The paper's Friday account framed Putin's stripped Victory Day parade alongside Nabiullina's labor-shortage admission as a single capacity confession. The Saturday register adds the third item. The Russian Ministry of Defence has confirmed that students from the Suvorov Military Schools, the Nakhimov Naval Schools, and the cadet corps will not appear on Red Square on May 9 either, citing "the current operational situation." [1]

The cadets are not soldiers. They are sixteen-year-old boys in dress uniform. Their absence from a parade is not a security calculation — it is an admission that there is no surplus to display. The 2026 column is an infantry column on foot, no armour, no rocket artillery, no self-propelled guns. [2] The Defence Ministry has not announced what flies overhead. Last year's airshow was cancelled by weather; this year there has been no flyover schedule released as of Friday. [3]

Elvira Nabiullina, governor of the central bank, told the Alfa Summit on April 28 that Russia faces an unprecedented labour shortage — "Never before in the history of modern Russia have we experienced such a labor shortage." [4] FinExpertiza, the audit firm whose figures Nabiullina cited, puts the labour deficit at 2.5 million workers since February 2022 and forecasts another 1.4 million missing by year-end. [5]

Three confessions in one week. The capacity is gone. The parade is what shows it.

-- KATYA VOLKOV, Moscow