In the current state of the term ‘propaganda’ it is a fair assessment to state that ‘propaganda’ in colloquial terms is general framed as something intrinsically tied to patriotism/nationhood? — I like sushi

Propaganda promotes a political view or a movement, and not all of those are nationalist or patriotic, so the term commonly also refers to the art, slogans, and rhetoric of revolutionary internationalist movements. The Russian Revolution and early Soviet Union, for example, are famous for their propaganda posters, many of which were specifically aimed against nationalism. If most propaganda is tied to nationalism, it's because most political movements have been and still are tied to nationalism.

Here is some propaganda:


Consolidate the dictatorship of the proletariat and the international unity of the proletariat!


Pioneer makes friends with children from all the world's countries


We are for friendship and peace! Our ardent greeting is flying around the world! We stand for friendship and peace!


Lenin in our hearts

Regarding the poster above, today we'd be tempted to question why the blond white guy is at the front [EDIT: now that I look again, he looks quite central Asian, so the following point might be less relevant]. This indicates that there's a patriotic element to some of these posters, that ethnic Russians were the target audience and that they were being encouraged to be proud of leading the cause of internationalism. And some of the others could be seen as claiming the world for communism as against the capitalist West, and you might see that as nationalist in some sense.

Ah, appeasement. I did take objection to that, yes, because it seemed to be part of the simplistic and hysterical likening of Putin to Hitler that I’d been seeing in the media. That was back in the good old days when I didn’t think Russia would invade, so what do I know?

People like jamalrob became offended when we brought this up earlier in the thread. What were they thinking? — frank

Not me, as far as I recall.

IMHO, I believe Putin and those that support him in Russia would be more than happy to reintegrate any and all former Warsaw Pact (that are currently on less then friendly terms with Russia) back into the "loving" arms of mother Russia and for all of them and Russia to create a USSR 2.0. — dclements

The Warsaw Pact was an alliance between the USSR (aka the Soviet Union) and several countries that were never in the Soviet Union, even if they were expected to submit to its wishes. Do you mean the former Soviet republics (Ukraine, Georgia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia) or are you actually saying that Putin wants to somehow integrate the Warsaw Pact countries (Albania, Bulgaria, Czechia, Slovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and the eastern part of Germany) into a single country along with Russia and presumably all the former Soviet republics as well?

They were talking about a bombing in Moscow as if it was the only one. In fact, there were a total of four apartment bombings in ten days, two of them in Moscow. But the incidents that are thought to provide the strongest evidence for the conspiracy theory were the bombings that didn't happen. You can read more about them in the Wiki article and elsewhere. Yet somehow Thomas and Aimen appear to be completely unaware of any of this context. — SophistiCat

Yeah, I noticed that. Maybe they'd forgotten.

Otherwise, it's just an hour about geopolitics so it's inevitable it'll be somewhat superficial and make things look like "a game between Russia and the big Western powers". This is how some of the participants see it anyway, and that's significant.

This is why the act of trying to prevent as much of your own biases and fallacies as possible when arguing is the only way to speak as truthfully as possible for a human being. — Christoffer

So I guess if we're to look for a reason why your own posts are such garbage, we have to look at something aside from bias?

We must confront Russian propaganda – even when it comes from those we respect

I don't always agree with George Monbiot but I think he's right here. Pilger really is just a tankie these days, soft on anything that positions itself against the US.

Among the worst disseminators of Kremlin propaganda in the UK are people with whom I have, in the past, shared platforms and made alliances. The grim truth is that, for years, a segment of the “anti-imperialist” left has been recycling and amplifying Putin’s falsehoods. This segment is by no means representative: many other leftists have staunchly and consistently denounced Russian imperialism, just as they rightly denounce the imperialism of the US and UK. But it is, I think, an important one.

Yeah I've seen that before. I think they're Chechen sufis.

Good luck.

I want to offer my services to write an algorithm to prevent morons from posting — SkyLeach

I'm interested.

Stay on-topic please, or just come out with a point, if you have one.

