Russia May Have Canceled Victory Parades Due to Humiliating Tank Shortage

Governors of two Russian regions have cited security concerns in scrapping military parades next month, although one theory suggested the cancelation was due to a lack of military equipment caused by the war in Ukraine.

Victory Day parades on May 9 are held throughout Russia and parts of the former Soviet Union to commemorate the defeat of the Nazis in World War II, which is widely known as the Great Patriotic War.

The most prominent event takes place in Moscow's Red Square in which a march past of troops and military equipment provides a colorful display of Russian military might, rendered more significant given the Kremlin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

But the war has prompted the governors of Kursk and Belgorod oblasts, which border Ukraine, to scrap their own events marking a military victory that Vladimir Putin has used as a reference point for his own unjustified invasion.

Kursk governor Roman Starovoyt said that there would be no parade in the regional capital of the same name "for security reasons," the news outlet RBC reported.

Meanwhile, Vyacheslav Gladkov, the governor of Belgorod Oblast, said that the parade "would also not be held in order not to provoke the enemy with a large number of vehicles and soldiers" in the center of the regional capital, Russian Telegram channel ASTRA reported.

However, the Twitter account of Tendar, which provides updates about the war in Ukraine, wrote that the decision was taken "because they simply have not enough functioning tanks to run up and down the road."

"Every Russian tank is needed at the front and all remaining parade vehicles are needed for the larger cities," Tendar added to the post to their 167,000 followers, and said that last year the flight show at the May 9 parade in Moscow had been canceled too due to what the authorities "claimed...was due to 'bad weather.'"

Maria Drutska, who tweets about the war, also speculated about the cancelation, writing: "Is it because there is nothing left to show at the parade besides T-34? Or they don't want extra charity fireworks? Any other reasons?"

Newsweek has contacted the governors of Kursk and Belgorod for comment.

Since the start of the war, Russian regions which border Ukraine, such as Belgorod and Kursk, have blamed Kyiv for regular rocket and drone attacks on military facilities.

Both regions held Victory Day parades last year, with Kursk hosting over 1,000 troops and security agency members. However, the event in the Russian capital was scaled back.

Other southern Russian regions, including Voronezh and Rostov, as well as Crimea, which Moscow annexed in 2014 and Ukraine has vowed to take back, have confirmed their Victory Day parades would go ahead next month.

The Kremlin has said it was up to regional heads to decide whether the parades should take place, taking into consideration the local security situation, The Moscow Times reported.

Update, 4/11/23, 5:20 a.m. ET: The headline on this article was amended.