Deborah Akinyosoye
US President, Donald Trump on Thursday expressed his intent to rename both May 8 and November 11 “Victory Day” in his latest attempt to alter the country’s nomenclature.
“I am hereby renaming May 8th as Victory Day for World War II and November 11th as Victory Day for World War I,” he wrote on his Truth Social platform.
Victory Day, observed by the European Union on May 8 and in former Soviet countries on May 9, marks the anniversary of the formal acceptance of Germany’s unconditional surrender.
The war continued in Asia until the surrender of Japan in early September 1945 after the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Though some in the United States mark the occasion, May 8 is not a public holiday or celebrated as widely as in Europe.
“Many of our allies and friends are celebrating May 8th as Victory Day, but we did more than any other Country, by far, in producing a victorious result on World War II,” Trump’s post said.
November 11 was originally named “Armistice Day” by former US president Woodrow Wilson to mark the anniversary of 1918 armistice ending the armed conflict in World War I.
It is now a public holiday celebrated in the United States as “Veterans Day” and meant to honor Americans who have served in the US armed forces.
“We won both Wars, nobody was close to us in terms of strength, bravery, or military brilliance, but we never celebrate anything — That’s because we don’t have leaders anymore, that know how to do so!” Trump continued. “We are going to start celebrating our victories again!”
During World War II the Soviet Union, in which Russia was the largest of 15 republics, was allied with Britain and the United States against Nazi Germany.
The USSR suffered the greatest number of casualties in the war, with more than 20 million killed.
No executive order or proclamation enumerating the holiday name changes has been formally issued yet by the White House. Trump in his second term has repeatedly sought to rename parts of US public life, whether it be a national holiday, such as changing “Indigenous Peoples’ Day” back to “Columbus Day”, or a geographical feature, like renaming the “Gulf of Mexico” as the “Gulf of America.”