MOSCOW, June 10. /TASS/. Russian troops and aviation held a joint rehearsal at the Alabino training range outside Moscow ahead of the Victory Parade on Moscow’s Red Square on June 24, Russia’s Defense Ministry reported on Wednesday.
"A joint rehearsal of foot formations, the mechanized column and the aircraft flyover of the military parade timed for the 75th anniversary of the Victory in the Great Patriotic War took place on the parade ground in Alabino in the Moscow Region," the ministry said.
Over 40 parade units consisting of officers, sergeants and soldiers of military units and formations, students and cadets of military educational institutions, trainees of military schools, cadet corps and members of the Young Amy movement, and also the personnel of other defense, security and law-enforcement agencies marched in the foot column.
"The mechanized column comprised 232 modern and advanced weapon systems, including 20 items of military hardware that will take part in the military parade for the first time," the Defense Ministry said.
The weapon systems involved in the military parade rehearsal included T-80BVM and T-90M tanks, BMP-2 infantry fighting vehicles with the Berezhok combat module, Kurganets-25 IFVs with a 57mm canon, the Armata IFVs with the Kinzhal combat module, Taifun-K 4x4 armored vehicles with a remotely controlled combat module and Taifun-VDV armored vehicles of Russia’s Airborne Force.
The airborne rehearsal of the military parade devoted to the 75th anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany in the 1941-1945 Great Patriotic War involved the crews of 75 aircraft and helicopters of the Aerospace Force’s long-range, military transport, tactical and army aviation that took off from eight airfields in the Moscow, Lipetsk, Tver, Ivanovo, Saratov and Kaluga Regions.
Mostly service members with the coronavirus immunity and without the signs of infectious diseases have been admitted to take part in the military parade, the ministry stressed.
Also, the parade teams are training while wearing masks and gloves. Meanwhile, the personnel of Russia’s radiological, biological and chemical protection troops are daily disinfecting the parade ground and all involved transport vehicles.
Russia postponed the military parade on Moscow’s Red Square on May 9 to a later date due to the coronavirus pandemic.
At a video conference with Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu on May 26, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that the Victory Parade would be held on Moscow’s Red Square on June 24.
The head of state explained he had chosen this date because June 24 was the day when in 1945 the legendary historic parade of victors took place, when soldiers, who fought for Moscow and defended Leningrad, who battled for Stalingrad, liberated Europe and stormed Berlin, marched on Red Square.
The Russian president instructed the defense chief to exclude any risks for the health of the military parade’s participants.