Let me say right away that propaganda has been applied very skillfully by Russia as one of its effective tools, or more precisely, weapons, in the past year as we have become familiar with what hybrid warfare means. I have been worried or rather alarmed by it from the beginning and I have found it even more worrisome and alarming because so few in the West found it worrisome and alarming – at least for a long time. Too long for my comfort. We live in grave times and are, clearly, witnessing a historic shift in the geopolitical situation and European security.
A Presentation at the International Forum on Challenges and Responsibilities in Comteporary Journalism , Vilnius March 10th, 2015
Let me say right away that propaganda has been applied very skillfully by Russia as one of its effective tools, or more precisely, weapons, in the past year as we have become familiar with what hybrid warfare means. I have been worried or rather alarmed by it from the beginning and I have found it even more worrisome and alarming because so few in the West found it worrisome and alarming – at least for a long time. Too long for my comfort. We live in grave times and are, clearly, witnessing a historic shift in the geopolitical situation and European security.
Too bad, that so many of the political leaders in the West have been asleep behind the wheel. They got a wake up call exactly one year ago. But the problem is that they did not really wake up. A recent report from the House of Lords about Ukraine has stated that many Western leaders sleepwalked into this crisis. Some of them are still sleepwalkers.
“We lie when it’s convenient”
Propaganda is lying, and as it happens, this is just something that Russians are very familiar with and have cultivated for centuries as an art form under the name vranyo.
The late, Russian-American professor of history, Vadim Medish, who for 30 years taught Russian history and literature at American University in Washington DC, studied “vranyo” and how the Russians themselves look upon it and practice their gross brand of lying. So his take on Russian lying was: “We lie out of necessity. We lie when it’s convenient. And we lie just to keep in shape.”
I am by no means saying that all Russians are liars, but I think it's safe to say that most Russians are familiar with the concept of vranyo. A discipline they know as a cross between sports and the arts. The Potiomkin villages is just one of the incarnations of vranyo – one of the older and more harmless ones – with a centuries old history. There are tons of other examples from more recent times, of course.
Let’s not forget that Russian leaders are not just serial liars, but serial invaders, too. Vladimir Putin and his generation of Russian leaders have grown up with the understanding and experience that Russia has the right to invade other countries when it serves Moscow’s interests. It’s legitimate and not a violation of international law. Just a quick look at history will show the Soviet invasion of the Baltic states in 1940, and then after the end of WW II: the invasion of Eastern Germany in 1953, Hungary in 1956, Czechoslovakia 1968, Afghanistan 1979, Georgia 2008, and Ukraine 2014.
To paraphrase a famous dictum, propaganda is war with other means. Let's not make it more complicated than it is. Propaganda is really not difficult to identify or define. It's like with pornography – you know it when you see it. If you are still in doubt, let me show you an example of propaganda:
Well, this is the straight forward kind of vintage propaganda with a modern narrative style and a high tech twist. Forget about Agitprop which looks like a kindergarten picnic compared to “Ya, russkiy occupant”.
War against the truth
Propaganda of this kind is perverted storytelling. It’s verbal violence, abuse and molestation. It’s war – war against the truth. It has nothing in common with the kind of journalism we want to practice and be associated with. But you know what? It works. Both within the borders of a country like Russia and outside, in the near abroad and in the more distant abroad. That’s why Moscow is investing so heavily in this brand of journalism like “Russia Today” on all its platforms from print and TV to on-line. In the past few years, RT-TV is turning up all over the world in hotels private homes as part of cable TV packages.
Some people wonder why Moscow spends so much money on something that virtually no one is watching. You can call it spam, not the kind you eat, but the kind that proliferates on the Internet and in our mailboxes. This is what most of us delete without even looking at it. But I suspect that Russian propagandists follow the Woody Allen doctrine: “Eighty percent of success is showing up.” So just showing up on TV screens all over the world, is considered a success by RT and its masters. They don’t care about ratings, but if just a tiny fraction of viewers watch RT and an even smaller fraction picks up some of the messages it’s enough for the Kremlin spammers.
All possible versions – in the past year
In the past year, after Crimea and Donbass, we have seen all possible versions of the vranyo variety from Putin’s denying of any Russian soldiers in Crimea, and some months later yes, of course, there were Russian soldiers in Crimea to ensure law and order during the referendum, to horror stories like the crucifixion of a baby in Slavyansk, to the rhetorical variety of Dmitry (the impostor) Kiselyov talking about Russia as the only power that can turn the U.S. into a radioactive ash heap.