Russia were simply not a threat at the time of NATO expansion. They were crippled and crumbling further. — Isaac

I think this is right. I just saw a tension between that and the following:

You're saying Putin's a threat, I'm saying yes, and if we knew this all along why the hell did we treat him as if he wasn't. — Isaac

You're saying Putin's a threat, I'm saying yes, and if we knew this all along why the hell did we treat him as if he wasn't. — Isaac

The purpose of the NATO expansion was surely always about the Russian threat, no?

At least Grozny seems reasonably stable (at the moment), as far as I know anyway. — jorndoe

Since the war, Russia has put a lot of money into Chechnya to re-develop it (Grozny, at least) and to enrich the local elite, thus buying the support of the Sufis (and their brutal leader Kadyrov, who earlier fought against Russia) and neutralizing the Salafist-led jihad, all to ensure Russian hegemony and stability in the North Caucasus.

Now, Grozny is a gleaming city with gigantic new mosques, and Chechen warriors are fighting for Russia in Ukraine and Syria.

The latest episode in the Conflicted podcast is very interesting on the history and geopolitical background.

Borderline Post-Soviet Disorder

Incidentally @ssu, in previous episodes Aimen Dean dismisses the inside job conspiracy theory about the Russian apartment bombings, and he's a person who knows a lot about the North Caucasian jihad.

Talking of the French, Putin's friend Gerard Depardieu, who has been a Russian citizen for a few years, has just declared his opposition to the war: https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2022/03/01/french-actor-depardieu-objects-to-fratricidal-war-a76686

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Yep, was mainly just making the point that those numbers apply to the Soviet Union as a whole, that very large numbers of them were not Russian.

Lenin and Stalin killed 20 million Russians — frank

I think you mean Soviet citizens, many of whom died in the famine in Ukraine. I don’t think there’s a consensus on whether that was genocide.

Well, I thought that comment of Isaac's was fair, and not unprovoked, but what do I know?

Clear and succinct summary, thanks. — Amity

You're very welcome. It should also be understood that the conditions for the possibility of such naked military aggression were to an important degree the responsibility of the West. Ensuring peaceful relations and partnerships with Russia in its recovery after 1991 was the most important task for the big powers at the time. It was possible, but they failed, and continued to fail in the same way as the decades went by, despite the many voices warning them they were taking the world in a dangerous direction. See Street's post above.

And if you really are implying that @Christoffer is not "playing out Top Gun fantasies", I think you need to look again at his posts.

The Denazificatiom claim of Putin is valid. The Azov battalion is a neo-nazi right wing militia and an actual unit of the Ukrainian national guard. In the eastern Ukraine, the neo nazi battalion was deployed without reservation to quell pro Russian sympathizers and by "quell", l mean torturing separatist, killing children, forcing people to speak Ukrainian and spreading Russophobia. — Eskander

None of that makes the denazification claim valid, because those neo-Nazis are not representative of the people, of the elected government, or even of the military, and yet it is the people, the government, and the country as a whole that is being attacked. The claim is a pretext for aggressive domination, with a view to extending Russia's hegemony in the region, in competition with the EU and NATO. The idea (perhaps not held by you but nonetheless widespread among defenders of the Russian state's line) that the invasion is humanitarian or moral is naive. Those are never the motivations for Russian military action. What the Russian rulers care about is power in the region and on the world stage, and they use force to establish it. They're old-fashioned that way.

Good stuff, thanks.

I see. Cool plan!

The best scenario would be to remove him, let's say eliminate him and the oligarchs. Then seize their money to a fund for rebuilding both Ukraine and changing Russia's political landscape. Next step would be to remove state propaganda sources, shut down media with state ties and give the void to independent media outlets to become official. Then, seize all nuclear weapons to remove the risks of rogue nukes. Then, initiate a republic leader, a president that has support from a large portion of the people of Russia. So far, that would be freeing Navalny and install him as the president. This is a temporary solution in order to build-up a proper democratic function. This is always a problem in nations that didn't have ideas of freedom and democracy within the population, but a large portion of Russia's people want to have a proper democracy, Navalny wouldn't have the support he had if there wasn't an underlying will to have this kind of state. Over the course of a few years, the development will be monitored by the world in order to push down anyone who sees the void after Putin as an invite to do the same — Christoffer

Who do you see carrying out this magnificent plan?

