How much?

[Gadianton]

From the Sachs paper:

Ukrainian leaders have gone along with the US deception for reasons that are hard to fathom. Perhaps they believe the US, or are afraid of the US, or fear their own extremists, or simply are extremists, ready to sacrifice hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians to death and injury in the naïve belief that Ukraine can defeat a nuclear superpower that regards the war as existential. Or possibly some of the Ukrainian leaders are making fortunes by skimming from the tens of billions of dollars of Western aid and arms.

It would be hard for an otherwise legit academic to be more presumptuous than he is here. Ukrainians are either dupes, fanatics, or frauds -- is he friends with DCP? -- the possibility doesn't even exist that they rationally want to defend their country. Their outperformance in battle suggests this is the case. If Putin rolled tanks into Las Vegas and your choices were to flee, fight, or surrender to Russia with whatever plan they have for your life from there, what would you do?

[Dr. Shades]

Which increases inflation, so it's not a real solution.

Of course it’s a real solution. That money isn’t going to print itself, so we have to turn the printer on. That’s why the printer has an ‘ON’ button. Press button; money printer go brrrrrrrrr.

I’m not gonna draw dollar bills by hand, am I? I tried that once, and things didn’t turn out well.

Great! Then why not advocate for a doubling of your taxes, just so long as it feeds into the U.S. economy? Or why not advocate for ballooning the deficit by another order of magnitude, since the borrowed money will feed into the U.S. economy?

You’re thinking too small, Shades. I mean, half of our budget is eaten up by the DoD. But, why? Why do we need things like an Air Force, or Navy? Ukraine really doesn’t seem to have much of either and they’ve been taking out Russkie aircraft and pretty much sunk Putin’s whole Black Sea fleet using cheap drones layered in Pop Rocks and duct tape. Think of how much we’d save in this nation if Trump just decided to stop building $14-billion-dollar aircraft carriers and $110-billion-dollar F35 aircraft systems? Seriously, save a half-trillion bucks and just equip each US citizen household with a dozen AR-15s, some MANPATS, and several hundred canisters of ammo, then call it a day. Let Putin or Xi just TRY to invade. Joke’s on them, suckas.

Better to have icky socialism than to have nothing at all by flushing the money down the toilet, wouldn't you say?

NO, SHADES. NO. BAD SHADES. SOCIALISM ICKY BAD, SHADES. Put that thing down and go wash your hands right now.

That's just the sad reality of politics. I'm very used to it. I won't complain too much as long as the deficit isn't increased and the money gets used in-house instead of flushed down the toilet.

What do you have against flushing money down the toilet? Plumbers have to eat, too, you know. MAGA!

It doesn't.

But, they broke the law!! We have to TEACH THEM A LESSON! Even if it ends up shooting the economy in the foot ... and then the other foot. And the leg. MAGA!

Then let's adopt a non-deportation stance.

Why do you INSIST on being creative? Stop trying to make people ‘think’. We need to simply react to our gut, and MAGA GUT says that IMMIGRANTS ARE BAD.

They’re eating the pets, you know.

Okay.

** money printer go brrrrrrrrrrrr **

I'm not MAGA, so I'm unsure of the point you're trying to make here. Please enlighten me.

[Dr Exiled]

From the Sachs paper:

Ukrainian leaders have gone along with the US deception for reasons that are hard to fathom. Perhaps they believe the US, or are afraid of the US, or fear their own extremists, or simply are extremists, ready to sacrifice hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians to death and injury in the naïve belief that Ukraine can defeat a nuclear superpower that regards the war as existential. Or possibly some of the Ukrainian leaders are making fortunes by skimming from the tens of billions of dollars of Western aid and arms.

It would be hard for an otherwise legit academic to be more presumptuous than he is here. Ukrainians are either dupes, fanatics, or frauds -- is he friends with DCP? -- the possibility doesn't even exist that they rationally want to defend their country. Their outperformance in battle suggests this is the case. If Putin rolled tanks into Las Vegas and your choices were to flee, fight, or surrender to Russia with whatever plan they have for your life from there, what would you do?

I'm sure some Ukrainians want to defend their country and some don't want to take part in the meat grinder and some are corrupt. The average age at the front right now is 40 for Ukrainian soldiers and it'll only increase as Russia moves forward. They really should have taken the peace deal Boris Johnson and the US nixed. The goal of weakening Russia through the Ukrainian proxy didn't work. It only strengthened Russia and drove them to make deals with the Chinese. It's turning out to be a horrible mistake to have continually pushed NATO to the east. Perhaps it's time to rethink our policy.

As for the Russians attacking Las Vegas, this scenario isn't close to what's going on now and what has happened in the recent past over in Ukraine and so isn't useful at all. However, if you continually provoke a bully don't be surprised if the bully strikes back. Sure, the public doesn't like war and so needs to believe that the bully is like Hitler or something evil and so the press starts reporting as if history started in Feb 2022 when NATO expansion and arming Ukraine had a lot to do with the Russian invasion.

