Friday 21 September 2018

"How embarrassment may be Putin's downfall"

Sven Hughes in City AM, three days ago:

When serving as a British army reservist within Psychological Operations, we used to refer to these subtle divisions as “fissures”.

These fault lines in enemy audiences could be exploited to create great chasms between the authoritarians and the minions that sustained their power. Quite simply, the minions love the sense of associated status they get from being in cahoots with the authoritarian – they don’t like to be laughed at.

The RT interview seemed to reveal this exact fissure – Putin’s arrogance is starting to make even his most loyal supporters feel social embarrassment.

This could be the one silver lining for the west from the Salisbury incident. Information warfare only works when you have the broadcasters and re-broadcasters in place to disseminate your message. One break in the chain, such as a pair of agents becoming an international laughing stock, and the whole propaganda machine quickly suffers a complete malfunction.


An interesting but very bold prediction, I thought.

To my surprise, from the BBC today:

... the cover-up seems to have backfired as badly as the actual operation. Instead of quaking with fright, many Russians are laughing at their spies instead.

"It's not just teasing, it's mockery. I have friends who couldn't believe our lot could be so rotten," Gennady Gudkov admits. "Now they call me, and they believe."

With jokes and memes flooding social media, some commentators suggest a line has been crossed.

"What seemed morally unacceptable before has become the new norm, it's routine," Andrei Kolesnikov wrote on Gazeta.ru, calling the Salisbury suspects' appearance a "clown show" and their story "obvious, evasive lies".

But he sees another new norm in response.

"Society is laughing at the authorities," the journalist wrote. "State propaganda is becoming genuinely comic and that discredits and weakens those in power."

10 comments:

Lola said...

Ridicule is THE ultimate weapon we all have when dealing with authoritarians of any stripe. e.g. I had a lovely experience of getting a whole room laughing at the FCA with two of its apparatchiks present. They absolutely hated it.

Graeme said...

It's all hearsay though,isn't it. And the BBC is almost duty bound to post anything that supports the position they have decided to endorse, in this case the UK government. All we can do is see what happens over the next month to Mr Putin. It's not as if the folk are rioting in Moscow as far as I know.

Bayard said...

"Information warfare only works when you have the broadcasters and re-broadcasters in place to disseminate your message. One break in the chain, such as (the official story) becoming an international laughing stock, and the whole propaganda machine quickly suffers a complete malfunction."

Which also applies to the UK government. Here indeed, we have "the broadcasters and re-broadcasters in place to disseminate (the government's) message". We also have a totally ludicrous story that anyone with an an ounce of cynicism thinks is completely preposterous.

Once you assume that Bashirov and Petrov were not agents, but just a couple of gay Russians involved in some shady dealings that the didn't want to elaborate on, but were totally unconnected with the Skripals, then their performance in the interview makes sense. Of course they look crap as secret agents: logic suggests that's maybe because they weren't secret agents.

"What seemed morally unacceptable before has become the new norm, it's routine," Andrei Kolesnikov wrote on Gazeta.ru, calling the Salisbury suspects' appearance a "clown show" and their story "obvious, evasive lies".

I have been following this story for months and their exists a strange dualism amongst commenters and others who write on the subject, which is this: It seems to be taken as a given that if the stories put out by either side are not true in every detail, then that proves that the story put out by the other side must be true in every detail. The idea that both sides are lying seems never to be entertained. So yes, B & P are lying, but that doesn't prove that the UK government aren't lying also when they say B & P are GRU agents.

Edward Spalton said...

I would suggest Googling Craig Murray on this. He is a former career diplomat and was UK ambassador to Uzbekistan. He goes through the account given by Bashirov and Petrov, comparing it with independently corroborated weather and traffic reports in the local and national press which tie in exactly with the suspects' claims that they could not get to Stonehenge because of snow. Craig Murray's diplomatic career ended when he would not shut up about the tortures inflicted by the Uzbek government which the FCO preferred to keep quiet.

His earlier reports on the Skripal case include the terrminological inexactitudes published by Boris Johnson which the FCO had to take down when they were denied by Porton Down.

MikeW said...

'These fault lines in enemy audiences could be exploited to create great chasms between the authoritarians and the minions that sustained their power. Quite simply, the minions love the sense of associated status they get from being in cahoots with the authoritarian – they don’t like to be laughed at.

I assume all that can be said in the current 'propaganda war/ wars' is that Russian 'fault lines, one assumes, have worse fractures than UK ones? https://www.pressgazette.co.uk/survey-finds-that-uk-written-press-is-by-some-way-the-least-trusted-in-europe/

I agree with Bayard. Our media BBC/ ITV/ Sky always models from the 'true' MI5/FO/ 'dossier' position outwards. I am old enough to remember what happened to the BBC when they attempted to report the Falklands War 1982 from a third party perspective, calling one group 'the British' not 'us' 'we' or 'our boys'.

The problem for Putin is not so much that the vaunted Russian intelligence service maybe actually no better than the British and American ones or journalists feeling bad about whoring themselves. In my view (1)the constant shooting down of Russian aircraft by US proxy powers; without any Russian military reply, is his main weakness amongst his nationalist supporters in a 'hot' war. (2)Also consider the detailed discussion of the 'risk' aspects in Western media of the purported Russian plan for springing Julian Assange and then assume Russian intelligence made no such 'risk model' of using toxic agents to murder in the UK. Then the issue would be not be the 'clowns', but that Putin has actually lost control!

Anyway, I assume Sven above, is talking his very old book, and hopes to do the: RUSI, Chatham House, Whitehall, lecture curcuit, and get himself hired as an expert GUV/media advisor along the way. Just selling himself as 'us' or one of the 'chaps' really.

Bayard said...

Here is an explanation slightly more convincing of what B&P were really doing.

Mark Wadsworth said...

L, well done.

G, B, MW, Ed, the whole thing is very murky. So what? On balance, I tend to believe the UK govt on this one, but it's only 60/40 in their favour.

Either way, that is not relevant to the post, which is that people are laughing at Putin, just like the man predicted they would.

B, that link is slow to load and his version is based just as much on conjecture as any other version.

So what if they were filmed 500m from Skripals' house and no nearer? I would assume there are no spy cameras on normal residential streets.

benj said...

I chose to believe B & P are gay. Why else would a couple of strapping Russian men be "sightseeing" in Salisbury?

Of course they cannot come out and say this, so the suspicion continues.

Bayard said...

"Either way, that is not relevant to the post, which is that people are laughing at Putin, just like the man predicted they would."

Well, we only have Andrei Kolesnikov's word for that and he's a Russki, so he must be lying.

"B, that link is slow to load"

Apologies, perhaps I should have cut 'n' pasted.

"and his version is based just as much on conjecture as any other
version."

including that of the UK government. The only thing that links B&P to the Skripals is the "discovery" of "Novichok" in their hotel room, four months after they stayed in it and in quantities so small that, we are supposed to believe, that the swabbing of the room removed every single trace of them. This from the Met, who have never fitted anyone up for any crime, ever.

Physiocrat said...

Ben,

I wondered if those two guys were an item.