Trump proposes national holidays for WWI and WWII victories
US President Donald Trump has announced plans to designate days commemorating America's victory in the First World War and Second World War as national holidays.
The proposal, first floated last week, is part of Trump's call to 'start celebrating our victories again,' although Russia dismissed his claim that the US won WWII as 'nonsense.'
In a post on Truth Social on Monday, Trump claimed that America 'won two World Wars, but we never took credit for it,' unlike other Allied nations around the world, which are celebrating 'the Victory we had in World War II.'
He went on to reiterate that 'the Victory was only accomplished because of us,' adding that 'without the United States, the War would have been won by other Countries, and what a different World it would be.'
Trump stated that he would establish a national holiday 'in celebration of the victories of World War I, marked by the Armistice on November 11, 1918, and World War II, with Victory Day on May 8, 1945.'
Last week Trump asserted that the US 'did more than any other country, by far' to win World War II, claiming 'nobody was close to us in strength, bravery, or military brilliance' in either war.
Trump's claims that America played the leading role in defeating Nazi Germany sparked controversy. Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who is now deputy chairman of his country's Security Council, dismissed the remarks as 'pretentious nonsense,' emphasizing the Soviet Union's sacrifice of 27 million lives in the war.
General Lord Dannatt, former chief of the UK General Staff, called Trump's remarks 'extraordinary' and accused him of 'rewriting history.'
Nazi Germany officially surrendered to the Allies on May 8, 1945, after Soviet forces captured Berlin. The surrender took effect after midnight Moscow time. While the US observes May 8 as Victory in Europe Day, Russia commemorates the occasion on May 9.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov acknowledged Russia's gratitude for US support during World War II but maintained that the Soviet Union would have defeated Nazi Germany without it. He noted that the Lend-Lease program provided valuable aid, such as vehicles, aircraft, ammunition, and tanks, which helped make a difficult task more manageable.
The Lend-Lease program was a US initiative that supplied Allied nations with military equipment, food, and raw materials. According to Peskov, the Soviet Union received aid valued at around $200 billion in today's terms. However, the support wasn't free. Russia, as the USSR's successor, only completed repayment in 2006.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Russia Today
2 hours ago
- Russia Today
Biden's Ukrainian spending ‘crazy'
Washington was spending 'crazy' amounts of money on Ukraine under the administration of former President Joe Biden without any thought to diplomacy, US Vice President J.D. Vance has said. Earlier this year, US President Donald Trump restarted diplomatic relations with Moscow, which have been frozen since Biden cut them off after the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022. Trump has also repeatedly criticized the massive flow of military aid Washington has provided Kiev under his predecessor's leadership. 'What happened with the Biden administration, man, it's crazy. They were spending so much money all over the world, they weren't engaged in diplomacy at all,' Vance said in an interview with American comedian-turned-podcaster Theo Von published on Saturday. 'They sent $300 billion to Ukraine, for example, and you never had the president of the United States actually trying to force a diplomatic settlement,' he said. The US vice president described the conflict as 'vicious.' 'The Russia-Ukraine thing is the most vicious thing,' Vance said, adding that he's pleased that Washington is trying to bring about a 'settlement.' The current US administration has engaged Russia in several high-level meetings in recent months. The diplomatic push has also led Kiev and Moscow to restart direct negotiations for the first time since 2022, when Ukraine unilaterally pulled out from the first Istanbul talks. In April, Trump signed a major minerals exploitation deal with Kiev, an agreement he has proclaimed would help Washington recoup the massive amounts of money it has spent on supporting Ukraine under Biden. The deal gives the US priority access to Ukrainian mineral wealth but does not include formal security guarantees for Kiev, a point that it had insisted on for months in the preceding negotiations. Apart from curtailing Ukraine-related spending, the current US administration has moved to cut down on all foreign aid as part of an effort to trim the bloated federal budget. This 'America first' switch is part of Trump's pivot away from a 'decades-old approach to foreign policy,' Vance said last month. 'The era of uncontested US dominance is over,' he said, promising that Washington will be turning away from 'open-ended conflicts.'