[honorentheos]

It's amazing how effective the effort is, isn't it? Mainstream media can't be trusted, the institutions of democracy are against the people, only those who have taken the red pill can see things for how they really are, everyone else is a mob under the thumb of the capitalist atheist elite serving American imperialism.

Cool, bro. You keep thinking you see things as they are. Putin needs to eat, too.

Yeah, and you don't tell everyone where the professors, at pretty good universities might I add, that I cited, are wrong in their assessment of the Russian Ukrainian war and its history. Your response is name-calling nonsense. Keep up the neocon propaganda. Raytheon needs one more aid package. Who cares about all the dead.

ETA: Can't wait for "Son of Russiagate: Neocons Strike Back."

If someone is spreading Russian propaganda points known to be originating from the Russian strategy of global hybrid warfare against western liberal democracy, what you suggest is trying to swat at hornets while ignoring the nest.

You probably won't care for the source but that's to be expected.

https://publications.armywarcollege.edu ... ddress-it/

Understanding Russian Disinformation and How the Joint Force Can Address It

Michael J. Kelley
©Michael J. Kelley 2024

ABSTRACT: Russia will dominate information warfare if the United States does not treat disinformation as central to Russian strategy. This article examines the vital role disinformation played in post–Cold War Russian strategy, including its strategy in the current Russia-Ukraine War, and in a departure from previous scholarship, this article observes that US defense leaders are aware of Russian disinformation but have failed to assess its impact or sufficiently negate Russian influence. The article also reviews current US efforts and suggests proactive ways to counter Russia’s disinformation strategy.

Keywords: Russia, Ukraine, information operations, disinformation, information literacy


Following the 2022 Ukraine invasion, BBC reporters launched a yearlong investigation into Yala News after it posted a story alleging an American plot to conduct biological warfare against Russia by releasing infected birds that would fly into Russian territory. The investigation was prompted by a remarkably similar story broadcast by Russian state media two hours earlier. The investigation revealed that Yala’s most popular stories mirrored sources owned by or affiliated with the Russian government, including false accounts of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky giving a drunken speech and Ukrainian soldiers fleeing the front lines, both of which appeared on Yala shortly after originating from official Russian sources. Belén Carrasco Rodríguez, one of the BBC’s contacts, coined the term “information laundering” to describe the phenomenon of false narratives gaining credibility through repetition by multiple sources. In the United States, most observers likely dismiss stories about bio-weaponized birds. Can the same be said about information consumers outside the West?1

Alongside traditional national power elements like military and economic operations, Russia generally controls perceptions among targeted audiences to shape the environment to its benefit. While every country controls narratives to some extent, few emphasize information operations on par with Russia. The United States could have taken advantage of this knowledge when Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election surfaced. Instead, partisan squabbling about which side Russia preferred to win muted those reactions. Subsequent fighting over “fake news” in media, political parties, and across American kitchen tables has provided Russian disinformation practitioners with cover as they ply their craft.

Lagging behind the Russian adversary, the United States has slowly realized that the information element can be crucial to outcomes, with the US Army only recently releasing a doctrinal publication on the topic. Perhaps this document represents a dawning realization in the defense establishment that lethality alone is unlikely to be decisive. This new publication begins by refreshing a lexicon for information operations, including disinformation, a key aspect of Russia’s information operations campaigns.

Disinformation is incomplete, incorrect, or out of context information deliberately used to influence audiences. Disinformation creates narratives that can spread quickly and instill an array of emotions and behaviors among groups, ranging from disinterest to violence. Relevant actors employ disinformation to shape public opinion, attract partners, weaken alliances, sow discord among populations, and deceive forces. Disinformation has a malicious intent.2

While news stories like the one about the infected birds may seem ridiculous, especially to Western audiences, repeating such narratives to vulnerable audiences erodes global trust in the United States. For the United States to succeed in the information domain, it must recognize that disinformation is central to Russian strategy and address it proactively. This article begins by reviewing disinformation’s central role in Russian strategy from the Cold War to the Russia-Ukraine War. It then examines the steps the United States has taken to counter Russian disinformation and recommends ways the US defense community can meet the challenge Russia poses in the information domain.

The Russian Approach to Disinformation
Not to be confused with Western debates surrounding the term, Russian doctrine embraces hybrid warfare, which it defines as “a strategic-level effort to shape the governance and geostrategic orientation of a target state in which all actions, up to and including the use of conventional military forces in regional conflicts, are subordinate to an information campaign.” A 2016 RAND Corporation report described the contemporary Russian approach to information operations as a “firehose of falsehood” due to the number and diversity of communication channels and Russia’s willingness to broadcast partial truths and complete fiction. Contrary to typical communication strategies, Russian information campaigns demonstrate no commitment to consistency among narratives. Instead, they focus on the volume and repetition of many themes, seeking acceptance from familiarity with the message.3