Agreed

Thanks for clarifying. I’ll leave it to others to further hound you if they feel (possibly rightly) that you haven’t sufficiently corrected yourself, or repented.

I take it you’re here just to cheer on one side in the war?* I suppose part of the point I was making before is that the demands for condemnation are nothing but demands for people to declare allegiance in a battle of good guys against bad guys. It’s an extension of the war into the forum and it’s completely pointless.

See, now you’ve got me angry, by agreeing with me no less.

* EDIT: actually I now see that I’ve attacked you unfairly here, because the post I was responding to was Isaac’s reply to you.

Pointing out there are Neo-Nazi elements is "disgusting" — Isaac

The problem is that you appeared to be labelling all the Ukrainians resisting Russian attack as neo-Nazis, which is stupid and offensive, even if you were just trying to redress the balance.

in Tajikistan there were both a US military base and a Russian military base. Did he bully the Central Asian states because they had contacts with the US military? No. Russia waited and worked behind the scenes. — ssu

I expect that was all to do with Afghanistan and probably not very comparable.

I often face it with Russian stuff. I have to show I'm passionately anti-Putin before people pay attention to anything I'm saying. It's so stupid. They can't get past it. Not everyone, but certainly several, and I don't get it. Who am I that I need to show how I feel about things? I'm nobody. My opinion is not going to change the world and nothing hinges on what position I take. I don't have a responsibility to fly a flag for anyone, only (on this forum) to try and work out what is happening and why it happened.

Can someone enlighten me? Why the demand for condemnation? Are we here to discuss or just to show we're on the right side?

I'm much closer to the people affected than most members of the forum. I personally know Ukrainian people here in Russia who are worried about their children in Ukraine. My wife has many Ukrainian friends in Kiev who are sending her messages and videos, frightened people who are leaving the city to get away from the conflict.

I don't usually mention these things here, because they have nothing to do with why the invasion happened, don't shed any light on the position of the Russian government, don't reveal what divisions there might be among people in power in Russia and thus how the regime might change, and so on.

Do people need me to tell them that war is bad, that invading other countries is bad?

That's where I'm coming from.

Anyway here's a recent Russian meme:



Tolstoy, Special Operation and Peace.

I have to confirm that I'm supporting the narratives you assume I'm supporting? What kind of twisted rhetorical obligation is that? Why don't you simply read what I've written and respond to that? Why insert additional beliefs and then require me to disabuse you of them on pain of being assumed to then hold them?

I don't hold with this modern fetish for wearing one's heart on one's sleeve. If I have to preface every paragraph with "bombing innocent people is bad", or else be thought a monster then we're not going have a very productive conversation.

Likewise if all my comments are going to be skim read just to see which of the two available camps I fall into and then responded to with a series of stock phrases assigned to that group, then there's little point in me being here, the exercise becomes a piece of theatre, not a discussion. — Isaac

:100:

To all: don't forget to flag low quality posts and discussions, or let us know about problem members by private message (PM).

If Comrade Putin wishes to reconstruct the Soviet Union — Bitter Crank

He wants to reconstruct the pre-Soviet Russian Empire. He sees the Russian Revolution as an interruption of that project.

Many in Russia likely believed the lie, promoted here also, that all this war-talk was just all US hype — ssu

Not many now, I suspect. Putin supporters tend to be quietists who seek stability. I don't see how they could reconcile this invasion with a concern for stability.

Russian Celebrities, Public Figures Speak Out Against Ukraine War

(The Moscow Times is an independent Moscow-based English language newspaper that's often highly critical of the regime)

Following are some quotes from a couple of the original documents mentioned in the above article (Google translated):

From 150+ scientists:

An open letter from Russian scientists and science journalists against the war with Ukraine

We, Russian scientists and scientific journalists, declare a strong protest against the hostilities launched by the armed forces of our country on the territory of Ukraine. This fatal step leads to huge human losses and undermines the foundations of the established system of international security. The responsibility for unleashing a new war in Europe lies entirely with Russia. There is no rational justification for this war. Attempts to use the situation in Donbass as a pretext for launching a military operation do not inspire any confidence. It is clear that Ukraine does not pose a threat to the security of our country. The war against her is unfair and frankly senseless.

