The American Propaganda Machine Is Ramping Up Anti-Russia Rhetoric to Scare Us into Accepting More Aid to Ukraine, But We Will Not Even Look Inward
In the last couple weeks, the Biden administration has been ramping up the Cold War II rhetoric and attempting to convince Americans to hate Russia. From the new space race to the fall of another Ukrainian city, we are being conditioned to think of the Vladimir Putin bogeyman as a real threat to American existence, but in reality, this is a scheme to keep the profits flowing to the military-industrial complex and Russia from being able to challenge American dominance around the world. All the while, Americans are dealing with the authoritarian threat within their own government but are more concerned about the internal environment in Russia.
Back in 2012, when President Barack Obama snarked, “The 1980s are now calling to ask for their foreign policy back because the Cold War’s been over for 20 years,” in regard to Mitt Romney's insistence on combating Russia, it became a sort of hint of what the elites had on their agenda for the upcoming years. Americans largely agreed with the Democratic Party’s less interventionist view on foreign policy at that time, but the tide has turned. After the fake story about Donald Trump collusion with Russia, spread by the Hillary Clinton campaign and wrongly investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Democratic Party began its descent toward hawkish attitudes against Russia, while the Trump wing of the Republican Party became more anti-war than that of the Bush-Cheney-Romney-McCain faction.
Today, the Democratic Party is allying itself with the bureaucratic and intelligence establishment, and it is currently using fearmongering to frighten Americans and politicians into thinking that if Trump were to somehow enter the White House, beating out a rigged election, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) would be under direct threat. Congress already passed a law in December that would prevent a president (emphasis on Trump) from being able to unilaterally leave the anti-Russia alliance, but what the Democratic Party is working on at the moment is placing additional safeguards to avert the deterioration of NATO. This potential weakening could include: pulling troops from Europe, not participating in exercises near Russia’s border, reducing spending, refusing to send or receive ambassadors to or from other NATO countries, and not invoking Article 5 to defend countries that may hypothetically be invaded by Russia.
This comes at a time when Trump stated that he would not defend (and let Russia do “whatever the hell they want” to) NATO countries that do not pay their fair share (the agreed upon minimum of two percent of their gross domestic product). Of course, the corporate media and the Biden administration took these comments and ran with them in order to cause panic that Russia may cease upon a Trump presidency and invade all of Europe like some kind of New Hitler. However, as Putin just reiterated in his interview with Tucker Carlson, the Russian leader has no such ambitions (even if he is lying, Russia is having trouble subduing Ukraine, so taking over Europe would likely be an impossible task). This is being blown way out of proportion by American and European war hawks.
News of the Ukrainian defeat at the city of Avdiivka on the Donetsk Oblast-Donetsk People’s Republic border has increased calls for the House of Representatives to get its act together and maturely send more American taxpayer money to Ukraine. After we hear about how horribly Russia bombed the city and left the air poisoned and all of that, it will be a rallying cry to give Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky a blank check to continue fighting a seemingly lost cause.
However, the fall of Avdiivka pales in comparison to the urgent intelligence report released strategically by House Intelligence Committee Chair Mike Turner. Despite the United States government knowing about the Russian capability to launch anti-satellite weapons into space since 2021 (the dubbed “nukes in space” was not at all urgent), Turner thought it necessary to manipulate the narrative and politicians into passing the $60 billion welfare program to Ukraine (the Senate has so far passed the larger $95.3 billion package, which also includes $14 billion in offensive aid to Israel, $8 billion to Taiwan, and humanitarian aid to Gaza and Ukraine; and the House of Representatives will almost certainly cave in due time).
Even Politico saw through the politicking on this one, and as a result of the report, Elon Musk’s SpaceX has collaborated with the Department of Defense’s Space Development Agency (SDA), under the Air Force, and the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) to launch six missiles into space to prepare for countering and tracking Russian hypersonic missiles and spacecraft. Not only has Turner’s scaremongering tactics caused panic among lawmakers, but now, the Biden administration considers it necessary to have a show-of-force to ease the minds of Americans. A new space race has begun, and this time, it has the potential to wipe out communications and power grids.
Alexei Navalny’s death is another issue that the Biden administration has utilized in order to try to gain favor for feeding the military-industrial complex (the new aid package would replenish stocks of weapons already given to Ukraine by purchasing from defense contractors) and providing $8 billion to bolster the Ukrainian government’s operations and $1.6 billion for the country’s private sector (the Biden administration will not even help struggling families in the United States but wants to send welfare programs to foreign countries). Even though President Biden is unsure exactly what took place or the details of the Russian opposition leader’s demise (he admitted as much), he is threatening to place additional economic sanctions against Russia (Russia is thriving, so the American and European sanctions have thus far been symbolic and not actually effective).