Disinformation has been a pillar of Russian strategy since the Cold War, with significant time and treasure spent on disinformation relative to other forms of espionage. Journalist Mark Hollingsworth devotes a chapter to the KGB’s use of disinformation in his book Agents of Influence: How the KGB Subverted Western Democracies. He cites a former KGB disinformation chief who claimed the KGB spent around 25 percent of its budget on traditional espionage, spending the remainder on “a slow process focusing on what we called ideological subversion or active measures.”4

During the Cold War, the Soviet Union effectively employed disinformation to undermine American legitimacy around the world. In one campaign, the Soviets convinced many that the AIDS epidemic was born in a US lab and released by the FBI to target minority communities. Russia uses disinformation to damage trust in the US government abroad and exploit the American fascination with conspiracy theories, damaging trust regarding the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, the COVID-19 pandemic, election security, and other events. Russia has also repeatedly used disinformation campaigns to legitimize military operations. Its actions in the Republic of Georgia and Moldova’s Transdniestria region exemplify a common theme: protecting ethnic Russians from various questionable threats.5

While Russia broadcasts facts that suit its purposes, it uses disinformation in its efforts to employ reflexive control strategies. Reflexive control theory was born in the Soviet era and is used to convince another actor to make decisions against its own interests. Russia accomplishes this strategy by manipulating the information environment to allow its adversary to perceive that Russia’s desired outcomes are the best choices the adversary can make. Russia often employs this method to mask or obscure the true risks and rewards of an adversary’s courses of action. Since reflexive control is designed to influence decisions, disinformation can temporarily or durably alter perceptions that drive a given decision. Given that facts do not constrain its information campaigns, Russia can manufacture anything necessary to yield desired decision outcomes.6

Russia uses the full spectrum of disinformation tactics to shape the environment to its benefit. Through direct seizure of control or forced shutdowns of outlets that oppose the government’s actions, the Russian government exerts near-total control of media within its borders. Russian outlets such as Sputnik and Russia Today own or influence proxy outlets around the world not explicitly branded as Russian. These outlets range from newspapers to blogs to YouTube news channels. Each repeats pro-Russia talking points, with each medium using its unique style to appeal to specific, targeted audiences. Russian information warriors create false social media personas and think tanks to sow discord among adversaries, as they did before the 2016 US presidential election. These fabricated sources often strike a chord with nonmainstream Western media outlets, which echo the messages to further their agendas and unintentionally promote Russian causes.7

Western audiences are unfamiliar with the media environment inside Russia. The control and coordination across channels are alien to those accustomed to a free press. Iuliia Iashchenko has written about Russian media from Sapienza University of Rome.

The [Russian] state-run national TV has a few very important primetime political shows that serve one purpose: to spread disinformation among Russian citizens to support the main ideological track of state propaganda. The most popular channel is Russia 1, with shows like “Duel” (Vladimir Solovyov), “60 Minutes” (Olga Skabeyeva), “Evening with Vladimir Solovyov” (Vladimir Solovyov), the same ideological content is also prominent on Channel 1, with shows like “Time Will Show” (Artem Sheynin), and many others. Usually, the level of subtlety of the disinformation is much higher for international audiences. Meanwhile, in Russia, in these shows, the creators present pure ideological propaganda without any proof, and with a heavy usage of simple or vulgar speech. These shows never end up in the global feed mostly because they are too open and would ruin the political goals of the Russian government.8

Controlling all information spaces within its borders and having significant influence over other outlets allow Russia to exert an outsized influence over its neighbors. Many former Russian Empire or Soviet Union countries have seen the benefits of turning westward, something Putin’s regime strongly opposes. Russia has used various methods centered on information warfare to prevent this theme from continuing.

Russia Uses Disinformation for Its “Special Military Operation” in Ukraine
Russia’s first salvo in the Ukraine invasion was a disinformation operation. As Russia built up combat power along the border, Russian spokesmen announced it was a large-scale training exercise and insisted that troops and ships would soon return to normal activities. Russian officials kept up this line, objecting more stridently as Western officials pointed out inconsistencies between their statements and activities on the ground. As the world knows, Russia’s statements proved false; nonetheless, its messaging prevented Ukraine and the West from responding to the buildup until Russia launched the assault. This situation is a prime example of reflexive control laden with disinformation. Russia understood its adversaries’ decision processes and self-image and realized it could lie long enough to freeze their willingness to move beyond words, allowing it to seize the operational initiative. After all, it would seem unreasonable for the US European Command or NATO to respond aggressively to a training exercise. Fortunately, that disinformation initiative was insufficient to consolidate the rapid military victory Russia expected. Western intelligence sharing allowed Ukraine to steel itself at the last minute while preparing the world to see through Russia’s narratives regarding the invasion.9

Consistent with the “firehose of falsehood” approach, Russia initially explained its actions through several competing narratives, including reuniting ethnic Russians with the motherland, maneuvering to counter NATO expansion, and fighting to excise the Ukrainian government’s “Nazi” influences. Putin even tried to deny Ukraine’s very existence, claiming, “Ukraine never had a tradition of genuine statehood.” None of these narratives survive scrutiny, and they all represent Russian disinformation to legitimize blatant efforts to expand territory and delegitimize opponents. The last significant NATO expansion occurred in 2004— hardly a credible reason for Russia to panic nearly two decades later.10

