Islam Times - Assessing the Russian counter propaganda efforts (Saker rant)

In 2016 I wrote an analysis I called “Counter-propaganda, Russian style” and, about a year later, another one I called “Re-Visiting Russian Counter-Propaganda Methods“. I ask you to please read them first, especially if you plan to post a comment!

What I tried to show in these articles that, in total contrast from acting like the bad old Soviet propaganda, the modern Russian counter-propaganda does the exact opposite of what most people in the West believe it does: far from suppressing western propaganda, the Kremlin tries its very best to make sure that as many Russians as possible become aware of what the West is saying about them, their country and their values. The Kremlin even PAYS anti-Russian pundits to go on Russian national TV!!!

Why? Simply, because considering the nature of what the western media outlets, and even entire specialized entities, write and say about Russia, the best thing the Kremlin can do is to make darn sure that everybody in Russia becomes aware of it.

During the Cold War, the Soviets had a strict censorship system, entire segments of literature was banned, you could not take certain books across the border and radios like RFE/RL, the BBC or DW were jammed.

Now the OPPOSITE is happening. Some anti-Russian talking heads on, say, DW declares that Putin eats babies for breakfast, and that is immediately aired on the main TV channels, with subtitles! Then it is discussed at length, with the “poor” Russian liberals trying to justify it. It is often quite hilarious to watch.

Another favorite topic on Russian TV are western threats against Russia, or the “master talks to his slave” tone of US Presidents: “we did Napoleon and Hitler and now the Muricans want to talk to us “from a position of strength, even after Kabul!!!” :-)

By the way, this is something the leaders of the West cannot admit, hence their continuous efforts to pay for these propaganda outlets to spew their nonsense and pretend like the Russians are living in an informational vacuum and that “Gulags” are full of freedom loving dissidents :-)

This will never happen, of course, but I believe that if, say, the US Congress decided to defund these propaganda outlets, the Russians would be glad to pay for the costs as what these outlets produce is a dream come true for Putin and the Kremlin!

But, alas, all of the above pertains only to Russian counter-propaganda efforts INSIDE Russia!
Alas, the picture for outside counter-propaganda is much less encouraging…
First, the two big ones RT, both as a TV station and a website, and Sputnik. Initially, I was rather enthusiastic about this alternative to the Cold War crap regurgitated on a daily basis by the western media. And, initially, it worked pretty well. Some shows were outright very good, and certainly good enough to get the western PTB quite hysterical, hence all the (freedom of speech crushing) measures taken by western “democracies” to, if not silence them, then make their work as hard as possible.

A simple conclusion would be “if the leaders of the AngloZionist Empire were so upset about RT and or Sputnik, then the latter must be doing a fantastic job”. Alas, the reality is more complex.

I got a lot of emails from readers asking me about my view of RT and Sputnik and, so far, I did not publicly comment about this. Now I feel that the time has come.

Frankly, I think that RT and Sputnik have tried to appeal to the worst and cheapest base instincts of the folks in the West to increase their audience. The RT website is the worst of them all. Here are just two recent examples:

I have an entire collection of examples of such truly disgusting stuff but I will spare you, and myself, any more these sights. Besides, those who read the RT website regularly already know what I am talking about.

This really begs the question of who their target audience is? I mean, seriously, the kind of folks who enjoy photos of butts and lingerie fights (plenty of such folks here in Florida, especially during “Bike Week”) will never turn into RT or Sputnik in the first place. May the target audience is sexually insecure teenagers? But, frankly, these teenagers won’t go to RT for that, there are other, “better” choices for them out there anyway.

As for those who would turn to RT for the right reasons (getting alternative infos and views) are going to be either bored or disgusted or both by such ridiculous “articles” (I am being kind here…). By the way, the audience which would turn to RT for the right reasons would include plenty of Orthodox Christian and Muslims which makes me wonder: is RT deliberately trying to offend or alienate them?

The shows on RT TV are better, but most of them are boring, just the same folks rehashing the same old same old without any originality. But compared to the very high quality of reporting and debating on the internal Russian TV, most of the shows on RT TV are boring.
As for Sputnik, I can share this about it: in the past, they interviewed me on several occasions. But then, I had to tell them that I would refuse to be interviewed by them. Can you guess why? For two reasons: they would not allow me to mention the 9/11 false flag or to use the term “AngloZionist”. Not even with the usual disclaimer about “the views expressed herein are not etc.”. Need I say more?
The truth is this: I rarely bother with either RT or Sputnik anymore, they bore me and, frankly, make me feel ashamed of a lot of their content.
But it is not just RT or Sputnik, there is much, MUCH worse.
Recently, the Kremlin did something really smart: they (FINALLY!) realized that need to move away from YouTube and released the website Smotrim and a Smotrim Android app (dunno about iStuff, I stay away from Apple/Mac products). Basically, you can think of Smotrim (which means “we watch”) as Russian TV on a website or app. Two problems with that otherwise very very good idea: