Later Western Views 1965-95

Western intelligence analysts during the late years of the Cold War faced challenges akin to piecing together a puzzle — except one that did not come in a box with a picture showing how the assembled puzzle should appear. Western analysts got the pieces just a few at a time, had no idea what the final picture should look like, and, to make the problem even harder, often included extra pieces (in the form of programs, like the tested-but-cancelled SS-10 ICBM), and pieces that might plausibly fit together several different ways (like the Tu-22M “Backfire” bomber, probably a theater weapon, but which also had the range to reach the United States).

Red Square is located in the center of Moscow, the capital of Russia. The former is the "Industrial and Commercial Area outside the City" opened by Ivan III in the late 15th century. It was renamed "Red Square" in 1662 and "Beautiful Square" in Russian. By the 1920s, the Red Square opened up with the neighboring Vasilevsky Square, which formed today's scale. 695 meters long from north to south, east-west width of 130 meters, with a total area of 91,000 square meters, only one-fifth of Tiananmen Square. The Red Square is paved with ocher red stone, rather than a flat cement floor, the military parade soldiers are walking on top of it while more able to reflect the majestic rhythm.

The military parade in Red Square was also a Soviet convention. It started as early as May 1, 1923, and it was the first time the Soviet Union held military parade on May 1 Labor Day. Since then, the annual May Day International Labor Day and November 7 Day of the October Revolution anniversary, will be held parade. However, the Soviet Union's first parade was not on Red Square. Instead, on November 7, 1918, to celebrate the victory of the Workers' and Peasants Red Army in the front line and the first anniversary of the October socialist revolution, the military parade was held in the Horden area of Moscow, with infantry, Cavalry, armored vehicles and three aircraft to participate in the parade.

However, in the early 1920s and 1930s, these Soviet military parades did not attract much attention because of the limited technical conditions of live broadcasting and the inability to show the parade scenes to the world at the same time. On the other hand, the Soviet Union Still was far from the center of the world, the degree of natural concern was not high.

November 7, 1941, coincided with the crucial moment of the Moscow war in World War II, the Soviet Union ushered in the most famous Red Square parade. The entire parade was carried out in heavy snow. Tanks, artillery and cars were all covered with snow. On June 24, 1945, just over a month after Nazi Germany surrendered unconditionally, the Soviet Union held a victory parade at Red Square.

The advanced weapons of the Soviet era always appeared first when the parade was on Red Square. Since then, the huge Soviet tank armor cluster created a dreaded nightmare in the West. The T-62, T-72 and T-80 tanks as well as the SAM air defense missiles, the R-5 ballistic missiles, the SS-18 intercontinental missile, Is the first public appearance on the Red Square.

Therefore, each parade became an excellent opportunity for Western countries to learn about the latest weapons developments in the Soviet Union. Whenever a new type of weapon appears, they make the military observers in Western countries look closely at them with wide eyes. The Soviet Union is also very aware of this point, so sometimes it will take advantage of this feature of Western countries.

For example, on the May 1 parade in 1954, the Soviet Union displayed a huge Mi-4 strategic bombers with huge voyages and payloads, enough to serve as a strategic deterrent. One by one, Mia-4, flew over Red Square and gave the western countries a tremendous shock. They believed that the Soviet Union had already equipped a huge Mia-4 strategic bombers with a size of about 100. In fact, Mia-4 voyage is simply not enough to flew back to the United States from the Soviet Union and then fly back. The Soviet-equipped Mia-4 is less than 20 in total. However, in the Red Army parade, it were only a few Mi-4 flying past, going back and forth again and again, giving people the illusion of quantity.

As another example, on May 9, 1965, the commemoration of the twentieth anniversary of the victory of World War II victory parade, which is also the first Soviet military parade after the war, the Soviet Union showed Sam-5 air defense missiles, Western experts immediately according to the size of the missile And shape projections, that this range of anti-aircraft missiles can reach 400 km, so that the Soviet Union won a huge air defense advantage. This is another trick that the Soviet Union will not be afraid of. It is to put the Sam-5 warhead on a missile missile that has already stopped development.

In 1962, the Strategic Rocket Army displayed ballistic missiles on the parade of Red Square. In Brezhnev era, the military parade was canceled in 1969 and the Soviet Union did not hold military parades in the May Day. In the 1970s, with the further improvement of the comprehensive national strength of the Soviet Union and overjoyed Brezhnev in order to show off, the parade on November 7 was extended from over an hour to three hours. The scene was even bigger and the momentum was stronger. I did not expect many years later, the anti-harm themselves. On November 7, 1982, Brezhnev, now 76, attended the Parade.

After the disintegration of the Soviet Union, Russia inherited the mantle for the first few years and did not hold military parades until May 9, 1995, in commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of the victory of World War II, the first military parade was held. Thereafter, on May 9 each year, military parades should be held. This formed a new Russian military parade routine.