Mosquito theory, peace plan cheating and murder allegations: that’s why war propaganda is so dangerous right now

No wonder. War expert Mike Martin of London’s King’s College writes in his new book “How to Fight a War” that confusion with disinformation is an important part of warfare. The goal of any propaganda campaign is to boost the morale of one’s own troops and to intimidate the enemy. The problem with this is that a lot of information transfers from the military to the civilian public, which confuses us all. Who the hell are you supposed to believe?

The problem is exacerbated by the legions of YouTubers and social media activists at the service of the warring factions who like to bite into the information bait thrown out daily by the military commands in Kiev and Moscow.

Three glowing examples show how the propaganda counteroffensive works:

The destruction of the Kachowka Dam is the biggest environmental disaster of this war so far. The Russians claim that the Ukrainians destroyed the dam with precision missiles to cut off the water supply to the Crimean peninsula. In addition claims a Kremlin generalmosquitoes would now spread in the flooded area, which would then be flown by US drones directly to Russian troops, where they would spread diseases such as malaria and West Nile virus.

Humbug, the Ukrainians say. They emphasize (supported by international experts) that the Russian occupiers blew up the dam to prevent a Ukrainian advance into the occupied territories east of the city of Kherson.

During the visit of the African peacekeeping mission last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin (70) presented the draft of a ‘peace plan’ to the cameras. This peace plan was presented to the Ukrainians in 2022. But the Ukrainians threw it “into the dustbin of history,” like so many other things.

Putin, the peace-loving diplomat? This is just a facade. The Kremlin ruler hides that Ukraine broke off peace negotiations when Russian atrocities in Bucha and Borodyanka came to light. He is not saying that the Russian demands in the treaty (Ukraine can only have 342 tanks and 85,000 soldiers) are completely ridiculous. And, of course, he also fails to mention that the Russian government recognized Ukraine as a sovereign state in the 1994 Budapest Accords in exchange for giving up Kiev’s nuclear arsenal, which Russia would never attack.

On Monday, a one and a half minute video with a helmet camera appeared on the Telegram platform. It shows Ukrainian soldiers storming a trench in southern Ukraine and shooting four Russians (three unarmed, one armed). «Give it up, and you will live! Come out with your hands up!” the cameraman shouts. Then the video stops.

The pro-Ukrainian Telegram channel “ghost’s telegram” celebrated the attack as a “successful operation” by the Ukrainian special forces and laughed at the fallen Russians (“What were you training for?”). However, former US Navy soldier Sarah Bils (37), who spreads pro-Russian propaganda as “Donbass Devushka”, considers the video to be evidence of Ukrainian war crimes: “Very normal for Ukraine: the soldiers of the 73rd Brigade kill unarmed Russian soldiers who wanted to surrender.”

The preliminary conclusion: both sides are causing a huge propaganda whirlwind. War researcher Mike Martin writes in his book: “People need security, especially soldiers. If you deny them security (through disinformation campaigns), they become stressed and inefficient.” Judging by the clear confidence of the Ukrainian troops and the staunch Russian aggressors, that has not yet happened. The propaganda attacks have so far had their main goal missed.