After the world discovered mass graves in Bucha, Russian propaganda has become more and more out of touch with reality. RIA Novosti, a pro-state media outlet, rather popular in Russia as it portrays itself as a news aggregator channel, published a manifesto by Timofey Sergeitsev. A political analyst and philosopher (even though it is doubtful he has the right to call himself that after the piece saw the light of day) openly calls for the mass murder of Ukrainians and the destruction of Ukraine as not deserving independence. In his essay, titled “Chto Rossija dolzhna sdelat’ s Ukrainoj” [What Russia has to do with Ukraine], he outlines an outrageous list of “activities” that Russia apparently must do to denazify Ukraine. He opens his piece by calling Ukraine “an enemy of Russia and a tool of the West to destroy Russia”, ignoring a long, rich history that Russia and Ukraine share. What is striking from the very first words is the hatred of Ukraine and Ukrainians that the author is not trying to hide, which is extremely surprising as he worked for Ukrainian politicians in the past, when he believed that Ukrainian votes were worth fighting for.
In his manifesto (I cannot call his piece an article as it has no resemblance of any logical or coherent writing to it), he calls Ukrainian cities such as Kharkiv and Odesa “Russian cities”. He states that most Ukrainians have been “Nazified” without explaining what that means and how it was even possible. In his striking piece, Timofey Sergeitsev laments that Ukrainian civilians cannot “technically” be prosecuted as war criminals; thus, they have to repent their alleged Nazi allegiance by slave labour for at least one generation. For anyone reading this manifesto, such calls must sound insane, but in Russia, it is just another day in the state propaganda land. Indeed, such a level of propaganda is impossible to achieve overnight – Russian people have been learning to adjust to it slowly. Starting with relatively innocent national pride rhetoric (who does not love their motherland after all?), state propaganda moved on to “we can do it again” slogan, instilling the belief that Russia is not only as strong as the USSR back in the day, but it is prepared to prove it with military force. Military education for the youth, military outfits with toy guns attached to them for babies that cannot even walk, and other state-supported pro-military ideological outlets have prepared the Russian public for what is to come.
As we know now, the war did not go according to plan, and Russian forces have not reached Kiyv in 3 days. Interestingly, it is possible to find an article published by RIA Novosti on 26 February 2022 praising Russia’s takeover of Ukraine (nothing is ever truly deleted – see the article here). The article written by Piotr Akopov, an ultra-right nationalist and a self-proclaimed follower of Russia’s right movement (which he admits never happened). He is a recurrent author at RIA Novosti. In his masterpiece of praising what never happened, he argues that the Russian invasion started a new epoch, the one where Russia unites the lands that it “lost” after the collapse of the Soviet Union. He also admires Vladimir Putin’s “historical responsibility” for not leaving “the Ukrainian question” to successive generations. Those of you who have been following Russia’s political adventures for some time might recognise that this rhetoric is similar to how the Kremlin framed the war in Chechnya as “chechenskyi vopros” [the Chechen question]. He also mentions Ukraine as “anti-Russia”, an interesting piece of rhetoric that has not become mainstream in many ways Russian propaganda refers to Ukraine now.
Other parts of Research Journal:
Part 1. Language, Nazification, and the media reporting here