As Russia celebrated the 77th anniversary of the USSR’s victory over Nazi Germany today, Vladimir Putin played the lead role as savior and defender against a new enemy, Ukrainian nationhood, reports Paul Goode. But while Putin’s speech was full of Nazis and anti-US references, Goode notes, it was remarkably silent on Russia’s declared aims of “de-nazifying” and “de-militarizing” Ukraine.

Ivan Kurilla says he cannot remember a time when the May 9 holiday “was anticipated with such anxiety.” As the date approached, Pavel Baev speculated Putin might use it to define more concrete goals since the Kremlin now “can neither reckon with reality nor keep denying it.” In this light, as Samuel Greene says, ordinary Russians would not feel like much had been accomplished. Nevertheless, Timothy Frye thought the holiday’s nationalist theatrics would likely sustain rallying-around-the-flag in Russia. None of this could have convinced the international community that Putin was winning the war, argued Olexiy Haran, and Volodymyr Dubovyk said Ukraine seemed ready for whatever would come, even if it involved mass Russian mobilization.

A new PONARS Eurasia Commentary by Martin Jirušek contends the Kremlin never abandoned a zero-sum, offensive realist approach to foreign policy, but only recently felt empowered to act on it. Mark Kramer compares today’s Russian invasion to the Red Army’s “deeply immoral” behavior. Nuclear war is now the likeliest it's been since the Sixties, says Volodymyr Ishchenko. Pavel Podvig, though, thinks nuclear weapons would not actually change anything on the battlefield. He also describes the Poseidon nuclear underwater drone, which a Russian TV anchor said could annihilate the UK, as a largely political weapon designed to demonstrate Russia can evade missile defense systems. Kimberly Marten highlights the irony that a Russian action intended to keep NATO away is likely to lead Finland to join the alliance, more than doubling its land borders with Russia.

Is Putin gaining or losing at home from the invasion? In a new PONARS Eurasia Policy Memo, Timothy Frye, Scott Gehlbach, Kyle Marquardt, and John Reuter now find reason to question how useful “list experiments” actually are in measuring the “real” popularity of autocrats like Putin today. Konstantin Sonin predicts that any political stability Russia gains by driving out dissenters will involve “a very low level of production and consumption.” In a recent forum, Marlene Laruelle sees “a definitive turn” toward more repression, authoritarianism, and heavy ideology in Russia but argues different futures are still possible, while Greene posits the invasion will “powerfully restructure the nature of elite politics within Russia.” One winner seems to be Russian oligarch Vladimir Potanin, whom Stanislav Markus calls “the ultimate opportunist,” someone with a talent for cultivating western stakeholders and avoiding sanctions. Meanwhile, Julie George characterizes Russia’s actions as largely unprecedented, even in their own history, making predictions difficult.