Pekka Kallioniemi Profile picture
Apr 26 18 tweets 9 min read Twitter logo Read on Twitter
In today's #vatniksoup, I'll discuss Russian online information operations, and how they are perceived around the world. In the West, we often perceive this propaganda only targeted at us, which is far from the truth.

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As I've written previously, the idea of Russian information operations date back to days of KGB, and it is part of the, aktivnye meropriyatiya, or active measures. Active measures includes activities like espionage, propaganda, sabotage and assassination, and it is ...

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...and was part of Russia's foreign policy. Another related term related to info ops is hybrid warfare, which is a theory of military strategy that blends conventional warfare with irregular warfare, cyberwarfare and warfare in the information space.

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It is worth noting that information operations are most often long-term operations, with goals far ahead in the future. KGB defector Yuri Bezmenov stated that most operations have a time span of around 25 years.



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The general, simplified model for info ops is as follows: first, you sow fears ("Ukrainians are killing Russians"). Then you fuel mistrust ("You can't trust the mainstream media, they're CIA/MI6/deep state/etc controlled"), ...

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...and finally you offer salvation ("here's an interesting blog/group that tells you the TRUTH").

The war waged in information space is just as important as the conventional war in the battlefield - when combined with other measures, effective online info ops can heavily..

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...affect people's opinions. For example, pro-Russian propagandists often refer to the Russo-Ukrainian War as a "waste of money". They can also refer to the high levels of corruption in Ukraine, which is mostly a legacy and tradition from the Soviet times, or refer to...

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...its leadership ("the Kyiv regime") as being greedy and corrupt group of warmongers.

One of the best-known propagandists of the modern era, Joseph Goebbels, laid out various principles on successful propaganda, and these principles are still utilized today.

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One of his principles was "Pick out one special 'enemy' for special vilification." In the case of Ukraine, this enemy is the "Kyiv regime" and their armed forces that is "infiltrated by neo-Nazis" that are a threat to both Ukrainians and the Russians.

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Another one of Goebbels' principles was "Avoid abstract ideas - appeal to the emotions" - bioweapons labs, "neo-Nazis", NATO proxy war, genocide of Russian population in Ukraine... all these are tangible, simple ideas that can easily be reinforced with propaganda.

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This reinforcing is done in line with another of Goebbels' principles, "constantly repeat just a few ideas". When we look at the Russian propaganda model in regards to Ukraine, we can see that Goebbels' last two principles are applied, too: the first one is "give only ...

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...one side of the argument", and "continuously criticize your opponents".

The most successful case of hybrid warfare were the Russian interference of 2016 US presidential election and the Brexit referendum. These operations was started almost a decade before the ...

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...actual events, and they contained operations such as hack-and-leak, mass spreading of online disinformation and propaganda, funding of (opposing) NGO's, and undermining of the authorities, journalists and official institutions.
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All online operations were naturally supported with heavy use of troll farms and social media manipulation through organizations like Yevgeny Prigozhin's Internet Research Agency.
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But now that we know all this, we can counter it, right? Yes and no. The Kremlin propagandists have realized long time ago that the West has become more resilient against their BS, and so they've focused on new areas such as the Global South.
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For example, RT is one of the most popular sources for the Russo-Ukrainian War in Latin America. RT recently made partnership with Cameroonian TV channel, Afrique Média. An animation where Wagner soldier defeats "French zombie invaders" goes viral on African social media.
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In Mali you can listen to news on Sputnik Afrique every night. The leaked US intelligence documents revealed that Russia is planning a propaganda campaign to "realign" public opinion in Africa towards Russia & so far almost nobody in the West has paid any attention to this.
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More from @P_Kallioniemi

Apr 28
Congratulations to Gennady on being the first Finnish to have their own private military company!

Ping: @IlvesToomas @puckfutler

Here's my thread on Timchenko:

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Next I'll talk about the distress of the Finnish pro-Kremlin scene. The whole gang is suffering of a serious election hangover - the results were devastating and not-so-suprisingly none of them were elected. The Grand Old Vatnik, @johanbek has mostly been joking around,...

