Trolling Us Daily. The War Russia Is Winning
Much as I wish to write about more pleasant topics, like anime and philosophy, things are happening around us that cannot be ignored. So then, let us talk again about a very much distasteful topic: the doings of Russia. It is no secret by now that the most recent Russian invasion of Ukraine has been a huge failure. The second largest military in the world has been constantly humiliated. As the joke goes:
“Two Jewish guys from Odesa meet up. One asks the other: ‘So what’s the situation? What are people saying?'”
“And he goes, ‘What are people saying? They are saying it’s a war.'”
“What kind of war?”
“Russia is fighting NATO.”
“Are you serious?”
“Yes, yes! Russia is fighting NATO.”
“So how’s it going?”
“Well, 70,000 Russian soldiers are dead. The missile stockpile has almost been depleted. A lot of equipment is damaged, blown up.”
“And what about NATO?”
“What about NATO? NATO hasn’t even arrived yet.”
Source for the joke: president of Ukraine.
There is, however, one front where Russia performs much better, and that is hybrid warfare, especially in the virtual sphere. Here Russia pushes conflicting narratives, promotes extremist politicians together with many other varied attacks, in order to confuse and scare neighbouring NATO countries and convince them that resisting Russian aggression is a waste of time. Let us take a look at some examples of this behaviour:
Influencing elections has been quite a successful strategy. Notable examples include Brexit and Trump’s first victory. A more recent event is the coordinated and heavy promotion of the Romanian far-right presidential candidate, conspiracy theorist and a Putin cosplayer. According to recent declassified documents, his political campaign was run by a vast network of bots on social media (especially Tik Tok) and dubious websites (conspiracy theory groups, naturist medicine websites, religious forums). This latest campaign was very similar to the one that Russia used before invading Ukraine in 2022.
Now, it does not mean that the countries targeted become pro-Russian overnight, but it does mean that we in Europe and the US start fighting between each other instead of resisting the Russian aggression together. Also, a large number of our citizens become desensitised to the reality of the war Russia brought to Ukraine!
The Border Migrant Crisis. Since 2021, tens of thousands of migrants or refugees from the Middle East were amassed at the borders between Belarus and Russia in a hybrid war. Belarusian forces pushed the people to cross the borders illegally; some died in the process, but also 3 Polish soldiers and a Lithuanian one lost their lives. Just imagine if NATO did something like this! Russia would likely start a war. Yet NATO has been surprisingly polite and level-headed about this matter, trying as much as possible not to escalate the situation.
What would you do if Lukashenko started to flood your country with ‘drugs and migrants?’ How I wish he’d flood our countries only with potatoes, but alas, he is not.
The Culture War. It is by now clear that many of the far-right online voices fighting on the culture war front had connections to Russia. This is not only about the Jordan Peterson type of people, who have putinist discourse, travelled to Russia, spread Russian propaganda but for whom we do not have clear evidence of getting paid for it. Many ‘content creators’ were exposed to have received money from Russia (people like Tim Pool, Dave Rubin and Benny Johnson). What does this mean for us? It is yet another reason to doubt the far-right as a good political alternative.
Putin’s propaganda is like King Midas, just that everything it touches turns to sh*t.
In a report titled Denying Russia’s Only Strategy for Success by the Institute for the Study of War, the West is compared to ‘’a giant that – at times – behaves like a mouse when it comes to Russia. All it needs to do is stand up. That is why Russia needs to develop offsets and ways to fight asymmetrically.’’ And there are very good reasons for us to stand up: Ukraine losing will be a global catastrophe, as it will promote nuclear arming and likely incite other dictators to start wars, not to mention it will give Russia incentives to attack further west.
Russia is trying to control the narrative, where Peace=Surrender and Resisting Russian Aggression = Escalation. What can NATO and the EU do? Simply supporting Ukraine, as we have more than enough proof that the Ukrainian people are perfectly able to defend themselves if they have the means to do that. Here putinists will say that we should not give weapons to Ukraine, but let us remember that after independence, Ukraine agreed to give away nuclear weapons for the promise of peace and border integrity. Russia broke that promise, but the world must not fail Ukraine: they chose to give away nuclear weapons in 1994; it is our time now to show that we can support them.
Another strategy may simply be for NATO not to escalate, so as to deny Russia the excuse of fighting a larger enemy, as their propaganda constantly repeats. Putin already claims to be at war with NATO, but as the joke goes ‘NATO hasn’t even arrived yet.’ As Russia pokes more and more through hybrid warfare, election interference, propaganda campaigns, etc. Time will show if this strategy is successful. Until then, I hope Romania stays strong after the next presidential elections and that the Eurosceptic, homeopathy enthusiast and Putin cosplayer candidate does not win the second round.
PS: Just to be clear, I do not want anyone to think that my texts are somehow against peaceful Russian people. I fully realise that many of them are also struggling to survive under a regime that treats them as cattle, fit for work and war but not rights. My texts are against the current Russian regime and military, which, besides bringing war and instability to the world, also promote far-right politicians with a very bad sense of humour. The Russian culture and government can be a force for good in the world, yet they are not. It is up to them to make the first step and stop the violence; it is up to us to call out injustice and crime whenever we see that happening.
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