In today's #vatniksoup, I'll introduce a US& German political cultists, Lyndon LaRouche and Helga Zepp-LaRouche. They're best-known for running the far-right, cult-like LaRouche movement, and for promoting conspiracy theories as well as pro-Kremlin and pro-CCP narratives.
1/22
Most of the ideas of Helga come from her late husband, Lyndon LaRouche. Initially, LaRouche movement was inspired by Trotskyist/Marxist ideas, opposing private ownership and such, but in the late 1970s these ideas were abandoned. As often happens with radical, cult-like...
2/22
...movements, Lyndon started promoting the Leninist idea of the intellectuals (including himself, of course) being the "vanguard" that helps the working class to develop their consciousness as their leading role in the society.
3/22
LaRouche movement claims that the world has been under the rule of British Empire for the last 600 years, and this epoch is now ending and we are moving towards a "multipolar world".
At some point during the 70s the movement started flirting with the far-right, and the...
4/22
...long-time critics Chip Berlet and Matthew N. Lyons wrote that the "LaRouchites combined populist antielitism with attacks on leftists, environmentalists, feminists, gay men and lesbians, and organized labor. They advocated a dictatorship in which a 'humanist' elite...
5/22
...would rule on behalf of industrial capitalists." They've also been described as staunch anti-Semites.
Lyndon ran for US president in every presidential election between 1976-2004. From 1989 until 1994, Lyndon spent behind bars for tax and mail fraud, and he ran one of..
6/22
...his presidential campaign from prison. So basically, the LaRouche cult is a horseshoe-shaped amalgamate of the far-left and far-right, combined with futurism like the high-speed maglev train that'll "re-invigorate industry and commerce", fusion power and the...
7/22
..."Verdi tuning", in which A=432 Hz, as opposed to the common practice today of tuning to A=440 Hz in classical music. According to Lyndon, this had a direct relation to the structure of the universe. I know, it's weird cultist stuff.
8/22
Lyndon's wife, Helga, established the Schiller Institute in 1984. The organization fights against "international financial institutions and other supranational bodies (without naming any)" and against their "tyranny".
9/22
The main idea behind the institute is to "unite left and right" to "fight a common enemy", and this rhetoric has been copied by other pro-Kremlin propaganda outlets, too. In 2003, Schiller came under scrutiny after one of their "students" died in a freak accident.
10/22
After Russia launched its full-scale invasion in Ukraine, Schiller Institute argued that the sanctions against Russia should be relieved, and that all other countries should stop their support for Ukraine. They also stated that Ukraine should accede to all Russian demands.
11/22
Few days after Russia's attack,she appeared on Chinese CGTN,where he touted that Russia is simply reacting to endless provocations by NATO & the West.She's also given interviews to TASS,in which she praises the "Global South" for their efforts to end the "US/UK imperialism".12/22
Schillerites are very active bunch, and they hold regular conferences around the world. They've hosted many prominent speakers, including Jeremy Corbyn in 2015. Trump's former campaign adviser Roger Stone has also been cooperating with the institute.
13/22
The group has other front organizations too, which are used to spread its core message. These include Executive Intelligence Review (EIR), LaRouchePAC, ICLC, LaRouche Youth Movement, and Fusion Energy Foundation.
14/22
After the war started, Zepp-LaRouche was interviewed by Mira Terada from the Prigozhin-ran sham organization called Foundation to Battle Injustice (FBI!). In this extremely biased propaganda show they discussed the "end of the Anglo-American hegemony", spread conspiracy...
15/22
..theories and lies, and of course defame Ukraine and praise Russia. Terada, whose real name is Oksana Vovk, was sentenced to 30 months in prison in 2020 for money laundering in the US, and was later transformed into a propaganda weapon by Yevgeni Prigozhin.
16/22
In 2015, Zepp-LaRouhe wrote an article which described climate change as a "satanic swindle" attempting to establish "a global eco-dictatorship whose results, and whose declared intention is to eliminate six billion human beings."
17/22
She claimed that there's a plan to create "a fascist world government which would exceed Hitler’s most audacious dreams". Lyndon LaRouche has also claimed that the 9/11 was orchestrated by Queen Elizabeth II together with the Saudis.
18/22
In 2018, the LaRouche posse have advocated a theory that it was actually the UK that interfered with 2016 US election, not Russia. They also have good relations with many prominent Russian politicians, including Sergey Glazyev, who was funding the pro-Russia...
19/22
...movement in Ukraine since 2014, and some of its former members including William Engdahl, have migrated to Duginist circles. In Feb 2023, she was one of the unannounced speakers at the "antiwar" event Rage Against the War Machine. Schiller Institute was also sponsoring..