In 2004, Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, and former Soviet republics Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania joined NATO. Since then, only six new countries have joined, including Finland and Sweden, which joined only after and because Russia invaded Ukraine. At the other end of the reasonableness spectrum, Russia has signed several agreements affirming Ukrainian sovereignty, which undercuts Putin’s statements about its right to exist and his fanciful claims that Ukraine was never a legitimate state. Still, NATO has repeatedly had to debunk claims that the Alliance is trying to threaten and encircle Russia, lest other countries take these assertions at face value.11

Russia has used disinformation to attack the global coalition aligned in support of Ukraine by undermining that support within those countries and sowing disunity among them. One independent analysis of Russian messaging determined that French, German, Polish, and Turkish audiences were heavily targeted through at least five specific themes, which aligned with those shown in an alleged Russian document published by Ukrainian intelligence services. The themes addressing the costs of Ukrainian aid and dealing with refugees could be dismissed as competing narratives. Still, one theme listed in the document is clearly disinformation:

Update information about neo-Nazis in Europe, make a comparison with Ukraine in order to show the European community how Nazism is born and ask why they ban Nazis in their countries, but support them in Ukraine? For these purposes, it is advisable to use BBC documentaries about neo-Nazis and Nazis.

This analysis lists dozens of information operations tied to official and proxy Russian sources that do everything from claiming imminent NATO aggression against Russia to discrediting Western media. Weaponizing the US military’s credibility, it was likely Russia behind a 2023 leak of US military documents modified to make Russian casualty numbers look better than the original documents represented.12

Although many Russian disinformation narratives may seem unlikely or even ridiculous to Western countries and allies, they may seem more plausible to audiences in countries already predisposed to dislike and distrust the West. The disinformation about bio-weaponized birds was not aimed at the West and is unlikely to affect public opinion. It is among hundreds of Russian-origin fake news designed to cause distrust of Russian adversaries. When water falls on a rock, erosion occurs one drop at a time. It is impossible to notice changes at first, but the rock is completely reshaped over time. Similarly, in spaces where the West is less likely to detect and contest its narratives, Russia employs disinformation like the bird story more aggressively. Where these narratives take root, American combatant commanders will likely find more resistance to their actions in their respective regions.

Russian support has propped up the Alexander Lukashenko regime in Belarus to control messaging and the electoral process. Lukashenko expresses his appreciation for these efforts by making Belarus a vassal state to serve Russian interests. Russian military forces have occupied portions of the Republic of Georgia for several years to buffer the Russian border and have sufficiently managed the information surrounding the operation to prevent worldwide outrage. In 2014, Russia used a combination of special operations forces and information operations to manipulate a referendum, forcing Ukrainian citizens from Crimea to give Russia control of the strategically important peninsula in the Black Sea. Having effectively seized Crimea, Russia did not need a referendum to hold power there. Nonetheless, the façade of legitimacy represented an information operation targeting those who may have considered intervening to eject Russia by force or other means. Before and after the 2022 Ukraine invasion, Russia undertook similar operations within the Ukrainian Donbas and Luhansk regions along the border with Russia.13

Given Russia’s potency, observers may expect a certain amount of “cognitive dissonance” within the population should Ukraine recover control of these places. The liberation of Russian-held territory is, therefore, more than a kinetic concern. Winning the fight will be insufficient. Russia understands the population must be convinced to be liberated, as demonstrated in its approach to Crimea, Donbas, Luhansk, and Transdniestria. Russia’s ability to wield information to achieve its strategic goals poses challenges for regional governance. Both inside and outside Russia, information manipulation challenges many vital aspects of governance, including transparency, accountability, inclusion, public participation, and the rule of law.14

Does Disinformation Work?
It may be that the American national security establishment has failed to focus on the disinformation problem because its effects are unquantifiable. Despite ample examples of Russian actions, cause and effect in the information environment is not always clear. Disinformation does not exist in a vacuum; it is one variable in the information environment that influences and is influenced by culture, previous events, bias and opinion, misinformation, and the observed truth. The same channels that deliver disinformation deliver all these factors, resulting in great difficulty associating a singular cause and effect. Most disinformation campaigns are not designed to yield precise results but to create chaos, doubt, mistrust, and confusion. Clearly, Russia places great emphasis on shaping the environment in this manner. With the past as a prologue, Russia will conduct information operations using disinformation in concert with more conventional power in future military operations, as it has attempted in Ukraine, with mixed results.

