Kremlin scales back May 9 parade as military vehicles vanish from Red Square

“The parade will take place, but last year’s parade was an anniversary parade, a large-scale one, as is customary on a milestone date. This date is not an anniversary, but the parade will still take place, albeit in a scaled-down format,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

Russia’s Defense Ministry earlier said this year’s May 9 parade on Moscow’s Red Square would not include military vehicles. The ministry said only service members — including cadets and representatives of various branches of the military — would march in the parade.

The ministry attributed the decision to the “current operational situation.”

The BBC’s Russian service noted that military vehicles would be absent from the Red Square parade for the first time since Russia launched its full-scale war against Ukraine in 2022.

Lithuania and Latvia refused to allow a plane carrying Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico to cross their airspace on its way to Moscow on May 9. Fico later said he would not attend the May 9 parade in Moscow but was not canceling his visit to Russia.

In 2025, 29 foreign leaders arrived in Moscow for May 9 celebrations. Along with Fico, they included Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Vietnamese Communist Party General Secretary To Lam.