Ukraine has been and remains a country close to us. Many of us have relatives, friends and scientific colleagues living in Ukraine. Our fathers, grandfathers and great-grandfathers fought together against Nazism. Unleashing a war for the sake of the geopolitical ambitions of the leadership of the Russian Federation, driven by dubious historiosophical fantasies, is a cynical betrayal of their memory.

We respect Ukrainian statehood, which rests on really working democratic institutions. We treat the European choice of our neighbors with understanding. We are convinced that all problems in relations between our countries can be resolved peacefully. Having unleashed the war, Russia doomed itself to international isolation, to the position of a pariah country. This means that we, scientists, will no longer be able to do our job normally: after all, conducting scientific research is unthinkable without full cooperation with colleagues from other countries.

The isolation of Russia from the world means further cultural and technological degradation of our country in the complete absence of positive prospects. War with Ukraine is a step to nowhere. It is bitter for us to realize that our country, which made a decisive contribution to the victory over Nazism, has now become the instigator of a new war on the European continent. We demand an immediate halt to all military operations directed against Ukraine. We demand respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Ukrainian state. We demand peace for our countries.

Let's do science, not war!

https://trv-science.ru/2022/02/we-are-against-war/

And from 150 local authority deputies in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Samara, etc:

Against the war

Fellow citizens! We, the deputies elected by the people, unreservedly condemn the attack of the Russian army on Ukraine. This is an unparalleled atrocity for which there is and cannot be justification.

The decision to attack was made personally by Russian President Vladimir Putin. We are convinced that the citizens of Russia did not give him such a mandate.

War with Ukraine will lead to catastrophic consequences. Thousands of people will die, be injured and maimed, cities dear to many Russians will be destroyed. Our country is waiting for the condemnation of the world community, isolation, rising prices and poverty. Hopes for a good life in Russia are crumbling before our eyes.

We urge you not to participate in the aggression and not to approve of it. Please don't be silent: only massive popular condemnation can stop the war.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1RQwoxg7tkjM-4BhuSLftyUaPfSDPd8ONECnMtFhqkgo/

Maybe a letter from some relatively powerless local authority members from around the corner in the neighborhood doesn't count for much (I'm not sure), but it's something.

There's also this statement from Russian journalists, published via Meduza, which is Russian but based in Latvia:

https://meduza.io/news/2022/02/24/eta-avantyura-prineset-gore-v-semi-tysyach-lyudey-rossiyskie-nezavisimye-smi-vystupili-protiv-voyny-s-ukrainoy

It looks like they have something related to "Soviet empire nostalgia" — javi2541997

More like Russian Empire nostalgia, I think.

No more from me tonight.

I don't understand why you would cut them slack here. Why is Russia's interests more important to you than Ukraine's — frank

Baden has responded himself, but I thought I'd say something about this. Can you, just for a few seconds, imagine that his comment is not showing more concern for Russia's interests than for Ukraine's, and that it does not represent cutting Russia any slack? I mean, actually try and make that work in your mind. Then you might get the point. I'm not being snarky; I'm just trying to show that falling back merely on anti-Putin rhetoric and moralizing is a hindrance to clear thinking, as well as pointless and harmful.

It seems to me that Baden's comments are concerned with how to ensure peace, whereas your own approach, especially your talk of "appeasement", is--to put it as politely as I can--very much not.

Just to be clear, nobody here is cheering on Russia, I don't think, and nobody here believes there is genocide against the Russian population, as Putin claims, or that this is Putin's reason for sending in the tanks.

Being critical of the West and opposed to American interference around the world doesn't make one a tankie.

I quite like the below thread by Sam Greene over at King's, which makes alot of sense to me, and certainly more than the cartoon character caricature painted by some here — StreetlightX

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