Waves of Ukrainian drones have hit Moscow in recent days as the Russian capital prepares for the country’s most important national holiday, Victory Day, this week.
Russia celebrates May 9 as Victory Day to mark the defeat of Nazi forces in World War II. The day involves a major military parade, with leaders of Russia’s allies often in attendance.
But this year, the run-up to the day has been clouded by a warning from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who has said Kyiv cannot guarantee the safety of the foreign leaders attending the parade in Moscow.
Here is more about Ukraine’s attacks, Victory Day and why it is significant.
What happened in Russia?
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said on Tuesday that Russia’s air defence systems shot down 19 drones flying towards Moscow from different directions. Drones were shot down for the second night in a row and Sobyanin wrote in a post on the Telegram messaging app that there were no reports of injuries or damage, but the city’s airports were closed out of safety concerns.
Russian officials also reported that 17 drones were intercepted over the Bryansk region and five more were intercepted over Kaluga.
Russian President Vladimir Putin last week called for a 72-hour ceasefire to mark the occasion from May 8 to May 10.
Meanwhile, local leaders of multiple Ukrainian cities also reported on Tuesday that Russia carried out drone attacks on civilian targets.
Zelenskyy has rebuffed the proposal. “This is more of a theatrical performance on his part. Because in two or three days, it is impossible to develop a plan for the next steps to end the war,” the Ukrainian president told a small group of journalists on May 2.
Ukraine, instead, wants a 30-day truce, eventually leading to a permanent ceasefire and ending the war that Russia imposed on its smaller neighbour with a full-scale invasion in February 2022.
“The Russians are asking for a ceasefire on May 9 and are themselves firing at Ukraine every day. This is cynicism of the highest order,” Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram on Sunday.
Why is Ukraine striking Russia?
Marina Miron, a postdoctoral researcher at the defence studies department at King’s College London, told Al Jazeera that Ukraine’s drone attacks are not surprising.
“Ukraine doesn’t really have any other plan of action because the situation on the battlefield is not favouring Ukraine,” Miron said, explaining that it is uncertain whether Ukraine will continue to receive support from the United States.
While the US has been Ukraine’s largest ally through this war, President Donald Trump and his allies in Washington have repeatedly called for a rethink on the military aid Washington sends Kyiv. In March, Trump announced a pause on military aid to Ukraine.
Miron added that Europe is unable to support Kyiv “at least to the extent that Ukraine would need to be supported”. Ukraine is also experiencing manpower shortages on the battlefield as its soldiers desert the army.
The drone attacks allow Ukraine to show that it still has the will to fight, Miron said. “In the grand scheme, it’s not going to make any major strategic changes.”
What is Victory Day?
Victory Day is commemorated in Russia and many other former Soviet countries on May 9. The day marks the victory of the Soviet Union over Nazi Germany in World War II, also called the Great Patriotic War in Russia. On the day, a large military parade passes Moscow’s Red Square.
The war formally began in 1939 when Germany, led by Adolf Hitler, invaded Poland, having cut a secret deal with the Soviet Union that the two countries would divide the Soviet Union’s western neighbour. Britain, in a bilateral defence treaty with Poland, declared war against Germany.
However, in 1941, the German army began Operation Barbarossa, its invasion of the Soviet Union.
The Soviet Union faced millions of casualties, losing the highest number of lives in World War II globally. During the war, the number of civilian and military deaths in the Soviet Union reached 24 million, including an estimated 8.7 million military personnel.
But the Soviet Union also led the pushback against Nazi Germany, marching on Berlin in May 1945 to mark the end of the war in Europe. Japan surrendered only in August after the US dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The US and its European allies celebrate Victory in Europe Day on May 8. In 2023, Zelenskyy signed a law, moving Ukraine’s remembrance of the World War II victory to May 8.
Victory Day is significant for Putin because, ever since the war with Ukraine started, Putin has drawn parallels between the ongoing war and World War II. During his 2022 Victory Day speech, months after the war begun, Putin said Russian troops fighting in Ukraine were “fighting for the motherland, so that no one will forget the lessons of World War II and there will be no place in the world for hangmen, executioners and the Nazis”.
Who is expected to attend the Victory Day parade?
Chinese President Xi Jinping, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, Vietnamese President To Lam, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko and Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico are expected to attend the Victory Day parade.
The attendance of these world leaders is also important for Putin as a demonstration of the West’s failure to isolate him despite a barrage of sanctions the US and its allies have imposed on Russia during the war with Ukraine.
What has Ukraine threatened about the day?
“Our position is very simple for all countries travelling to Russia on May 9: We cannot be held responsible for what happens on the territory of the Russian Federation,” Zelenskyy told reporters, Ukrainian news agency Interfax reported on May 3.
“They provide you with security; therefore, we won’t give you any guarantees. Because we don’t know what Russia will do these days,” said Zelenskyy, claiming that Russia could also order provocations such as “arson, bombings and so on, only to blame us”.
On the same day, Russia hit back by warning Ukraine against violence on May 9. Former president and deputy chairman of the Russian Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev, called on Zelenskyy to stop “verbal provocations” and said, “In the case of a real provocation on Victory Day, no one guarantees that May 10 will come in Kyiv.”
Could Ukraine attack Moscow on May 9?
Despite the presence of leaders like Xi and Lula, that could not be ruled out, experts said.
“As far as May 9th, the V-Day in Russia, is concerned, it’s very possible that Ukrainian military intelligence is going to do something,” researcher Miron said, adding that it is unclear what the scale or location of this action by Ukraine could be. “There is a pattern that things have usually happened around the May celebrations.”
In early May 2023, Russia said its defence system had thwarted a drone attack on the Kremlin citadel near Putin’s residence. “We regard these actions as a planned terrorist act and an attempt on the president’s life, carried out on the eve of Victory Day, the May 9 Parade, at which the presence of foreign guests is also planned,” the Kremlin had said in a statement, declaring it would retaliate.
On May 8, 2023, Kyiv said Russia launched drones at Ukrainian targets, killing four people. It said its air defences downed Iranian-made kamikaze Shahed drones.
What is the state of the war right now?
Trump had declared he would negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine while on the presidential campaign trail. About a month after his inauguration, starting in February, the Trump administration held multiple meetings with Russian and Ukrainian representatives separately to try to broker a deal.
Several meetings and exchanges later, all sides were able to get on the same page, announcing a 30-day ceasefire on attacks on Russian and Ukrainian energy infrastructure on March 19, and a Black Sea deal on March 25, halting the military use of commercial vessels and the use of force in the Black Sea.