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...@HuuhtanenPanu has his full focus on the class action lawsuit against me and probably the whole of NATO, and the Kremlin-paid @janus_putkonen had most of his money stolen by his long-time associate, Jonathan Widell.

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Read 12 tweets
Apr 28
In today's #vatniksoup and in the first edition of "Where are they now?",I'll do an update on some of your favorite vatniks around the world, and report on what they've been up to.

If there's someone or something you'd like to hear more about, let me know in the comments👇

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Let's start with everyone's favorite former naval officer, Sarah "Donbass Devushka" Bils. She recently gave an interview to RT, where she doubled down on her previous statements, stating that "truth is our most potent weapon".

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That's a weird statement coming from a person who faked to be a "poor woman from Lugansk", Latvian, Gazan, and so on.

Now, what's even funnier, that on 24 Mar 2022, she faked that her father was in Mariupol (thank you NAFO investigators!).

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Read 6 tweets
Apr 27
Banks started his work career at the insurance market, eventually becoming a relatively successful businessman. According to The Guardian, Banks had set up 37 different companies with slight variations of his name.

4/20
Three of them had the same date of birth but listed different companies. When asked about this, Arron's spokesperson declared that he'd prefer to "correct [the Guardian’s] mistakes in court".

One of Banks' companies, Eldon Insurance, increased its profits by almost...

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...17 million £ for the first half of 2017. He claimed that this profit increase was due to the same AI technology that they used in the Brexit campaign. Banks is also involved in mining in South Africa and has connections to companies based in Gibraltar and the Isle of Man.
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Read 19 tweets
Apr 25
In today's #vatniksoup, I'll introduce an American political consultant and lobbyist, Roger Stone (@RogerJStoneJr). He's best-known for his work as an advisor to Donald Trump & for his alleged connections with Julian Assange and the GRU in relation to the leaked DNC e-mails.
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Stone has been involved US politics for a long time, and he'd started his dirty tricks already in 1972, when he contributed money to Nixon's rival under the name of Trotskyist youth group, and tipped about this to the local news.

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In 1977, he won the presidency of the Young Republicans with Paul Manafort as his campaign manager. In 1980, Stone and Manafort launched a lobbying company, BMS, together with partner Charlie Black. The company represented basically anyone with money, including Zaire's...

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Read 21 tweets
Apr 24
In today's #vatniksoup, I'll introduce a Russo-Ukrainian businessman and politician, Oleg Tsaryov (@OlegTsarov). He's best-known for acting as a pro-Russian separatist officer in Donetsk, Ukraine, and revealing Yanukovych's plan to become the dictator of Ukraine.

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Oleg was born in 1970 in Dnipropetrovsk (now Dnipro) in the Ukrainian SSR of the Soviet Union. He became an MP in the Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada in 2002, later joining Viktor Yanukovych's Party of Regions. He was re-elected again in 2006, in 2007, and in 2012.

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When the 2013-2014 Revolution of Dignity got in full swing, Tsaryov was one of the most fervent supporters of using violent against the protestors, whom he called "terrorists, bandits and extremists."

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Read 20 tweets
Apr 21
In today's #vatniksoup, I'll introduce a German-Finnish entrepreneur, conspiracy theorist and propagandist, Kim Dotcom. He's best-known for his illegal online activities and projects, for his hate towards the US, and for his unwavering support for Putin's imperialism.

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During the 90s, Kim rose to notoriety in Germany for various hacking activities. In 1998 he was convicted on several charges of computer fraud and data espionage and received a 2-year suspended sentence. In 2003, he was arrested in Thailand and was deported to Germany,...

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...where Kim pleaded guilty to embezzlement and was sentenced to jail, only to flee to Hong Kong to avoid going to prison. He was eventually granted a citizenship in New Zealand through their "investor plus" system, after he'd invested over 10 million USD in the country.

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Read 20 tweets

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