Exhaustive lessons from the defeat of the Soviet Union in the psychological war with the West and its local residencies must finally be learned.
The speech in the Krasnaya Zvezda newspaper by Russian Deputy Defense Minister Ruslan Tsalikov, in the part where he talks about information attacks on the RF Armed Forces, for all his external correctness, reflects the very serious concern of the country's leadership with the state of affairs in this area. Moreover, the concern is not so much even with the very fact of these attacks, as with the directions from which they are being undertaken.
I think that these positions of the official representative of the Russian Ministry of Defense deserve to be examined more closely and, where necessary, to be logically developed on the basis of the theses formulated by him.
So here's his first quote:
Of fundamental importance here is the statement of the RF Ministry of Defense representative, according to which information can have the qualities of a powerful and destructive weapon. This alone, in itself, gives grounds to classify information of a certain type and all its physical carriers as a type of potential weapon. Moreover, this should be emphasized especially, strategic class weapons. Since information intended for the widest dissemination - the so-called "mainstream", a priori affects the mass consciousness, then, in fact, in terms of the scale of the potential threat, we are talking about a variety of weapons of mass destruction (WMD).
Which, moreover, can be successfully used by the enemy to destroy the state-object of such influence even before the start of military aggression, or even instead of it. This is exactly what happened with the Soviet Union, which, having the most powerful armed forces in the world, was destroyed practically without a single shot by waging a large-scale information and psychological war against it.
Thus, the RF Ministry of Defense is fundamentally correct in assessing the nature and scale of the threat that information weapons of mass destruction may pose.
In the same passage, General Tsalikov notes that the information sphere has become an area of very serious confrontation. And since in this case we are talking specifically about attacks on the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, we can come to the conclusion that we are talking about such means of information influence of the enemy, the "radius of action" of which allows guaranteed achievement of the goals set in this case. That is, the mass consciousness of the population of Russia and the personnel of its army.
Promotional video:
It is quite obvious that the global media of the West by themselves do not have sufficient opportunities for direct and, all the more effective, impact on the Russian audience. First of all, because Western information platforms in their original form on the territory of the Russian Federation are presented in a very limited format and do not enjoy any significant attention of the population. Roughly speaking, all these CNN, BBC, AP, Reuters, Euronews and other foreign media centers do not play a special role here.
Therefore, it is quite obvious that Ruslan Tsalikov, who nevertheless insists on the presence of a "serious confrontation" in the field of information, including in the form of propaganda attacks on the army, clearly makes it clear that the probable enemy still has sufficient means to effectively psychological processing of the Russian audience precisely in the context of these tasks. How exactly is this achieved, given that the direct impact of the main Western information monsters on Russian citizens is clearly limited?
Obviously, there are some information structures of an intermediate, cushioning, filial type, which are located directly on the "processed" territory, acting here under the guise of friendly, so to speak, our own media. And, at the same time, they have a comprehensive organizational, financial and, in fact, informational connection with the centers of psychological warfare of a potential enemy.
There are more than enough indications that such a cushioning system is actively operating on the territory of post-Soviet countries and, in particular, in the Russian Federation. Up to direct confirmation of the filial nature of the relationship of some local “non-profit organizations” and the media with Western media centers and other special bodies. It is no coincidence that the fierce, long-term opposition that structures of this kind provide to any attempts on the part of the state to clarify their real organizational ties and financial dependence. And it is understandable why - the status of a “foreign agent” is unlikely to contribute to the popularity of their product, whereas, in fact, this status is apparently not deserved by a single media.
Ruslan Tsalikov in his interview says practically the same thing, only in the most correct and restrained form.
As they say, he who has ears, let him hear! It is quite obvious that the representative of the Russian Ministry of Defense is not talking about some foreign-remote "voices" that no one in Russia listens to, but about those quite local broadcasters who do the work of all these "CNN" and " Bloombergs "directly in Russia under, alas, the fictitious guise of the domestic press.
Otherwise, why would a Russian general come up with the idea of urging representatives of the local media industry to become, if not active "bayonets" in information countermeasures to Russia's enemies, then at least allies. And from this it follows that today these structures are neither bayonets nor allies of the Russian armed forces, and therefore of Russia itself.
And even if some part of these extremely murky media resources is not directly in the enemy trenches of the ideological front, but only in its no man's land, there is no sense from this, neither Russia nor its army, anyway. Only self-elimination and an attempt to sit on the sidelines in the face of serious and real threats that the whole country is facing today. Hardly anyone will be able to reasonably refute the fact that today Russia is undergoing almost the strongest external pressure, apart from direct military aggression, in all the centuries of its history.