20/22
...the event, like it did with the UK event No2Nato. Especially the former event was the embodiment of the horseshoe theory, with people attending from the far corners of the left and right, including Jimmy Dore, Jackson "Z" Hinkle, The Oathkeepers and Caleb Maupin.
21/22
To conclude, LaRouche is a cult-like organization that tries to promote pro-Kremlin and pro-CCP worldviews around the world. A large part of the "multipolar world" narrative comes from this lot, and especially Helga has been staunch supporter of Russia.
In today’s Vatnik Soup, I’ll introduce an American radio host and propagandist, Scott Horton (@scotthortonshow). He’s best known for blaming Russia’s genocidal war against Ukraine on the US, and for publishing a 700-page book full of Kremlin propaganda.
1/23
Most of you probably remember Scotty from this recent episode of Piers Morgan Uncensored, in which he was schooled for his revisionist propaganda by Ukrainian volunteer and activist Anastasiya Paraskevova (@UkrainianAna).
2/23
Let’s start with the obvious - Scott Horton is a hardcore Kremlin apologist who sees nothing wrong with what Putin does, but strongly condemns anything that Ukrainians do to defend themselves. For Horton,the enemy is the US and all of its allies. The way this works is that…
3/23
In today’s #vatniksoup, I’ll discuss the sad (but funny) state of Finnish vatniks. After Russia launched their full-scale invasion against Ukraine, the Finnish pro-Kremlin/conspiracy theorist scene experienced a dramatic devaluation and hasn’t been able to bounce back since.
1/20
I often get asked about the current state of the Finnish vatnik club, and there’s usually not much to report.
It’s not because these people have stopped, but because today their work has only comedic value.
So here’s the latest:
2/20
Master vatnik and traitor Johan Bäckman has relocated to Russia, and he was recently given a Russian citizenship. It’s obvious that Johan was recruited by Russia’s intelligence agencies a long time ago. He’s still producing videos on YouTube on his…
In today’s #vatniksoup, I’ll introduce a Romanian politician and conspiracy theorist, Călin Georgescu (@calin_georgescu). He’s best-known for his pro-Kremlin and conspiratorial views, running for president of Romania, and doing it by only campaigning on TikTok.
1/25
Georgescu has a doctorate in pedology (a branch of soil science), and held various positions in Romania’s environment ministry during the 90s.
Between 1999-2012, he was a representative for Romania on the national committee of the United Nations Environment Program.
2/25
He was proposed as Romania’s prime minister in 2011, 2012 and 2016 by Romanian far-right parties, but he rose to international infamy in 2024, when he ran for president of Romania independently and obtained the most votes (22,95%) out of all candidates in the first round.
In today’s #vatniksoup, I’ll introduce a Canadian journalist and alleged Soviet/Russian spy, David Pugliese (@davidpugliese). He’s best-known for his articles about “Ukrainian Nazis”, and for allegedly being a spy for both the Soviet Union and later Russia.
1/21
Several months ago I was anonymously sent a pile of documents from the mid-80s originating from the KGB archives in Kyiv. These documents outlined a KGB recruitment into “Stuart”, or David Pugliese who “works in foreign mass media” and who is…
2/21
..“studied with the perspective of possible operative use”. Another document described “Stuart’s” contact “Ivan”, who allegedly became his handler.Some have speculated that “Ivan” is Fred Weir, a correspondent of the Christian Science Monitor.He’s lived in Moscow since 1986.
3/21
In today’s #vatniksoup, I’ll introduce an American far-right social media personality, Nicholas J. Fuentes (@NickJFuentes). He’s best-known for his white supremacist, misogynistic and antisemitic rhetoric, and for being the poster boy for the so-called incel movement.
1/17
Like so many from the white supremacist movement, Fuentes dropped out of university after his freshman year. He studied introductory international relations, which apparently made him a geopolitics expert. Nick was introduced to the white supremacist movement at an…
2/17
..early age - he took part in the infamous Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville,Virginia. In 2017, Fuentes launched his political talk show “America First”. Initially the show was aired on Trump-aligned Right Side Broadcasting Network, but it was dropped after the rally.
3/17
In today’s #vatniksoup, I’ll discuss foreign malign influence operations during the 2024 US elections. As in 2016 and 2020, these recent elections were also a target of massive disinformation and hacking campaigns originating mostly from Russia and Iran.
1/17
First of all, my opinion is that these influence operations alone didn’t affect the elections so much, that they actually made a difference.
Unlike in 2016, Trump’s win over Harris was clear and these short-term campaigns didn’t really change that much this time.
2/17
Yet, many of these online campaigns attacked both Harris and Walz on various social media platforms. Especially Walz became a big target after his nomination, and many Russian efforts attempted to defame him.