fought against Germany before its surrender in 1945 -- an awkward milestone for Putin as he leads ceremonies marking the Nazi defeat.
The most obvious evidence of Russia’s struggles at this point is also the phenomenon that Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov made plain was behind the decision to scale down the parade: Ukrainian “terrorist activity,” by which he clearly meant the surge of drone and missile strikes in which Kyiv has targeted Russian oil infrastructure and military facilities.
In the past, Putin has publicly played down suggestions that Ukraine poses a threat, repeatedly claiming that what the Kremlin calls the “special military operation” is on track and Russia will achieve its war goals.
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Drone Strikes, Deep Strikes: How Ukraine's Long-Range Air Attacks Are Hurting RussiaAhead of Victory Day, the Kremlin has been playing it up. Having unilaterally declared a cease-fire on May 8-9 and ignoring Ukraine’s call for a truce starting May 6, Russia has chosen to interpret statements by Volodymyr Zelenskyy as threats to attack Moscow during the ceremonies, when what the Ukrainian president actually said was that Russia fears such an attack.
On May 6, Russia urged foreign governments to evacuate diplomats and citizens from Kyiv, warning that its military would strike the city hard if Ukraine targets Moscow on the “sacred holiday.”
Few Foreign Leaders Expected
Against that backdrop, attendance at the parade by foreign leaders looks likely to be much thinner than in the past.
The only national leaders on a Kremlin list of dignitaries arriving in Moscow were Aleksandr Lukashenko of Belarus, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, Malaysia's King Sultan Ibrahim, and Laotian President Thongloun Sisoulith, and the Kremlin did not specify whether those named would attend the parade itself.
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Snipers, Checkpoints, Limited Internet -- Moscow Prepares For Victory Day
The absence of all five Central Asian presidents from the list was highly unusual, and Lukashenko was the only leader of a former Soviet republic other than Russia whose presence has been confirmed, seemingly underscoring Russia's struggles to retain influence in the region in recent years.
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian, who hosted EU leaders and Zelenskyy at a summit in Yerevan this week, said he told Putin a month ago that he would be busy campaigning for June 7 elections and would not attend.
Fico, seen as the most Russia-friendly leader in the EU after Viktor Orban’s election loss in Hungary in April, said he does not plan to attend the parade.
Security is traditionally tight on Victory Day, but this year there’s a new element: the government has announced that mobile Internet access will be restricted on May 9.
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The Mess With Max, Telegram, And More: Russians' Patience Tested By Online TroublesIn recent months, unpopular mobile Internet shutdowns --– which the state has also suggested are needed to mitigate security threats emanating from Ukraine -- are part of a series of developments that have dismayed Russians and posed mounting challenges for Putin as the war drags on and the Russian economy struggles.
Since the New Year, evidence that the war and its effects on life in Russia are undermining Putin’s status amid the elite and ordinary citizens alike has been increasing, with rumblings of discontent on the rise and, according to some polls, his approval ratings hitting their lowest point since the start of the full-scale invasion.
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In Russia, Putin Sees Something Not Seen In Years: A Notable Drop In Approval RatingsThe evidence is diverse, ranging from a viral video address by an influencer who lives outside Russia and avoided direct criticism of Putin to the abrupt transformation of a lawyer who previously helped the state target the now-deceased opposition leader Aleksei Navalny into a Kremlin opponent who is vowing to keep up his criticism despite landing in a psychiatric hospital after his first tirade against Putin.
There are also growing signs of clashes among -- and within -- rival factions in government, including Putin’s administration, the military, and the security services.
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Knives Out 2.0. What's Going On At Russia's Defense Ministry?“For the first time in years of war, there may be a shift…. Until recently, many assumed that Putin had a plan, even if it was simply to keep the war going. Now there are growing doubts as to whether such a plan exists,” said Tatyana Stanovaya, founder of analysis firm R.Politik, wrote on X on May 5.
“There are growing sentiments in Russia that the current system of governance is becoming too damaging and increasingly self-defeating. Tolerance for the status quo is eroding,” she wrote, “while Putin appears either unable or unwilling to rethink his policy.”
Coup Plot?
Five days before the Russian parade, several media outlets cited a leaked document from an unidentified European intelligence service as saying Putin has ramped up his personal security because he fears a coup or assassination plot, particularly one involving drones.
The media outlets, including CNN, the Financial Times, and iStories, cited a report they said was provided on condition of anonymity by a person close to the intelligence service that produced it. RFE/RL could not independently verify the information.
The reports added to suggestions of growing divisions with the elite, including by stating that longtime former Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, now secretary of Putin’s Security Council, is “associated with the risk of a coup.”
Several analysts were skeptical of the alleged intelligence report, but many say the slew of recent developments suggest what Aleksandr Baunov of the Berlin-based Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center likened to a change in the air.
“The entire state apparatus, the media, the government, parliament, the church, and the intelligence agencies are still trying to solve the same problem: hide Putin's mistake of 2022, but it's getting worse,” Baunov wrote. “Putin is losing his magic. Power remains undivided in his hands, but the magic of power is fading.”
“None of this can be taken to herald the imminent end of Putin’s rule,” author and analyst Mark Galeotti wrote in the iPaper late last month.
“Instead,” he wrote, “it demonstrates how greater and greater effort needs to be spent on maintaining the status quo, and one of its greatest assets -- Putin’s own personal authority -- is in decline."