In a speech, excerpts of which were made public ahead of the military parade in Moscow this Monday, British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace wants to draw parallels between Russia under Vladimir Putin and Nazi Germany.
"With their invasion of Ukraine, Putin, his inner circle, and his generals are mirroring the fascism and tyranny of 70 years ago and repeating the errors of the totalitarian regimes of the last century," reads the manuscript of the speech, which Wallace wrote in the National Army Museum wants to keep.
Wallace accuses Putin of "hijacking history" and abusing the commemoration of fallen Soviet soldiers.
Jochen Buchsteiner
Political correspondent in London.
Follow I follow
In sharp words bordering on scorn, he wants to attack the Russian army command.
"Let's call the absurdity of Russian generals - glistening in their decked out parade uniforms and weighed down by their many medals - by its name," it says.
They are "highly complicit in hijacking the proud history of their ancestors who resisted a nefarious invasion, repelled fascism and sacrificed themselves for a greater cause."
“All professional soldiers should be disgusted”
The reaction to the military defeats in Ukraine was a "disgraceful show of self-preservation, an intensification of failure, anger, dishonesty and false accusations".
"All professional soldiers should be disgusted by the behavior of the Russian army".
"Not only did they engage in an illegal invasion, but their leadership left their own foot soldiers hanging in a way that deserves a court-martial."
After talks with G7 leaders, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said over the weekend that the world must support Ukraine "more and faster".
With new weapons, the Ukrainian armed forces would have to be able "not only to hold areas in Ukraine, but to recapture them".