One way to assess effectiveness is to see whether disinformation enters public discourse. For many years, Russia claimed biological research facilities in Ukraine were centers for biological weapons production. In 2022, a viral Twitter (now X) hashtag led to a US Senate hearing. These claims were subsequently repeated on Tucker Carlson’s popular show on Fox News, using selectively clipped testimonies to bolster those claims. The following day, Russian state television cited Carlson’s program. Following an explosion that damaged a gas pipeline in the Baltic Sea, Russian officials quickly lashed out at the United States, publicly accusing it of sabotage. Carlson also picked up that story, again bolstering Russia’s sensationalized version. Carlson had tremendous reach as the host of America’s most popular infotainment program. His Kremlin-friendly approach led to Putin’s first Western interview since the Russia-Ukraine War began, despite multiple previous requests from other journalists worldwide. Carlson’s programming offers a stark example of Russian disinformation creeping into American mainstream media, but there are also more subtle ones.15

Recent analysis revealed the Russian promotion of anti-immigration themes in the United States to weaken support for Ukraine assistance funding. These efforts are evident in Sputnik and Russia Today broadcasts, on X (formerly Twitter), and other Russian-affiliated social media sites. Russian efforts in the Western Hemisphere are not limited to the United States. A recently declassified US intelligence product demonstrated how Russia deliberately fed stories and talking points to media outlets across Latin America, a charge Russia quickly denied. To borrow the BBC’s term, each example represents a form of information laundering. Although challenging to quantify, Russian disinformation efforts seem to be sowing a measure of chaos and distrust in the United States at home and abroad. The Joint Force plays a role in resolving this problem.16

[canpakes]

I'm not MAGA, so I'm unsure of the point you're trying to make here. Please enlighten me.

When you started in with the “let’s just double taxes” argument, I figured that I would align the seriousness of my response to yours.
: )

[Dr Exiled]

Yeah, and you don't tell everyone where the professors, at pretty good universities might I add, that I cited, are wrong in their assessment of the Russian Ukrainian war and its history. Your response is name-calling nonsense. Keep up the neocon propaganda. Raytheon needs one more aid package. Who cares about all the dead.

ETA: Can't wait for "Son of Russiagate: Neocons Strike Back."

If someone is spreading Russian propaganda points known to be originating from the Russian strategy of global hybrid warfare against western liberal democracy, what you suggest is trying to swat at hornets while ignoring the nest.

You probably won't care for the source but that's to be expected.

https://publications.armywarcollege.edu ... ddress-it/

Understanding Russian Disinformation and How the Joint Force Can Address It

Michael J. Kelley
©Michael J. Kelley 2024

ABSTRACT: Russia will dominate information warfare if the United States does not treat disinformation as central to Russian strategy. This article examines the vital role disinformation played in post–Cold War Russian strategy, including its strategy in the current Russia-Ukraine War, and in a departure from previous scholarship, this article observes that US defense leaders are aware of Russian disinformation but have failed to assess its impact or sufficiently negate Russian influence. The article also reviews current US efforts and suggests proactive ways to counter Russia’s disinformation strategy.

Keywords: Russia, Ukraine, information operations, disinformation, information literacy


Following the 2022 Ukraine invasion, BBC reporters launched a yearlong investigation into Yala News after it posted a story alleging an American plot to conduct biological warfare against Russia by releasing infected birds that would fly into Russian territory. The investigation was prompted by a remarkably similar story broadcast by Russian state media two hours earlier. The investigation revealed that Yala’s most popular stories mirrored sources owned by or affiliated with the Russian government, including false accounts of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky giving a drunken speech and Ukrainian soldiers fleeing the front lines, both of which appeared on Yala shortly after originating from official Russian sources. Belén Carrasco Rodríguez, one of the BBC’s contacts, coined the term “information laundering” to describe the phenomenon of false narratives gaining credibility through repetition by multiple sources. In the United States, most observers likely dismiss stories about bio-weaponized birds. Can the same be said about information consumers outside the West?1

Alongside traditional national power elements like military and economic operations, Russia generally controls perceptions among targeted audiences to shape the environment to its benefit. While every country controls narratives to some extent, few emphasize information operations on par with Russia. The United States could have taken advantage of this knowledge when Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election surfaced. Instead, partisan squabbling about which side Russia preferred to win muted those reactions. Subsequent fighting over “fake news” in media, political parties, and across American kitchen tables has provided Russian disinformation practitioners with cover as they ply their craft.

Lagging behind the Russian adversary, the United States has slowly realized that the information element can be crucial to outcomes, with the US Army only recently releasing a doctrinal publication on the topic. Perhaps this document represents a dawning realization in the defense establishment that lethality alone is unlikely to be decisive. This new publication begins by refreshing a lexicon for information operations, including disinformation, a key aspect of Russia’s information operations campaigns.

Disinformation is incomplete, incorrect, or out of context information deliberately used to influence audiences. Disinformation creates narratives that can spread quickly and instill an array of emotions and behaviors among groups, ranging from disinterest to violence. Relevant actors employ disinformation to shape public opinion, attract partners, weaken alliances, sow discord among populations, and deceive forces. Disinformation has a malicious intent.2

While news stories like the one about the infected birds may seem ridiculous, especially to Western audiences, repeating such narratives to vulnerable audiences erodes global trust in the United States. For the United States to succeed in the information domain, it must recognize that disinformation is central to Russian strategy and address it proactively. This article begins by reviewing disinformation’s central role in Russian strategy from the Cold War to the Russia-Ukraine War. It then examines the steps the United States has taken to counter Russian disinformation and recommends ways the US defense community can meet the challenge Russia poses in the information domain.

