Nefarious Russian Propaganda
Nefarious Russian Propaganda
Putin has succeeded in filling MAGA talking points with his lies.
US aid to Ukraine has been embroiled in a political battle between those who understand how Ukraine’s success prevents greater global conflict and those who are repeating Russian propaganda, often word for word.
Russian propaganda has been a part of the MAGA movement since the beginning. Their constant dismissal of anyone who attempts to discuss Russia by claiming it is all a hoax has been a largely successful effort in preventing the important discussion of the real threat Russia presents to America.
The Washington Post obtained a classified document containing Russian foreign policy plans and blunt ideas about their ambitions. Here is how they view the war in Ukraine:
The outcome of Russia’s war in Ukraine will “to a great degree determine the outlines of the future world order,” a clear indication that Moscow sees the result of its invasion as inextricably bound with its ability — and that of other authoritarian nations — to impose its will globally.
As for how Russia views NATO:
“For Putin, it is absolutely natural that he should try to create the maximum number of problems for the U.S.,” he said. “The task is to take the U.S. out of the game, and then destroy NATO. This doesn’t mean dissolving it, but to create the feeling among people that NATO isn’t defending them.”
In that sense, Russia is winning. And they are doing so thanks to the America First movement that is playing directly into Putin’s hands.
Ukrainians Aren’t Nazis
Putin has long pushed the propaganda that Ukraine is a neo-Nazi regime and that the invasion of Ukraine is a move to defend Russia. Sadly, this propaganda has been repeated by MAGA politicians, most notably Marjorie Taylor Greene.
Greene used a Congressional hearing to “address the misinformation.” She wanted to refute the claims that calling Ukraine a Nazi regime was Russian propaganda.
Her topic was the Ukrainian Azov Brigade. In 2014, the Azov Brigade was initially a privately funded militia group. The founder had far-right viewpoints and assembled the group to fight against Russian forces. Later in 2014, the group was pulled into the Ukrainian National Guard, and the founder left.
The Azov group's philosophy transformed into nationalism focused on defending the homeland. The far-right ideologies faded away. In 2022, the now-named Azov Regiment was down to just 900 personnel.
This was the group that Greene attempted to use as an example to repeat Putin’s propaganda that Ukraine is a Nazi regime.
Greene even misrepresented an article and statements from others to push her narrative. She quoted an article from Time magazine from 2021:
Ali Soufan, a security consultant and former FBI agent who has studied Azov, estimates that more than 17,000 foreign fighters have come to Ukraine over the past six years from 50 countries.
That is where Greene stopped quoting the article. But the very next line was this:
The vast majority have no apparent links to far-right ideology.
Greene misled what Christopher Wray, director of the FBI, was discussing in a House Homeland Security Committee hearing in 2019. She claimed Wray was saying that Azov was radicalizing Americans abroad when what Wray was discussing was that homegrown white supremacists from the US were finding organizations to join up with overseas to train up their combat skills to then return to the US as a greater threat to our nation.
Wray was discussing America’s neo-Nazi problems, not Ukraine’s. Wray also never specified the Azov group in his discussion.
There is no truth to Ukraine being a Nazi regime. It is purely Putin’s propaganda that has fully seeped into America’s MAGA movement.
Ukraine has had some bad actors among its population. America has had far more.
The United States and the United Kingdom Did Not Kill a Peace Treaty
Another lie directly from Putin is that a March 2022 peace treaty, which was in negotiations between Ukraine and Russia, was stopped by the United States and the United Kingdom to force the war to rage on.
Again, this lie has been repeated by MAGA almost word for word.
While the ongoing peace talks were optimistic, the agreement being worked on was extremely flawed, which ultimately led to its failure.
Initially, the deal didn't define what happened to occupied Ukrainian territory. Later, Ukraine demanded that Russia withdraw from the Donbas region. Russia didn’t want to give up any of the occupied territory, which continues to be one of the main issues blocking every peace talk.
The treaty was made without US involvement. Yet it had a provision that if Ukraine were to be attacked again, the guarantor nations, which included the United States and the United Kingdom without their consent, would be obligated to go to war with the invader, who would almost certainly be Russia. The US was against the commitment made without America included in the discussion.
When the US and other nations pushed back against that measure, Russia tried to assuage the world by saying that all guarantor nations had to agree to go to war for them to get involved. The problem was that Russia was also a guarantor nation. Allowing Russia to invade Ukraine and then veto all of the other countries from coming to Ukraine’s defense.
That was on top of the fact that Russia was demanding that Ukraine could not join NATO and that Ukraine needed to be limited to a military that was even smaller than its pre-invasion force, including limited-range weapons. That would have made Ukraine very susceptible to a later blitzkrieg-style Russian attack.
In the end, Ukraine and Russia never found an agreement.
Why MAGA?
There are numerous political groups and organizations within the US, but MAGA is where the majority of Russia's propaganda efforts have been focused. Why is that?
The document for the first time provides official confirmation and codification of what many in the Moscow elite say has become a hybrid war against the West. Russia is seeking to subvert Western support for Ukraine and disrupt the domestic politics of the United States and European countries, through propaganda campaigns supporting isolationist and extremist policies
“continue to facilitate the coming to power of isolationist right-wing forces in America”
American isolationism, by default, means a desire to avoid foreign conflicts, which is exactly what Russia needs to achieve its goals.
Russia has also sought to create distractions for the US. The most direct of which is helping to spread America’s ongoing internal culture wars through online disinformation and troll accounts. This is where a lot of Putin’s propaganda seeps into MAGA talking points.
In addition, Russia wants to create more external problems for America and the West. This includes:
“Russia can create difficulties for the U.S. in many different regions of the world,” the academic said. “This is about the Middle East, northeast Asia, the African continent and even Latin America.”
The document also specifically discusses:
…enable the destabilization of Latin American countries and the rise to power of extremist forces on the far left and far right there,”
Other points in the policy proposal, which was also provided to The Post, suggested that Moscow stoke conflict between the United States and China over Taiwan to bring Russia and China closer together, as well as “to escalate the situation in the Middle East around Israel, Iran and Syria to distract the U.S. with the problems of this region.”
Again, this has been successful. The destabilization of South and Latin American countries has led to harsher US sanctions on several nations. Those sanctions, combined with the failing governments and struggling economies, have led to a rapid increase in the displaced population, or in other words, migrants who are seeking somewhere to go and are making the trip to America’s southern border.
We are also now seeing the escalation happening between Israel and Iran, the ongoing attacks by the Houthi rebels on the Red Sea, and the deterioration of the US standing with Muslim-majority nations in the Middle East.
What are Republicans focused on with their talking points? The southern border and the evil that Iran represents which is pulling focus away from Russia’s direct military efforts in Ukraine.
The Post article is well worth reading to understand Russia’s true intentions and how important saving Ukraine is for America’s future. A gift article is linked below.
“The Americans consider that insofar as they are not directly participating in the war [in Ukraine], then any loss is not their loss,” Khodorkovsky said. “This is an absolute misunderstanding.”
