Lies and propaganda have become the leading tool for implementing Russia’s plans to take over Ukraine. And its intensity and the leading theses that the occupiers “throw” into our information space are intended to sow confusion among Ukrainians, break our will to resist, and quarrel with our allies.
The junta – that is, the gang of security forces that seized power in the Russian Federation – has been using this instrument of war against Ukraine since the beginning of independence, and since 2022, the wave of lies has become incredibly intense. According to the research center of the Military Institute of Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, as of the beginning of summer, Russian propaganda forces have introduced almost fifty “fresh” thematic areas into the information field aimed at overcoming Ukrainian resistance to armed aggression.
The main efforts of Kremlin propaganda are directed against the force that has become the biggest obstacle to Heredia’s plans to seize Ukraine and destroy the Ukrainian nation – the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Therefore, the Kremlin’s information attacks are focused on creating obstacles to military and technical assistance to Ukraine from the United States and NATO, especially in the process of supplying heavy weapons to Ukraine. Various bubbles of nonsense are being created, ranging from Ukrainians’ dissatisfaction with what they have received to European politicians’ hesitation to provide real help.
Among the The main Russian myths and fakes about the Armed Forces of Ukraine are as follows:
Myth. 1 “Crimes” of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
The Kremlin continues to shape the media image of the Ukrainian military as Nazis and terrorist fighters who are fighting their own people. Absolutely false stories are invented and fake videos are edited about the “crimes” of Ukrainians, the “genocide of Russian speakers” and other nonsense. The quintessence of these fakes was the lie about the “crucified boy,” which was refuted by journalists back in 2014.
Instead, the videos from the cities liberated by our military show something completely different: local residents meet their liberators with tears of joy. And the public will soon learn how Russian media outlets are posting ads for temporary work as extras to travel to the Russian-occupied Donbas, where they are promised $30 for telling lies about the Ukrainian army. In particular, a vacancy for an actor to act as an extra in the previously occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk regions was posted in St. Petersburg. This explains what the “eyewitness accounts” of the “atrocities of the Ukrainian fascists” actually look like – they are just ordinary scripted performances.
Myth 2. Biological weapons
Russia’s lies about biological weapons in Ukraine, as well as new fakes about the “dirty bomb,” have become one of the means of discrediting Ukraine in the eyes of the international community. After all, despite Russian fakes about Ukraine’s development of weapons of mass destruction, the Russians who invaded Ukraine have not yet turned into radioactive ash or died of disease.
All such accusations by the Russian Federation are lies generated by Russian propaganda. Only the Kremlin’s henchmen with their sick imaginations can invent stories about “birds spraying bioagents” that are designed for the most uneducated and zealous segments of the population.
In the end, RF three times(11.03, 18.03, 13.05) received an official response from the UN High Representative for Disarmament Affairs that the UN is not aware about any biological weapons programs in Ukraine.
Myth 3. “Nato mercenaries” are fighting against Russians in Ukraine
The Kremlin is spreading the lie that 100-500 billion American special forces and Polish mercenaries are fighting against the Russians in Ukraine only to explain its own defeats and failures of the war in Ukraine to its deceived population. After promising to take Kyiv in three days, the Kremlin junta does not know how to justify its defeats in Ukraine, so it is inventing “insurmountable circumstances” in the form of NATO super-special forces.
After all, the mere fact that Pskov paratroopers and Kadyrov’s tiktokers are being crushed in Ukraine by mobilized Ukrposhta employees and IT workers can drive all Russians who fantasized about themselves as the “lost army of peace” into a deep existential depression.
Myth 4. “Western weapons are not will help Ukraine, stealing and then, for God’s sake, stop pumping Ukraine with arugula!”
The myth is intended for the Western consumer and aims to dissuade the West from supporting Ukraine, which is deadly for the Russians. Even useful idiots from among Western politicians were involved in the information campaign, and they began to spread the lie that Western weapons from Ukraine could, theoretically, end up in Syria or Mexico.
The absurdity of these accusations is shattered by elementary geographical facts. After all, under the Russian blockade of the Black Sea, it is impossible to export goods, let alone weapons, from Ukraine. And the entire movement of goods can only go through NATO countries. Therefore, the Russian fake that the Ukrainian military is selling weapons to Syrian militants is simply absurd.
A variation of this myth is the fiction that allegedly military supplies to Ukraine will repeat the fate of Western aid to the Afghan army, when all Western weapons fell into the hands of the Taliban.
In practice, however, there is no evidence that Western weapons have been exported from Ukraine, but there is plenty of evidence that the Ukrainian Armed Forces have successfully destroyed Russian military equipment with Western weapons.
A more dangerous fake is the false, intimidating thesis aimed at the Western audience that “countries that provide military assistance to Ukraine are themselves becoming weaker and will have less military equipment.” With such statements, the Kremlin is trying to at least slow down the supply of weapons to the Ukrainian Armed Forces, which have become a terrible death for them.
In fact, the West will not become weaker, because by supplying weapons to Ukraine, it will help to overcome the Russian threat, which was preparing to attack NATO states in the near future, threatening to bomb Poland and the Baltic states. And the Western industry can produce enough high-quality weapons.
Myth 5. Russia spreads fake about “huge losses of the Armed Forces”
The official reports of the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Moldova on Ukraine’s losses in the war have already surpassed the combat capabilities of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in their statistics.
Losing its own combat capability in the battles on the territory of Ukraine, the Kremlin is creating a fake reality of the total defeat of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, which in the media world are not fighting against the Russian aggressor, but are launching missile attacks on their cities and civilians, while Russians are destroying armed “Nazis” in the uniforms of the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
As part of this myth, Russian propagandists invented an information and psychological operation, spreading a fake “document” signed by the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, containing information about the huge losses of the Ukrainian army, which was written with a lot of mistakes, Russianisms and incorrectly indicated areas of competence.
In fact, such fakes are being spread to demoralize Ukrainians. Instead, it is the Russian occupiers who should be worried about losses, as the number of people killed has already reached 70,000. And these young Russian soldiers died for the ambitions of a sick 70-year-old dwarf who wanted to create an empire.
6. Myth “Nazis, fascists”
The lies about fictional fascism or Nazi ideas in Ukraine not only have nothing to do with reality, but also seem to be a mirror effect on the Russian propagandists themselves. After all, most of the classical political science features of fascism and Nazism are found not in Ukraine, but in Russia, namely:
- The cult of the dictatorial leader;
- Imperial desire to seize the territories of other countries;
- The idea of the superiority of one’s own nation and culture over other nations;
- The suppression of civil rights and freedoms and the dominance of propaganda.
That is, the real fascism of the twenty-first century has become the state ideology in the Russian Federation.
In Ukraine, on the other hand, propaganda of fascism and Nazism is prohibited by the Law of Ukraine “On the Condemnation of Communist and National Socialist (Nazi) Totalitarian Regimes in Ukraine and the Prohibition of Propaganda of Their Symbols” of April 9, 2015.
Similar to Goebbels’ propaganda, the Russian state system of lies tries to capture the attention of citizens with its scale and absurdity, distort reality, and present white as black and vice versa. Kremlin propagandists use lies to push Russians to commit crimes and use lies to hide and justify their atrocities. And the best weapon against the Kremlin’s lies is the truth and the victories of the Armed Forces.
Author: Valerii Maidaniuk, Ph. h D., expert of the Foundation for the Promotion of Democracy
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