Why Kremlin propagandists now tell Russians they’re at war with the whole West

It is not usual to see criticism of the regime on Russian TV now that the Kremlin has closed its fist on the media. Less usual yet to hear it on political talk shows that are closer to George Orwell’s Two Minutes Hate than Newsnight. Nonetheless, that was what happened last week. But it did not suggest a loosening of control. Rather it suggests that President Putin is recalibrating his narrative and digging in for the long term. According to Putin’s ideology, Ukrainians are proving difficult to conquer because they are actually Russians . . . they just don’t realise it yet.

War is not easy

The criticisms came from Colonel Mikhail Khodaryonok, a retired officer who served a tour in the Russian general staff’s main operational directorate, the division known as the “brains of the army”. He then became a defence columnist, and before the invasion had published an article, “About enthusiastic hawks and hurried cuckoos”, in which he criticised the glib assumptions that a war in Ukraine would be quick or easy.

It is one thing to write a column in a relatively niche defence newspaper, quite another to go on the prime-time TV programme 60 Minutes and call the Ukrainian soldiers “professionals” willing to “fight to the last man”, such that the Russian position “will frankly get worse”. Above all, “we are in full geopolitical isolation”.

60 Minutes fits into a distinctive genre, in which a strident and ultra-hawkish host presides over a shouting match between pundits, most of whom compete to come up with the most alarmist conspiracy theories and bullish nationalist rhetoric. Yet Khodaryonok was listened to largely in respectful silence. Even the host, Olga Skabeyeva, whose on-screen persona could be described as headmistress-meets-dominatrix, made only a few interjections.

New narrative

Shows such as 60 Minutes are carefully stage-managed, and there can have been little doubt as to the kind of commentary Khodaryonok was going to provide. Have even the flagships of state TV propaganda gone rogue? Hardly. Instead, what this reflects is an important shift in how the Kremlin’s political technologists seek to redefine the narrative. In particular, how an apparent variety of perspectives can nonetheless combine to form a picture that suits the Kremlin’s needs.

An apparently different contribution, for example, had come from the former parliamentarian and current think tanker Sergei Markov in the tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda a few days earlier. He too addressed the question of why the Ukrainians were putting up such dogged resistance, but came up with what could charitably be described as an imaginative spin.

 “The Ukrainian army is an amazing and very strong combination of a Russian soldier, a fascist officer and an American general.” In other words, although secretly controlled by Washington and under the thumb of an officer corps that has been “Nazified” such that it is “ideological, motivated, ready to die and to kill”, it owes its backbone to the fact that its ordinary soldiers are, if they but knew it, Russians.

According to Putin’s take on Ukraine, this is not a real country, but a temporarily mislaid part of the wider Russian world. Therefore, Ukrainians are Russians, and it is as true that Russians are winning as that they are not.

Ukraine’s successes are furthermore down to western assistance, from American weapons to British intelligence and virtual brainwashing. Ukrainians have been taught that Russians are “subhumans, orcs and vatniks” — the last, literally meaning “quilted jackets”, being a slur used for poor Russians who unthinkingly swallow patriotic propaganda.

Same destination

Gone are the days of airily pretending all was well. That was necessary before the May 9 Victory Day celebrations, to ensure no unhelpful truths sullied the nationalist festivities. This could never be sustained in the long term, as more men fall in battle, as the economic pressure mounts and as conscripts who fought there come home. Hence the shift to a new line.

A key tactic of Russian propaganda is to create the illusion of pluralism but ensuring that the composite message is the one the Kremlin wants to convey. In the words of a former Russian diplomat, “Everyone can take whatever road they want, so long as they all end up at the same destination.”

Khodaryonok’s heartfelt critique and Markov’s fantasia came from different sides of the argument, but they came to the same destination: the Ukrainians are putting up a tough fight because they are backed by the West, and that this is therefore going to be a long, hard war. Furthermore, it is a war not for territory but to uphold the honour of Russia and against those who would characterise its people as beasts and barbarians.

West is to blame

Russia is portrayed as nobly standing up for what it thinks is right, against the assembled might of a United States bent on global hegemony and its debauched and craven European puppets. This was signalled by Putin in his Victory Day speech, where he sought to compare his “special military operation” with the Great Patriotic War — the defeat of Nazi Germany — and claimed that Russia launched a “pre-emptive attack against aggression” that was being prepared in Ukraine but planned in Washington, because the Russians had the temerity to stand up for their own independence and culture.

This has become the standard line. The real war is against the “collective West”, and the Ukrainians are their brainwashed cannon fodder.

Such a line is useful to the Kremlin in all kinds of ways.

It provides an excuse for the underwhelming performance of the military, and also prepares the ground should Putin decide to admit that this is a war so that he can mobilise at least some reserves.

This is also about trying to frame Russia’s hardships in heroic terms. As one commentator put it, “When we give up foreign cars and foreign holidays, we are doing our bit on the home front, like our grandparents did in the Great Patriotic War.”

More broadly the new line signals that Russians ought to be digging in for a long war. Managing expectations after the initial promises of a quick, easy victory will be crucial, especially as and when conditions get more difficult.

For the next few months, Russia can survive on its reserves, just as many Russian families can use savings to offset prices that are rising partly as a result of the conflict. However, by the autumn these will have been exhausted. Local and gubernatorial elections are due to be held in September. Unemployment is likely to be rising, and winter will loom. Pressure will be intensifying in Russia.

Expelling traitors

Handily the new line also delivers a rationale for Putin’s increasingly authoritarian rule. In a video conference with ministers in March, Putin warned that “the Russian people, will always be able to distinguish the true patriots from the scum and the traitors, and just spit them out like a fly that accidentally flew into their mouths”. He called for a “natural and necessary self-cleansing of society”. In other words, now is the time for all Russians — oligarchs, oil men, technocrats, teachers — to make a choice: are they patriots or are they traitors?

This is a chilling message, reflecting the Kremlin’s growing concern about the potential for dissent and division. The massive outflow since the start of the war of middle-class Russians critical of the regime (or those seeing little future at home) has perversely been welcomed by a regime which is willing to accept this loss of talent as the price for, as one hardliner put it, “draining the abscess of liberal defeatism”.

But there are more than enough disillusioned Russians left — including a growing body of nationalist critics of the regime and unhappy workers who could unleash a wave of labour unrest later this year. That is why the Kremlin is getting ready for a long war at home, too.