Joseph Stalin declared the end of the war on May 9 on Soviet radio: 'Your courage has defeated the Nazis. So even when British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and United States President Harry Truman announced the war's end German soldiers continued fighting Soviet troops until the following day. Tatyana Makeyeva/Reutersīut a chief concern for Nazi soldiers was being taken prisoner by the Red Army, which already held Berlin. Russian artillery fire in salute during the Victory Day military parade marking the World War II anniversary in Moscow. on May 7 and it came into force the next day. The Nazi regime negotiated a surrender with Britain and the U.S. In April and early May 1945, with the Nazis retreating on both the Eastern and Western fronts, German troops had already begun surrendering in a piecemeal fashion. Russia marks the anniversary a day after the rest of Europe, which commemorates the end of World War II on May 8. May 9 has become the day to commemorate that staggering loss of life and one of Russia's most popular holidays. 'The Soviet Union faced the most powerful assaults by the Nazis, but there is no force, and there will be no force, that could conquer our people,' Putin said during the parade in Moscow. It is also important to President Vladimir Putin-he has encouraged greater celebration of the day during his time in charge, and when he addressed crowds in Red Square he made much of the historical triumph. Updated | There are few days in the Russian calendar that can lay claim over a single word as May 9 can over 'victory.' The Soviet Red Army's counter-offensive against Nazi Germany-which verged on catastrophic in the war's early days-ended with a triumphant march into Berlin in 1945.Įven in modern Russia the anniversary remains not only a massive public celebration, but an intensely personal one for citizens of Russia and many of the former Soviet republics, whose collective casualties during World War II exceed 25 million.

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