Putin’s day of humiliation

 

For most of Vladimir Putin’s seemingly endless reign, Victory Day parades have offered a chance to showcase Russia’s military might with technicolour bravado.

But this year’s procession exposed the frailty of his regime in the starkest fashion.

The serried ranks of Russian soldiers goose-stepping beneath the Kremlin’s walls looked as splendid as ever. Yet there was little disguising the anxiety sweeping through Putin’s war machine.

The reason for the disquiet is clear. Ukraine’s campaign of deep strikes within Russia has become so effective that not even the centre of Moscow feels safe from Kyiv’s missiles and drones.

Indeed, it was only after Putin prevailed on Donald Trump to negotiate a temporary ceasefire with Ukraine that the most important event in the Russian state calendar was able to proceed at all.

Little wonder the increasingly jowly Russian leader cut such a diminished and isolated figure as he took the salute.

Previous parades allowed Putin to stoke the embers of Russian superpower nostalgia with demonstrations of raw power intended to chill neighbours and adversaries alike. As in the Cold War, tanks and nuclear missile launchers trundled across the cobblestones of Red Square every May 9, the day Russia marks victory over Nazi Germany.

The grandstanding reached a crescendo last year, the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War, when 29 world leaders joined Putin to watch nearly 200 tanks, armoured vehicles and missile launchers roll through Moscow in one of the largest parades in decades.

At the time, there was some justification for the swagger. Russia was making slow but discernible progress on the battlefield in Ukraine. With Mr Trump in the White House, Washington had ended financial support for Kyiv and seemed intent on reconciliation with Moscow.

Twelve months later, however, the picture looks very different. The Russian advance has stalled. Last month, Russia lost more territory than it gained for the first time in nearly two years, according to the Institute for the Study of War in Washington.

Making matters worse, Ukraine is no longer the only side struggling with manpower shortages. Since the start of the year, Russia – often suffering casualty rates well above 1,000 a day – has been unable to recruit as many soldiers as it has lost, according to Ukrainian intelligence and Western think tanks.

But the greatest challenge for Russia has come from Ukraine’s increasingly potent long-range strike capability.

Until recently, Kyiv’s ability to hit military and economic targets inside Russia depended heavily on its Western allies, which often imposed targeting restrictions and could not keep pace with Ukrainian demand.

Now, though, Ukraine’s investment in its indigenous missile and long-range drone programme is bearing fruit, most notably with the unveiling last year of the FP-5 Flamingo, a heavy cruise missile capable of carrying a 1,150-kg payload over a range of nearly 2,000 miles.

The scale of the campaign has surged accordingly. In March last year, Ukraine carried out an estimated 7,300 long-range strikes, compared with just 110 in early 2024.

What was once sporadic and symbolic has become systematic and sustained, inflicting deep economic and military damage on the Kremlin’s war machine while preventing Russia from fully capitalising on the spike in oil prices triggered by the US war in Iran.

Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine’s former foreign minister, offered an upbeat but sober assessment of the campaign’s significance in a social media post this weekend.

“This is not a turning point in the war,” he noted. “But it is a qualitatively new instrument of pressure on Putin at a time when Trump is unwilling to bear down on him and Europeans lack the ability to do so.

“More importantly, it is a powerful example of how a nation builds its own capabilities and reduces critical dependence on partners.”

The most telling consequence, though, may be psychological. Putin himself is reportedly so concerned about the growing danger that he is spending far more of his time in underground bunkers, according to sources close to the Russian leader quoted by the Financial Times. He and his family have also stopped visiting many of their residences outside Moscow.

That growing vulnerability helps explain why this year’s parade felt so diminished. Despite the ceasefire, Russia’s leaders did not dare allow heavy armour or missiles to join the procession, fearing they could become targets. Instead, a montage of Russian military hardware was broadcast on giant screens in Red Square.

Few world leaders could be persuaded to attend either, while the event itself was cut to just 45 minutes.

Meanwhile, to the irritation of many Muscovites, an internet and communications blackout was imposed across much of the capital, a “digital iron curtain” strategy intended to reduce the accuracy of Ukrainian drones.

One drone evaded the S-400 and S-300 surface-to-air missile defences and struck a luxury apartment block just four miles from the Kremlin and less than two miles from the Russian defence ministry building last week.

Putin is not just a strongman but a showman, too. He has always understood the importance of spectacle.

He will be all too aware of the message sent out by his inability to stage the kind of chest-thumping extravaganza designed to project strength. Worse still, he was only able to hold the parade at all because he secured the acquiescence of Volodymyr Zelensky, his bitterest enemy.

Putin has now been in power for 9,770 days, if you include his bizarre four-year interlude as prime minister. Few are likely to have been as galling as this one.