Some commentators have pointed out that Putin stands to gain nothing by killing off his political rival, thus leading to the conclusion that perhaps American or European intelligence units (perhaps the CIA or MI6) found a way to infiltrate the penal colony in western Siberia (specifically the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District) and murder him as a false flag operation to further garner Western hatred of Putin, and although that is certainly possible, we simply do not know. Putin has captured American journalist Evan Gershkovich and charged him with espionage (like with Edward Snowden or Julian Assange), and of course, Brittney Griner was charged with drug smuggling crimes for political purposes, so the Kremlin is capable of eliminating its political rivals. It is possible that Navalny was killed to prevent anti-Putin influence from swaying next month’s presidential election, but was Putin’s victory really that much under threat that he would need to risk drumming up more American revulsion?
What is fascinating to watch in the United States is that Americans have become more furious with the imprisonment and potential murder of a Russian opposition leader than they have with the fact that journalists and whistleblowers are pursued by the United States government. The opposition leader in the United States, Donald Trump, is being served with trumped-up charges for political purposes, and yet, most stay silent or have been conditioned to believe that it is the correct course of action, since Trump is apparently an extraordinarily bad dude.
Of course, it is wrong and authoritarian for Putin to have imprisoned (and possibly murdered) his political opponent, but that is a matter of internal Russian politics. Why would Americans care about this except to gain more hatred for Putin and become conditioned to accept war with Russia? It is really quite strange, and it shows how easily Americans are manipulated and brainwashed to believe that their government is really less authoritarian than the Russian one. The American propaganda machine is very strong, and we need to rally around the flag so that we can collectively abhor our Russian enemy (just like we communally hated Japanese Americans, Communists, Muslims, etc.).
Edward Snowden revealed how the American government was collecting data and spying on people without warrants, and he had to flee the United States and seek asylum in Russia to avoid espionage charges. Julian Assange was secluded in the Ecuadorian embassy in London for years and has been in a British prison for another five years (awaiting extradition to the United States) because he released embarrassing information about the American military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan (the United States’ version of the Russian invasion of Ukraine).
Of course, our government had no problem pursuing charges for leaking or retaining classified documents against Snowden, Assange, and Trump, but when the Department of Justice’s preferred candidate for the 2024 American presidential election, Joe Biden, “willfully retained” classified documents in order to write his 2017 memoir, he was let off the hook because he is currently too senile and incapable of remembering the details of what he did (but he can run for president with no issue, somehow). Hillary Clinton knowingly deleted thousands of emails when she found out that she was under investigation for potentially leaving classified information vulnerable to foreign actors, and just like the FBI aided her campaign’s false story about Trump’s supposed collusion with Russia, the bureau sheltered her from prosecution under the Espionage Act. The United States government picks and chooses who will be subject to espionage charges based on their political orientation, connections with elites, and intentions for release (under the Espionage Act, intentions do not actually matter); and clearly, Trump’s willful retention charges are politically motivated in nature. If you are attempting to inform Americans about injustices in the system, you will be hunted down to the full extent of the law, but if you are politically connected and not hated by the establishment, you will be let off without any criminal charges.
Then, we have the January 6th protesters who were tracked by militarized units of the United States government, held in solitary confinement, and imprisoned for years on end in order to make a political example. Additionally, journalist Tayler Hansen, who was filming the January 6th protest as it was happening and revealed that Ashli Babbit was unjustifiably shot by police, was surveilled by the Department of Homeland Security (including by forty-eight air marshals). But, of course, the federal government and its corporate media allies will fixate on the false imprisonment of Navalny and ignore stories such as these.
Furthermore, Chilean-American journalist Gonzalo Lira was imprisoned for speaking out against atrocities committed by the Zelensky regime during wartime (under charges of “production and dissemination of materials justifying Russia’s armed aggression against Ukraine”), and because the United States government backs the current Ukrainian government, it has been silent on the issue, while it raises hell about Navalny. Lira died in a Ukrainian prison, and Americans simply do not care. Yet, Navalny has been propped up as this martyr and hero against Russian authoritarianism. Again, the American propaganda machine is very strong.
Aside from the hypocrisy on the Navalny issue, the ramping up of the cold war with Russia should be concerning to Americans. We are being conditioned to hate Putin, and the more that we let the corporate headlines dictate our feelings toward our enemy, the more likely we will be to sacrifice our livelihoods and family members to fight a war that could have been avoided in the first place. The Biden administration’s push to bring Cold War II into World War III should be obvious to those paying attention, and convincing Americans to support this political nonsense is the sure way to guarantee that the Democratic Party and the bureaucratic establishment will continue to hold onto power. They thrive on the collective hatred of Russia and China, but if we said enough is enough and refused to play into their geopolitical drama, what would they have left to chase their authoritarian and dystopian dreams? With war comes the destruction of civil liberties and the redistribution of the economic system, so the elites will attempt to push authoritarian agendas on us. It is up to us to resist calls for conflict.
Thank you for reading, and please check out my book, The Global Bully, and website.