The Russian Approach to Disinformation
Not to be confused with Western debates surrounding the term, Russian doctrine embraces hybrid warfare, which it defines as “a strategic-level effort to shape the governance and geostrategic orientation of a target state in which all actions, up to and including the use of conventional military forces in regional conflicts, are subordinate to an information campaign.” A 2016 RAND Corporation report described the contemporary Russian approach to information operations as a “firehose of falsehood” due to the number and diversity of communication channels and Russia’s willingness to broadcast partial truths and complete fiction. Contrary to typical communication strategies, Russian information campaigns demonstrate no commitment to consistency among narratives. Instead, they focus on the volume and repetition of many themes, seeking acceptance from familiarity with the message.3

Disinformation has been a pillar of Russian strategy since the Cold War, with significant time and treasure spent on disinformation relative to other forms of espionage. Journalist Mark Hollingsworth devotes a chapter to the KGB’s use of disinformation in his book Agents of Influence: How the KGB Subverted Western Democracies. He cites a former KGB disinformation chief who claimed the KGB spent around 25 percent of its budget on traditional espionage, spending the remainder on “a slow process focusing on what we called ideological subversion or active measures.”4

During the Cold War, the Soviet Union effectively employed disinformation to undermine American legitimacy around the world. In one campaign, the Soviets convinced many that the AIDS epidemic was born in a US lab and released by the FBI to target minority communities. Russia uses disinformation to damage trust in the US government abroad and exploit the American fascination with conspiracy theories, damaging trust regarding the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, the COVID-19 pandemic, election security, and other events. Russia has also repeatedly used disinformation campaigns to legitimize military operations. Its actions in the Republic of Georgia and Moldova’s Transdniestria region exemplify a common theme: protecting ethnic Russians from various questionable threats.5

While Russia broadcasts facts that suit its purposes, it uses disinformation in its efforts to employ reflexive control strategies. Reflexive control theory was born in the Soviet era and is used to convince another actor to make decisions against its own interests. Russia accomplishes this strategy by manipulating the information environment to allow its adversary to perceive that Russia’s desired outcomes are the best choices the adversary can make. Russia often employs this method to mask or obscure the true risks and rewards of an adversary’s courses of action. Since reflexive control is designed to influence decisions, disinformation can temporarily or durably alter perceptions that drive a given decision. Given that facts do not constrain its information campaigns, Russia can manufacture anything necessary to yield desired decision outcomes.6

Russia uses the full spectrum of disinformation tactics to shape the environment to its benefit. Through direct seizure of control or forced shutdowns of outlets that oppose the government’s actions, the Russian government exerts near-total control of media within its borders. Russian outlets such as Sputnik and Russia Today own or influence proxy outlets around the world not explicitly branded as Russian. These outlets range from newspapers to blogs to YouTube news channels. Each repeats pro-Russia talking points, with each medium using its unique style to appeal to specific, targeted audiences. Russian information warriors create false social media personas and think tanks to sow discord among adversaries, as they did before the 2016 US presidential election. These fabricated sources often strike a chord with nonmainstream Western media outlets, which echo the messages to further their agendas and unintentionally promote Russian causes.7

Western audiences are unfamiliar with the media environment inside Russia. The control and coordination across channels are alien to those accustomed to a free press. Iuliia Iashchenko has written about Russian media from Sapienza University of Rome.

The [Russian] state-run national TV has a few very important primetime political shows that serve one purpose: to spread disinformation among Russian citizens to support the main ideological track of state propaganda. The most popular channel is Russia 1, with shows like “Duel” (Vladimir Solovyov), “60 Minutes” (Olga Skabeyeva), “Evening with Vladimir Solovyov” (Vladimir Solovyov), the same ideological content is also prominent on Channel 1, with shows like “Time Will Show” (Artem Sheynin), and many others. Usually, the level of subtlety of the disinformation is much higher for international audiences. Meanwhile, in Russia, in these shows, the creators present pure ideological propaganda without any proof, and with a heavy usage of simple or vulgar speech. These shows never end up in the global feed mostly because they are too open and would ruin the political goals of the Russian government.8

Controlling all information spaces within its borders and having significant influence over other outlets allow Russia to exert an outsized influence over its neighbors. Many former Russian Empire or Soviet Union countries have seen the benefits of turning westward, something Putin’s regime strongly opposes. Russia has used various methods centered on information warfare to prevent this theme from continuing.

