There were times when Muscovites got closer to their Victory Parade.

Just a few years ago, on Pushkin Square in the center of the capital, onlookers were only a few meters away from the tanks, anti-aircraft missiles and truck-mounted ICBMs of the “Jars” type, whose drivers waved happily from their cabins before continuing on to Red Square to lead.

If you want to catch a glimpse of the military vehicles before they pass President Vladimir Putin this year, you are not only wrong at Pushkin Square: the route of the military parade marking the 77th anniversary of the victory over Nazi Germany is cordoned off over a wide area.

Police officers and National Guardsmen guard the bars.

The "Z" sticks to their uniforms;

the letter stands for the war in Ukraine,

Frederick Smith

Political correspondent for Russia and the CIS in Moscow.

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You can roam through backyards.

Sometimes you can see through an archway, behind bars and guardsmen, a rocket in the distance.

Near the building of the Duma, the lower house, a police officer advises looking at the vehicles after they have appeared on Red Square, perhaps on the other, southern bank of the Moskva River.

So hit the subway with a father who has dressed his three young children in Red Army costumes.

A family then drives up the escalator, whose eight or nine-year-old daughter has come in camouflage, lace-up boots and the red “Junarmija” cap.

Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu created this "youth army" to mold Russia's children and youth in Putin's spirit.

People are gathering near the bridge that crosses the river from Red Square.

Many of them wear George's ribbons on their jackets and backpacks;

the black and orange ribbon represents struggle and victory over fascism.

The “Z” has also become a black and orange spike on many visitors.

11,000 men, 1,500 fewer than a year ago

Anyone who asks her about the meaning of the day hears about fathers, grandfathers and great-grandfathers who fought;

some draw the same arc from the war against Hitler's Germany to "special operations" as Putin and his apparatus.

This year the holiday is "more serious" than usual, says a 40-year-old man from Moscow with a Red Army cap who brought his son and daughter with him.

He understood that "fascism" had to be defeated once again, and just as Hitler once could not attack the Soviet Union alone, "America and England" now used "Ukrainian hands" against Russia.