War Stories By Enter your email to receive alerts for this author. Sign in or create an account to better manage your email preferences. Unsubscribe from email alerts Are you sure you want to unsubscribe from email alerts for Fred Kaplan ? May 09, 2026 5:40 AM Photo illustration by Slate. Photo by Grigory Sysoyev/Pool/AFP via Getty Images. Sign up for the Slatest to get the most insightful analysis, criticism, and advice out there, delivered to your inbox daily. Moscow’s annual Victory Day parade, celebrating the defeat of Nazi Germany and the end of World War II, is usually a chest-thumping affair, with vast formations of Russian troops marching through Red Square, alongside an impressive array of tanks and missiles, while the country’s leaders beam from the Kremlin’s viewing stand, flanked by foreign dignitaries—including, a couple of times , American presidents—pleasurably awed by the spectacle.…