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| lic, July 1, 2014. Bill Powell, Pushing The Kremlin Line Newsweek, May 20, 2014. 133 Ostrovsky, The Invention of Russia, at 297. 134 Ibid. at 297. Mikhail Zygar, Why Putin Prefers Trump Politico, July 27, 2016. ing their content to be branded as such as well as their foreign funding sources to be disclosed. 130 Disinformation and Propaganda The use of disinformation and propaganda has long been a hallmark of the Kremlin’s toolbox to manipulate its own citizens. The historical precedent for these tactics stem from the Soviet era, when the government routinely utilized propaganda to suppress any suggestion of the unpleasant and reassure the viewer that life in the communist empire was peaceful and optimistic.’’ 131 While propaganda inside Russia has long cast aspersions on the Western democratic model as a counterpoint to Russia’s own, the Kremlin’s use of disinformation and propaganda under Putin has not sought simply to keep a lid on unpleasantness at home, but rather to whip up anxieties and generate fevered sentiment in support of its policies and actions. To implement its propaganda, Putin’s deputies reportedly summon chief editors on a regular basis to coordinate the Kremlin line on various news and policy items and distribute it throughout mainstream media outlets in Moscow. 132 Driving the narrative often requires media partners who have created myths and explained reality in the production of news as well as entertainment often blurring lines between the two to ensure that media content fuels enthusiasm for the Kremlin’s overall narrative. 133 Russian journalist Arkady Ostrovsky quotes one such partner at the helm of leading Russian television channel Perviy Kanal, Konstantin Ernst on this imperative Our task number two is to inform the country about what is going on. Today the main task of television is to mobilize the country.’’ 134 Propaganda under Putin has played up examples of Western failures in an attempt to undermine the credibility of a Western-style alternative system of government to Russia’s corrupt, authoritarian state. Founder of independent television outlet Dozhd, Mikhail Zygar, summarizes it this way Russian television doesn’t suggest that Russian leaders are any better or less corrupt, or more honest and just, than Western leaders. Rather, it says that everything is the same everywhere. All the world’s politicians are corrupt just look at the revelations in the Panama Papers. Everywhere, human rights are being violated—just look at what American cops do to black people. All athletes dope. All elections are falsified. Democracy doesn’t exist anywhere, so give it up. 135 Ginning up cynicism among the Russian population about democratic nations also provides a convenient brush with which to tar Russia’s democratic opposition at home. As Ostrovsky notes VerDate Mar 15 2010 04:06 Jan 09, 2018 Jkt PO 00000 Frm 00033 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6601 S:\FULL COMMITTEE\HEARING FILES\COMMITTEE PRINT 2018\HENRY\JAN. 9 REPORT FOREI-42327 with DISTILLER 28 136 Ostrovsky, The Invention of Russia, at 2; the name ‘‘Maidan,’’ a borrowed word in the Russian and Ukrainian languages that refers to an open public space or town square, has been frequently used to refer to popular protests and street revolutions in the former Soviet space. Chapter 4 for more information on the Russian Orthodox Church’s role in promoting traditional values abroad. 138 Ostrovsky, The Invention of Russia, at 312. Joshua Yaffa, ‘‘Dmitry Kiselev Is Redefining the Art of Russian Propaganda New Repub- lic, July 1, 2014. 140 Ostrovsky, The Invention of Russia, at 298. 141 Ibid. at 298-99. 142 Ibid. at 315. In the weeks before his death, opposition leader Boris Nemtsov] was demonized on television to great effect. In Moscow street protests at that time, hate banners carrying his image were hung on building facades with the words Fifth column—aliens among us . . . marchers carried signs proclaiming PUTIN AND KADYROV PREVENT MAIDAN IN RUSSIA alongside photographs of Nemtsov identifying him as the organizer of Maidan.’ ’’ This climate led Nemtsov to assert in an interview hours before his death that Russia was turning into a fascist state with propaganda modeled on Nazi Germany’s. 136 Putin’s propaganda machine has asserted amoral superiority over the West, bolstered by a focus on traditional values of the state and the Russian Orthodox Church. 137 This was especially useful at home as the 2011-2012 protests against Putin’s return to the presidency gained steam, particularly among a relatively secular and urban middle class, forcing the Kremlin to appeal to its core paternalistic and traditionalist electorate.’’ 138 As such, state- sponsored media outlets have displayed an unforgiving tone for members of Russian society who buck traditional or religious mores. In April 2012, for example, the popular, pro-Kremlin News of the Week presenter Dmitry Kiselev said that gays and lesbians should be prohibited from donating blood, sperm, and in the case of a road accident, their hearts should be either buried or cremated as unsuitable for the prolongation of life.’’ 139 State-sponsored media have also doctored the Kremlin’s image to help justify Russian military incursions into Georgia, Ukraine, and Syria to the Russian population. During the 2008 invasion of Georgia, Ostrovsky notes that television channels were part of the military operation, waging an essential propaganda campaign, spreading disinformation and demonizing the country Russia was about to attack.’’ 140 Russian television inflated figures of civilian deaths and refugees in South Ossetia by the thousands. Alleging genocide, the picture that media painted was of the Kremlin fighting not a tiny, poor country that used to be its vassal but a dangerous and powerful aggressor backed by the imperialist West.’’ 141 Six years later, these tactics would betaken to new extremes during the so- called Euromaidan protests in Ukraine in which pro-European protesters railed against the pro-Russian government in Kiev, and the subsequent illegal Russian occupation of Crimea in 2014. Russian media painted the Euromaidan protesters as a collection of ‘‘neo- Nazis, anti-Semites, and radicals staging an American-sponsored coup in Kiev. 142 ‘‘Pass this Oscar to the Russian Channel and to Dmitry Kiselev for the lies and nonsense you are telling people about Maidan,’’ one protester said to a Russian state television VerDate Mar 15 2010 04:06 Jan 09, 2018 Jkt PO 00000 Frm 00034 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6601 S:\FULL COMMITTEE\HEARING FILES\COMMITTEE PRINT 2018\HENRY\JAN. 9 REPORT FOREI-42327 with DISTILLER 29 143 A.O. ‘‘Russia’s Chief Propagandist The Economist, Dec. 10, 2013. 144 Ostrovsky, The Invention of Russia, at 324. 145 Zygar, All the Kremlin’s Men, at 337. Julia Ioffe, Bears in a Honey Trap Foreign Policy, Apr. 28, 2010. 147 Download 0.63 Mb. Share with your friends:
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