Russia Uses Disinformation for Its “Special Military Operation” in Ukraine
Russia’s first salvo in the Ukraine invasion was a disinformation operation. As Russia built up combat power along the border, Russian spokesmen announced it was a large-scale training exercise and insisted that troops and ships would soon return to normal activities. Russian officials kept up this line, objecting more stridently as Western officials pointed out inconsistencies between their statements and activities on the ground. As the world knows, Russia’s statements proved false; nonetheless, its messaging prevented Ukraine and the West from responding to the buildup until Russia launched the assault. This situation is a prime example of reflexive control laden with disinformation. Russia understood its adversaries’ decision processes and self-image and realized it could lie long enough to freeze their willingness to move beyond words, allowing it to seize the operational initiative. After all, it would seem unreasonable for the US European Command or NATO to respond aggressively to a training exercise. Fortunately, that disinformation initiative was insufficient to consolidate the rapid military victory Russia expected. Western intelligence sharing allowed Ukraine to steel itself at the last minute while preparing the world to see through Russia’s narratives regarding the invasion.9

Consistent with the “firehose of falsehood” approach, Russia initially explained its actions through several competing narratives, including reuniting ethnic Russians with the motherland, maneuvering to counter NATO expansion, and fighting to excise the Ukrainian government’s “Nazi” influences. Putin even tried to deny Ukraine’s very existence, claiming, “Ukraine never had a tradition of genuine statehood.” None of these narratives survive scrutiny, and they all represent Russian disinformation to legitimize blatant efforts to expand territory and delegitimize opponents. The last significant NATO expansion occurred in 2004— hardly a credible reason for Russia to panic nearly two decades later.10

In 2004, Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, and former Soviet republics Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania joined NATO. Since then, only six new countries have joined, including Finland and Sweden, which joined only after and because Russia invaded Ukraine. At the other end of the reasonableness spectrum, Russia has signed several agreements affirming Ukrainian sovereignty, which undercuts Putin’s statements about its right to exist and his fanciful claims that Ukraine was never a legitimate state. Still, NATO has repeatedly had to debunk claims that the Alliance is trying to threaten and encircle Russia, lest other countries take these assertions at face value.11

Russia has used disinformation to attack the global coalition aligned in support of Ukraine by undermining that support within those countries and sowing disunity among them. One independent analysis of Russian messaging determined that French, German, Polish, and Turkish audiences were heavily targeted through at least five specific themes, which aligned with those shown in an alleged Russian document published by Ukrainian intelligence services. The themes addressing the costs of Ukrainian aid and dealing with refugees could be dismissed as competing narratives. Still, one theme listed in the document is clearly disinformation:

Update information about neo-Nazis in Europe, make a comparison with Ukraine in order to show the European community how Nazism is born and ask why they ban Nazis in their countries, but support them in Ukraine? For these purposes, it is advisable to use BBC documentaries about neo-Nazis and Nazis.

This analysis lists dozens of information operations tied to official and proxy Russian sources that do everything from claiming imminent NATO aggression against Russia to discrediting Western media. Weaponizing the US military’s credibility, it was likely Russia behind a 2023 leak of US military documents modified to make Russian casualty numbers look better than the original documents represented.12

Although many Russian disinformation narratives may seem unlikely or even ridiculous to Western countries and allies, they may seem more plausible to audiences in countries already predisposed to dislike and distrust the West. The disinformation about bio-weaponized birds was not aimed at the West and is unlikely to affect public opinion. It is among hundreds of Russian-origin fake news designed to cause distrust of Russian adversaries. When water falls on a rock, erosion occurs one drop at a time. It is impossible to notice changes at first, but the rock is completely reshaped over time. Similarly, in spaces where the West is less likely to detect and contest its narratives, Russia employs disinformation like the bird story more aggressively. Where these narratives take root, American combatant commanders will likely find more resistance to their actions in their respective regions.

Russian support has propped up the Alexander Lukashenko regime in Belarus to control messaging and the electoral process. Lukashenko expresses his appreciation for these efforts by making Belarus a vassal state to serve Russian interests. Russian military forces have occupied portions of the Republic of Georgia for several years to buffer the Russian border and have sufficiently managed the information surrounding the operation to prevent worldwide outrage. In 2014, Russia used a combination of special operations forces and information operations to manipulate a referendum, forcing Ukrainian citizens from Crimea to give Russia control of the strategically important peninsula in the Black Sea. Having effectively seized Crimea, Russia did not need a referendum to hold power there. Nonetheless, the façade of legitimacy represented an information operation targeting those who may have considered intervening to eject Russia by force or other means. Before and after the 2022 Ukraine invasion, Russia undertook similar operations within the Ukrainian Donbas and Luhansk regions along the border with Russia.13

Given Russia’s potency, observers may expect a certain amount of “cognitive dissonance” within the population should Ukraine recover control of these places. The liberation of Russian-held territory is, therefore, more than a kinetic concern. Winning the fight will be insufficient. Russia understands the population must be convinced to be liberated, as demonstrated in its approach to Crimea, Donbas, Luhansk, and Transdniestria. Russia’s ability to wield information to achieve its strategic goals poses challenges for regional governance. Both inside and outside Russia, information manipulation challenges many vital aspects of governance, including transparency, accountability, inclusion, public participation, and the rule of law.14

Does Disinformation Work?
It may be that the American national security establishment has failed to focus on the disinformation problem because its effects are unquantifiable. Despite ample examples of Russian actions, cause and effect in the information environment is not always clear. Disinformation does not exist in a vacuum; it is one variable in the information environment that influences and is influenced by culture, previous events, bias and opinion, misinformation, and the observed truth. The same channels that deliver disinformation deliver all these factors, resulting in great difficulty associating a singular cause and effect. Most disinformation campaigns are not designed to yield precise results but to create chaos, doubt, mistrust, and confusion. Clearly, Russia places great emphasis on shaping the environment in this manner. With the past as a prologue, Russia will conduct information operations using disinformation in concert with more conventional power in future military operations, as it has attempted in Ukraine, with mixed results.

