PerspectiveRussia Knows Just Who to Blame for the Coronavirus: America
The coronavirus outbreak has been accompanied by an avalanche of conspiracy theories about the outbreak. “But in Russia the misinformation has been particularly pointed. Russia’s spin doctors have capitalized on the fear and confusion of the epidemic to point the blame at the United States,” Amy McKinnong writers. McKinnon notes that the Russian messaging fits a now well-established pattern in that it doesn’t look to persuade audiences of a single alternative truth, because “That would take effort, planning, and persuasion.” Rather, Kremlin propaganda specialists produce “a steady stream of underdeveloped, sometimes contradictory conspiracy theories intended to exhaust and confuse viewers, making them question the very notion of objective truth itself.”
Last week marked the deadliest day yet in the battle with coronavirus, with 242 deaths reported in Hubei province, the epicenter of the outbreak. Amy McKinnon writes in Foreign Policy that as the virus has spread around the world, so to have conspiracy theories cropping up everywhere from India to Australia.
But in Russia the misinformation has been particularly pointed. Russia’s spin doctors have capitalized on the fear and confusion of the epidemic to point the blame at the United States, following a well-established pattern of previous Russian disinformation campaigns and evoking a Cold War-era plot by the KGB to paint HIV as a U.S. biological weapon.
Russia is certainly not alone in promulgating conspiracy theories about the virus…. But in Russia these theories are appearing on prominent mainstream news discussion shows such as Big Game and Time Will Tell on Channel 1, rather than just being confined to squalid corners of the internet. In late January, the firebrand leader of the far-right Liberal Democratic Party of Russia party told a Moscow radio station that he thought coronavirus was an American bioweapon or a big plot by pharmaceutical companies to get richer.
Russian efforts to undermine Western countries long predates the outbreak of coronavirus. The nature of the messaging and their singling out of the United States are typical of the Kremlin’s disinformation playbook, which loyal editors and producers are well familiar with—and know the political necessity of sticking to.
McKinnon notes that the Russian messaging fits a now well-established pattern in that it doesn’t look to persuade audiences of a single alternative truth.
That would take effort, planning, and persuasion. Modern-day Russian propaganda has instead been described by the Rand Corp. as a “firehose of falsehood,” a steady stream of underdeveloped, sometimes contradictory conspiracy theories intended to exhaust and confuse viewers, making them question the very notion of objective truth itself.