Make no mistakes, Vladimir Putin focused on the media and propaganda from the very beginning. He had hardly taken over as president in May 2000 before he focused on two areas – gaining control over the oligarchs and the media. It was a simultaneous, parallel process. And he knew exactly what he was doing – the objective was full control over media, primarily electronic media. Clearly, it’s one of his unabated successes.
Propaganda requires two premises to achieve success – power and funding. Propaganda thrives in authoritarian societies, the more power in the hands of a few men, the better. Putin and his men have been able to provide both, generously – power as the oxygen of propaganda and money as its fuel. That’s the formula of successful propaganda.
A picture from Russian propaganda video clip “I'm a Russian Occupant”
How to deal with propaganda?
Now the organizers of our conference have asked us how to overcome propaganda without becoming a propagandist and how to maintain professional integrity when you are up against propaganda.
Well, I can only say that truth is the best antidote. The masters of propaganda fear light and truth like the devil fears the cross. The best antidote is truth as a serum – applied instantly and massively to counter the spreading of the propaganda poison. Ideally, it should be used prophylactically before damage has been done. This means that we should be proactive instead of reactive. We should use all available means and venues to get the truth out both to our own audiences and to people in Russia and Ukraine and elsewhere the traditional way in print, on radio and TV, but first of all on the Internet with the use of social media and all the other tools that technology provides us with.
It goes without saying that truth is not an absolute term, but when I talk about truth here, what I have in mind is the kind of journalism that we teach the young generations of journalists. It’s the journalism that follows the highest standards of the profession and abides by the basic rules of fairness, balance, ethics and multiple sources by presenting more than just one side of an issue. It lets opposing views be presented in the story with the reporter, the editors and fact checkers doing the utmost to get the facts right. In other words, this is about the kind of reporting and writing when the journalist plays the classic role of the critical public watchdog. He or she is neither an attack dog nor a lap dog.
Let me wrap up by saying that I think that the Baltic states have a special role to play. Not just because they are front line states and have more to fear than most, but also because they have the first hand experience and the historical memory that sets them apart from other Europeans. They know and they understand, and I find it extremely important that they take the lead in spreading the word and telling the truth. Not as propagandists. But with the help of honest, un-compromising, uncorrupt journalists who do not engage in propaganda, but in genuine journalism of the old school. You can call it knowledge sharing on a massive scale. It sounds simple. It’s not. It will require a lot of work, commitment and resources. And funding.
Explicit from the book of Samuel Rachlin, , "I, PUTIN The Russian Spring and the Russian World":
Crimea got wrapped up in a web of lies and deception, and it was so obvious that when you saw it with Western eyes, it was hard to believe that any political leader would think that he could get away with something like this without being found out, and becoming the target of ridicule and derision. But it did not affect Putin whatsoever when he unflinchingly told Russian journalists that there were no Russian soldiers in Crimea. This created a very strange situation – Putin, of course, knew that it was a lie, the journalists and the Russian public knew it was a lie, we, in the West, knew it was a lie, and Putin and his associates knew that we knew it was a lie. But it did not matter because it’s part of the game, which is quite difficult for foreigners to comprehend completely.
Vladimir Putin. Reuters/Scanpix photo
For Putin and most Russians it is easy and natural to view lying as a kind of magic trick or a sports discipline, and the one who masters the art of lying achieves almost a hero status. This a well-known and well-documented phenomenon with the name “vranyo”, which means an extreme or perverted kind of lying. There is a straight line from “vranyo” to the “Potemkin villages” which since the days of Catherine the Great have signified the attempts to embellish reality and cover-up decay and misery so that it looks like prosperity and beauty – at least, from a certain distance.
While lying is not regarded as a virtue in our Western culture, it is seen differently by Russians who know the rules of the game and see “vranyo” as a ritual for the initiated. Not all Russians are liars, but most understand the game and know what Russian lying is about. They experience a certain defiant pleasure and a sense of community from “vranyo” without the slightest hint of condemnation or remorse: “We don’t talk about it, but everybody knows and everybody understands it.” The late, Russian-American professor of history, Vadim Medish, who for 30 years taught Russian history and literature at American University in Washington DC, studied “vranyo” and how the Russians themselves looked upon their gross brand of lying: “We lie out of necessity. We lie when it’s convenient. And we lie just to keep in shape.”
Paradoxically, the Russians’ support of Putin co-exists side by side with their ingrained cynicism towards the state. Just like the state has never trusted its people, the people have never had any real trust in their government in that token division between state and people that has always been a part of Russia’s political culture. The concept “soft power” does not exist and is not being applied in Russia. For years, Russia has tried to copy the kind of soft power that is such a natural part of the West’s political universe, but so far, the Russian government has not succeeded in making it work in a Russian context.
