The immediate aftermath of the Skripal poisoning
produced some unlikely, Bondesque assassination theories. Many came
from the British tabloids; the poisoned beer, the Russian in the rafters of the
Zizzi restaurant where Sergei and Yulia had lunch that day or the poison wafted
through the air vents of Skripal’s car, and yet even more came from the Russian
media, who blamed everyone from terrorists to Theresa May and the CIA. The
panellists of the recent Guardian Live event The Skripal
Case: A New Cold War? were under no illusion that this attack could have
been orchestrated in any way other than through the Kremlin and viewed the
Russian response as little more than direct obfuscation and an attempt to muddy
the waters as the investigation developed. But then, can we ever really be
sure?
Many of the facts that
emerged in the aftermath of the poisoning seemed to raise more questions than
they answered. Why Sergei Skripal, a retired GRU agent who was surely a
nuisance to the Kremlin but had been out of the loop for many years and whose
days of selling state secrets were far behind him? And, if they wanted him
dead, why use Novichok, an untested nerve agent that caused considerable
collateral damage but ultimately failed to kill the target? Surely, the trained
killers of Russian military intelligence would not have bungled an
assassination attempt so catastrophically? Does that mean Skripal was in fact
not the target at all? Why now, at a time of heightened tension between Russia
and the West, and during a particularly tempestuous time in British politics
(and just two weeks before Russia’s Presidential elections)?
As panellist Steven
Morris pointed out, in many cases the point of chemical warfare is to
destabilise the target population, as people do not necessarily know what is happening
at first, whether there is a continued risk of exposure, or what the effects
may be. This can lead to disorientation, false flags for further danger, and
sometimes panic. The Skripal attack certainly destabilised not just Salisbury
but the British establishment. The calls to hold Moscow to account for the
attack were met with rebuttals in Parliament from Jeremy Corbyn, who argued
that more evidence was needed before the finger was pointed eastwards. The
foreign secretary Boris Johnson fumbled his way through a press conference in
which he asserted that the British defence science laboratory at Porton Down
(coincidentally located only five miles from Salisbury) had told him
“unequivocally” that the Novichok agent had come from Russia, a claim that Porton
Down later denied. Theresa May, who was commended for her level-headed handling
of the crisis, nevertheless was forced to share high-level intelligence with
her French and German counterparts in Brussels to provide evidence of Russia’s
involvement at a time where relations between these allies are particularly
strained (leaving panellist Anne Applebaum to pose the interesting question of
how events may have unfolded had Britain already left the EU and May had been
unable to meet with Merkel and Macron in Brussels so soon after the event).
The European and
American response to the poisoning did in the end represent a relatively united
front against the Russian attack, and yet Moscow continued to deny, deflect,
and counter-accuse. It does not appear that they have been successful in
convincing anybody in the West that they are innocent of this crime, and yet,
as audience member and former GCHQ Director Sir David Omand pointed out,
perhaps again the point is not to convince, but to pollute the media and the discourse.
This “implausible deniability” has been cultivated by the Putin administration
for some time now and is paying dividends in terms of how the president is
viewed both at home and abroad.
Much attention has
been paid to Putin’s close advisor Vladislav Surkov, who is rumoured to have
written a short story under the pseudonym of Natan Dubovitsky, Without Sky,
that details “the world’s first non-linear war”, where truth and fiction are
blended to confuse and disorient the public, and where the goal of war is not
victory but to reach a point where it is hard to know if there is even a war at
all. The story, which appeared just one month before Russia’s annexation of the
Crimea and subsequent backing down from the brink of full-scale conflict in
eastern Ukraine, has been credited as a road-map for Putin’s new “hybrid warfare”,
which merges traditionally militaristic posturing with new technologies and
covert operations to create disorientation and alarm in the West. The fact that
nobody really knows if Surkov is the author of the story or not encapsulates
exactly what this new information war is trying to achieve. Historically,
propaganda aimed to create a narrative. Today, Putin’s propaganda machine wants
to obscure that narrative and leave his audience in a state of unease and
instability.
A similar campaign of disinformation to that viewed
after the Skripal poisoning emerged following the shooting down of Malaysian
Airlines flight MH17 by Russian-backed rebels in Eastern Ukraine in 2014, with
the Kremlin denouncing investigations identifying a Russian-made missile as a
cause of the crash, suggesting that the satellite imagery showed the missile
did not come from a rebel-held area, then blaming a Ukrainian fighter pilot for
shooting down the passenger flight and even hinting at tacit EU/US involvement.
Meanwhile, the rebels themselves first claimed responsibility for the attack
through Twitter, then denied it.
The rabbit hole goes
deeper as Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016
US election uncovers growing evidence to suggest that collusion between Trump
staff and Russian officials was ongoing throughout the election cycle. Trump
himself has denounced the investigation as ‘fake news’, but fake news, it
seems, is what Putin excels at. Several of the Guardian Live panellists discussed their personal interactions with
social media “trolls” who spread misinformation about them that quickly dissipated
from social media to news outlets and influential figures such as Julian
Assange, who posted inaccurate information about journalist Anne Applebaum that
had originated from a “troll”. As the panellists acknowledged, some of these
methods are relatively crude, with fake social media bots and individuals
posting obviously fake stories or claims about their target, but the
US-election meddling claims suggest a far more sophisticated disinformation
campaign that may be headed by the Kremlin.
The world of spies and assassination is one that is
rife for embellishment and provides a situation where conspiracy theories can
run rampant, but with suggestions of interference in foreign elections and the
Twitter account of the Russian embassy in the UK posting jokes at Britain’s
expense on their feed, this information war is making its way into the
mainstream. Journalists and citizens who are careless with their sources can
perpetuate these lies, and when enough people believe them they can quickly
become truths. Whether it’s a sophisticated propaganda machine orchestrated by
the Kremlin, the White House, Downing Street, or a single troll on a computer
in their living room, the information age has made deception ever simpler, and
it would appear we are teetering on the edge of the abyss of post-truth. It has
never been more important to check your sources, question what you are told,
and verify information before passing it on. The technological advances of the
internet and the instantaneousness of knowledge from around the world has been
misused not just by unscrupulous individuals in their basements, but
increasingly by the leaders of the world. And this has led us to the brink of the
disinformation age.
A big thank you to Guardian Live for chairing an
enlightening discussion at their recent event, and to the panellists who gave
some unique insight into what the case means for Russia, the West, journalists,
and all of us.
Find out more about Vladislav Surkov here https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/oct/26/kremlin-puppet-masters-leaked-emails-vladislav-surkov-east-ukraine
To learn more about the phenomenon of Russian bots you
can read this
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