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I was in Russia during the Victory Day holiday (commemorating when Germany surrendered), and was able to see the practice runs for the parade in Moscow and the actual parade in St. Petersburg.  

Tverskaya street is about 8 lanes wide and leads directly to Red Square and the Kremlin.  The street was blocked off to vehicles and numerous military vehicles came thundering down the street towards Red Square.  It was pretty awesome to see all of the vehicles, especially the sound and feel of tanks rolling by.  I also watched hundreds of soldiers marching in front of the Kermlin.  I thought I'd share some of those pictures.  It was low light, so the pics aren't as good as I'd like.

The day of the actual parade I was in St. Petersburg where huge crowds had gathered.  In Moscow everyone was held back from the parade of people and vehicles.  In St. Petersburg I was in a huge crowd which all of the sudden started to part and soldiers came marching through.  They were so close I almost got smacked in the face by AK-47s a couple times as they went by.

Moscow
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St. Petersburg
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In kind-of-Soviet Russia, Victory Day you!

You can tell by the armor in Moscow, the Russian military is not doing too well. All those chassis are cold war era design, most are pre-1970.

What unit has the SKS's? Is it some sort of honor unit that uses the SKS like we use the M1?

I'm jealous that you get to travel and see things like this

Awesome pics man! +1 for you.

Tanker wrote: You can tell by the armor in Moscow, the Russian military is not doing too well. All those chassis are cold war era design, most are pre-1970.

What unit has the SKS's? Is it some sort of honor unit that uses the SKS like we use the M1?

I'm jealous that you get to travel and see things like this

the only money that the russian government spends on military equipment is the stuff u cant see..submarines. they do have some awsome fighters....i'd take a Su-37 over a eurofighter anyday.

Tanker wrote: What unit has the SKS's? Is it some sort of honor unit that uses the SKS like we use the M1?

They had soldiers carrying a few different types of weapons.  I'm not sure why they were carrying the different type of weapons and what exactly the different uniforms were (pretty sure one was Navy and some Army).

IronChef wrote: they do have some awsome fighters....i'd take a Su-37 over a eurofighter anyday.

And... I'll take one of our F-22's or F-35's over either!

Those Russians in the first picture sure do have great fashion sense!

Don't worry people, after Georgia, Puttin's puppet Medvedev has no reason to think he can roll over eastern block countries without reprisal.

nice pics and i love the vehicles

Dominum wrote: after Georgia

I already told you people, we didn't see any tanks in Atlanta! XD

IMHO, we should have let them have Georgia.  Oh, well... can't please everyone!  Once again, nice pics!  That must've been a pretty epic night...

Arbee wrote: Those Russians in the first picture sure do have great fashion sense!

hope they do not wear those red berets into battle.

Bushmaster wrote: hope they do not wear those red berets into battle.

Green berets are more tactical 

I like tan ones.

Arbee wrote:IMHO, we should have let them have Georgia.

For all practical purposes, we did