Russia Today
2 hours ago
- Russia Today
US diverted military aid for Kiev to Middle East
US President Donald Trump's administration has diverted a large military aid package his predecessor promised to Kiev to American forces in the Middle East, Ukraine's Vladimir Zelensky has told ABC. The package included thousands of anti-drone missiles Ukraine desperately needs to fight Russia's long-range unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), he said. The Ukrainian leader raised the issue in an interview with ABC News' Martha Raddatz which aired on Sunday. When asked about the importance of US support, Zelensky admitted that the Ukrainian military was struggling to deal with Russian UAVs on its own. 'We have a lot of problems with these Shaheds,' he said, referring to Russian Geran-2 long-range drones, which Kiev claims to be Shahed-family UAVs allegedly supplied to Moscow by Tehran. Both Russia and Iran have previously denied the allegations. The Ukrainian leader then revealed that Kiev had not received a major aid package it was 'counting on.' Former US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin promised Ukraine 20,000 anti-drone missiles that were based on a 'special technology,' Zelensky claimed. Austin served as the secretary of defense under Trump's predecessor, Joe Biden. '[This] morning, my minister of defense told me that the United States moved them to the Middle East,' Zelensky said, adding that, without the US military assistance, Russia has 'more chances' of winning the war and Ukraine will have 'much more losses.' Earlier this week, the Wall Street Journal reported that the Pentagon was 'redirecting a key anti-drone technology earmarked for Ukraine to American forces' in the Middle East. President Trump has frequently questioned continued military support for Ukraine, and has pushed Moscow and Kiev to reach a peace deal. Earlier this week, he also said that it might be better to let Russia and Ukraine continue fighting 'for a while' before 'pulling them apart.' Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth – a critic of the US involvement in the Ukraine conflict – skipped a NATO meeting this week focused on coordinating military aid to Ukraine, in the first such instance since the conflict escalated in 2022. According to the WSJ, the Trump administration 'inherited' the authority to provide Ukraine with $3.85 billion worth of weapons but has refrained from doing so. Moscow has repeatedly condemned foreign arms shipments to Kiev by arguing that they do not change the course of the conflict, only lead to escalation, and extend human suffering.
Russia Today
6 hours ago
- Russia Today
Ukrainian strikes cause major blackout
Ukrainian forces have left tens of thousands of people without electricity in a drone strike targeting a substation in Russia's border Kursk Region, Governor Aleksandr Khinshtein has said. Kiev's troops 'are continuing to attack civilian infrastructure,' he said in a Telegram post on Sunday. According to Khinshtein, the strike targeted an electricity substation with a capacity of 110 kilowatts in the western Rylsk district. The Rylsk district had a population of around 30,000 as of 2021, according to government data. The strike on the substation affected parts of two neighboring districts as well, Khinshtein said. The governor vowed to restore power 'as soon as the security situation allows.' Kiev has significantly intensified its drone raids on civilian infrastructure in Moscow and other Russian regions since mid-May, when the first meeting between negotiators from Russia and Ukraine took place in Istanbul. The attacks peaked during the final week of May, when 2,300 UAVs were shot down, according to the Russian Defense Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has described the raids as attempts to derail the peace process. Last week, two bridges collapsed in Russia's border regions. In one case, a bridge fell in front of a moving passenger train in Bryansk Region. The second incident took place in Kursk Region, when a railway bridge collapsed under a moving freight train. In total, seven people died and 113 were injured. Moscow deemed both cases deliberate acts of sabotage. The Russian Investigative Committee stated that they were terrorist attacks planned by Ukraine to cause maximum civilian casualties. Both attacks came shortly before the second round of Russia-Ukraine talks in Istanbul.