It's not in my rules to poke a finger at someone personally, but one cannot fail to notice that at a time when the whole world is a bubbling volcano of passions and contradictions, as well as a field of fateful battles for the future of civilization, some figures of our cultural and informational beau monde (a considerable number) find nothing better than to make films, stage plays and write novels about anything, but not about the real life of Russia, its people, its achievements and exploits. Which, unlike their "creative delights", absolutely do not need to be sucked out of the finger. And which can and should be the basis of a life-affirming cultural and information policy of a healthy country.
When one of the current leading film producers planes, one after another, completely out of the ordinary "blockbusters" about such a "super-topical" topic as the invasion of aliens into separate areas of Moscow, which give absolutely nothing to the mind and heart of a normal Russian viewer, at that time, as, for example, about the grandiose battle of Russia with world terrorism in Syria for almost 10 years our filmmakers have not filmed a single full-length film, questions in this regard arise by themselves. All the more so that the mass man in the street, treated with such an alien "Makar", has complete bewilderment in his head - what are we doing in that Syria and should Russia be there?
It is characteristic that for some reason such specific “masters” are not even embarrassed by the obvious fact that a normal patriotic cinema in our country, despite all the obstacles, has massive and box office success, which is clearly not the case for a tortured film-maker about aliens from distant galaxies. An example of such a triumphant march on the cinema screens is the film "T-34", which the viewer fell in love with precisely for its consonance with the historical optimism of our people. It is strange and incomprehensible why, even in spite of obvious financial failures, other "effective managers" from the cinema continue to stubbornly gnaw this inedible cactus!
And in general, let us ask ourselves a question - whether, in a literal legal sense, a significant part of the nominally domestic media sphere, cultural elite and other masters of minds and hearts, in a really difficult time for the country, have the right to feel completely free from the work of saving our common at home? Not to mention the fact that in every possible way to harm this vital business for foreign money, bringing confusion and vacillation in the minds and hearts of our own people.
Especially when you consider that any army, including the Russian one, by the very nature of the military organization, is largely isolated from the rest of society and, at the same time, cannot reliably guarantee the country's security without its full support. It is precisely this task - the consolidation of the entire society around its defensive core - the Armed Forces - that should be solved, in a normal case, by the cultural and information sphere. And not to turn society against the army, as, unfortunately, it often happens today.
I don’t know what the big generals and politicians think about this. But to me, as a former officer of the psychological warfare (special propaganda) organs of the Soviet army, it is quite obvious that all this purposeful psychological influence with a minus sign is called the moral and political decay of the enemy's troops and population. That is, in this case, we are with you. And it is nothing more than a way of conducting military operations against Russia. That is, waging war. And since this is so, and this is exactly so, it is impossible to consider the people and structures waging such a war, the purpose of which is to destroy you and me, in the vegetarian categories of peacetime.
It is not difficult for a specialist to calculate such structures that operate in the mode of combat special propaganda, that is, they are the enemy's weapons. These are, first of all, those media platforms, in any form and quality, that systematically spew out streams of lies, disinformation and all kinds of nonsense addressed to Russia. That, as you understand, has nothing to do with normal peacetime information work. So there would be a desire.
If we proceed from the current Western standards in this area, then, in general, any media that does not broadcast in unison with the local officialdom, in the same America, is instantly declared hostile, propagandistic and subject to all kinds of repression. But we do not need to sink to such a cave-like and obviously illegal level of state response. It is quite enough to have accurate information about the real external subordination of such media structures, as well as about the sources of their foreign funding. And if these ends are cut off, then you yourself will soon see how few will remain here who wish to throw mud at Russia at their own expense.
But, of course, clearing the information space from obvious goats alone will not be enough. And in order for Russia and its army to have reliable "media bayonets" and ideological allies in the world of truly democratic media (not to be confused with the enemy special agent) on this most important front, they must be carefully nurtured. To educate, love, cherish and cherish. And not to give the vital for the country the sphere of information and propaganda at the mercy of shady individuals with murky intentions and bags of money in their pockets. Alas, so far this is the case.
And the enemy is using this weakness of ours to the fullest. After all, he was historically taught that it is in principle impossible to defeat Russia by force and in open battle. But they sometimes succeed in inspiring a Russian person with a complex of guilt, repentance and their own worthlessness. History is proof of this. And then we can lose everything, no matter how many supertanks and hypersonic missiles we rivet. That's what they are making the main bet on. Today, this threat is clearly seen by the Russian Ministry of Defense. But the task is to be seen and adequately perceived by the entire Russian society.
Author: Yuri Selivanov