One way to assess effectiveness is to see whether disinformation enters public discourse. For many years, Russia claimed biological research facilities in Ukraine were centers for biological weapons production. In 2022, a viral Twitter (now X) hashtag led to a US Senate hearing. These claims were subsequently repeated on Tucker Carlson’s popular show on Fox News, using selectively clipped testimonies to bolster those claims. The following day, Russian state television cited Carlson’s program. Following an explosion that damaged a gas pipeline in the Baltic Sea, Russian officials quickly lashed out at the United States, publicly accusing it of sabotage. Carlson also picked up that story, again bolstering Russia’s sensationalized version. Carlson had tremendous reach as the host of America’s most popular infotainment program. His Kremlin-friendly approach led to Putin’s first Western interview since the Russia-Ukraine War began, despite multiple previous requests from other journalists worldwide. Carlson’s programming offers a stark example of Russian disinformation creeping into American mainstream media, but there are also more subtle ones.15

Recent analysis revealed the Russian promotion of anti-immigration themes in the United States to weaken support for Ukraine assistance funding. These efforts are evident in Sputnik and Russia Today broadcasts, on X (formerly Twitter), and other Russian-affiliated social media sites. Russian efforts in the Western Hemisphere are not limited to the United States. A recently declassified US intelligence product demonstrated how Russia deliberately fed stories and talking points to media outlets across Latin America, a charge Russia quickly denied. To borrow the BBC’s term, each example represents a form of information laundering. Although challenging to quantify, Russian disinformation efforts seem to be sowing a measure of chaos and distrust in the United States at home and abroad. The Joint Force plays a role in resolving this problem.16

Anything against the approved narrative is conveniently branded as Russian disinformation. Save us Joint Force. We aren't smart enough to see through the masturbation meme from 2016 and the like. He was too dismissive of the birds into Russia plan outlined above. Everywhere is RUSSIAN DISINFORMATION conveniently disguised as mere disagreement with the preferred narrative. Heeeeeellllllp!!!!!

by the way, here is the fact sheet put out by the DOD regarding the labs it helps through the BTRP: https://media.defense.gov/2022/Mar/11/2 ... KRAINE.PDF

It seems the DOD has invested $200,000,000.00 in 46 labs since 2005. However, they say it's peaceful and only has good intentions for good, not unlike those evil Russians that are always doing evil and lying all the time. Nothing to see there. Whew!

This is just so simpleton in logic that it seems easy to see why the corporate media and the government isn't trusted and why Harris lost. Maybe they think the population is more addicted to meth or fentanyl than is really happening? Perhaps maybe just stop with the everything that disagrees with the presumed superior narrative is automatically disinformation and how about we discuss and debate the issues?

Just please think about not rebooting russiagate. That was so ridiculous. But from the above, you are itching to do so. If Putin says clean water is a good thing, if safe food is a good thing, and Trump agrees, the Trump as Putin stooge is just too irresistible. At least Biden authorized missile attacks into Russia. Perhaps now we can have the real war you and your neocon buddies dream of every night. Maybe then the military can, reluctantly of course, exert its influence to finally squash, once and for all, that nasty, evil disagreement that the population seems to have more and more with the most excellent smart narrative, for democracy.

[canpakes]

Perhaps now we can have the real war you and your neocon buddies dream of every night.

Good Doctor, I’m pretty sure that ‘real war’ began on February 24, 2022.

Putin remembers that date well. He chose it.

[Dr Exiled]

Perhaps now we can have the real war you and your neocon buddies dream of every night.

Good Doctor, I’m pretty sure that ‘real war’ began on February 24, 2022.

Putin remembers that date well. He chose it.

I mean the US entering as a direct participant and not just in the background funding it.

[canpakes]

Good Doctor, I’m pretty sure that ‘real war’ began on February 24, 2022.

Putin remembers that date well. He chose it.

I mean the US entering as a direct participant and not just in the background funding it.

No worries there. The Biden Administration is leaving town shortly and the Trump Administration won’t lift a finger against anything Putin would do in Ukraine or elsewhere.

Trump would sooner stack cash onto pallets and ship them off to Moscow to compensate Putin for the claimed damage to Russian military assets caused by any Biden-era assistance.

[Moksha]

ABSTRACT: Russia will dominate information warfare if the United States does not treat disinformation as central to Russian strategy.

Yes, but... Russian disinformation is a friend to MAGA.