More than 20 heads of state and government, including African countries, will be in Moscow to celebrate Victory Day, the press secretary to the Russian president, Dmitry Peskov, has said.
On May 9, 2025, Russia will celebrate the 80th anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War, which lasted 1,418 days and nights.
This is the war of the USSR against Nazi Germany and its allies that invaded its territory.
More than 60 countries were involved in the orbit of the war in one way or another, and hostilities were conducted in Europe, Asia, and Africa.
The German army was fully prepared for war and had real combat experience. On the eve of the war, Germany and its allies had superiority in manpower, with more than 5 million people in the eastern group (in the USSR, there were about 2.8 million people on the western border).
The USSR surpassed Germany and its allies in the number of tanks and aircraft: about 14 thousand tanks against 4.3 thousand, about 9.4 thousand combat aircraft against 5 thousand.
However, some of the USSR personnel were on leave or training at the start of the war, some tanks and planes were in disrepair, and the process of rearming the troops with modern equipment and weapons was not completed.
Despite all the circumstances, the Red Army defeated the German armed forces, expelled them from the Soviet Union, and liberated the countries of Eastern and Central Europe occupied by the Third Reich. The war ended with Soviet troops capturing Berlin and Germany’s unconditional surrender.
“There is no consensus on which battle of the Great Patriotic War is considered the most significant. The Battle of Moscow (1941-1942), where Germany suffered its first major defeat and the myth of the invincibility of the Wehrmacht was dispelled. The Battle of Stalingrad (1942-1943) marked the beginning of a radical turning point in the war.
“The Battle of Kursk (1943) is the largest tank battle of all time (7.7 thousand tanks participated). Operation Bagration in Belarus (1944) was the largest battle in terms of the number of participants: 8 million troops, 6.7 thousand tanks, and 6.7 thousand aircraft participated on both sides.
“The war took the lives of millions. Almost every family had someone who went to the front and never returned. We must remember the losses during the war so that nothing like this happens again in human history,” Russian President Vladimir Putin stated.
He also cited data on losses during the war: “Great Britain lost almost 400,000 people, the United States a little more—410,000, and Germany almost 7 million people, the Soviet Union almost 25 million, of which over 15 million were civilians.” However, according to experts, it is still impossible to calculate the exact numbers of losses.
The USSR suffered enormous damage, 1,710 cities, more than 70 thousand villages and settlements were destroyed, and about 32 thousand industrial enterprises were blown up and destroyed.
Victory Day symbolises the unity of the Soviet people, the heroism of millions, and the price at which peace was won. This holiday will live forever.
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