INSIDIOUS WARFARE

In this episode of The Cosmopolicast, Livia Ponzio and Monique Camarra describe in chilling detail the global network of disinformation Russia has built to confuse, overwhelm, and destabilize democracy.

In 1984, Yuri Bezmenov, a Soviet journalist for RIA Novosti and a former KGB official who defected to Canada, detailed the strategy used by the KGB to subvert the United States.

Russia has insidiously employed the four stages of ideological subversion, as Bezmenov described this psychological warfare. They have been adapted to today’s social media and the Internet and used not just during the Russia-Ukraine war, but throughout the Covid19 pandemic, and further back to the Trump era.

Bezmenov detailed the active measures meant to sow distrust, spread confusion, and eventually destabilize a society. The goal: Russian (or then, Soviet) dominance.

In what might be the most disturbing episode of the Cosmopolicast we’ve published, Vivek Y. Kelkar and Claire Berlinski speak to Livia Ponzio and Monique Camarra about Russian disinformation. Livia and Monique describe in detail the networks, people, companies, and corporate or quasi-corporate entities—from troll farms in India and Africa to useful idiots across the West—who spread disinformation and destabilize democracy.

Here’s the RAND Corporation’s study of the “Firehose of Falsehood” propaganda model—which at once “entertains, confuses, and overwhelms”—they mention in the podcast.

And below is the graphic Monique explains showing the global network of disinformation.

You’ve been a target. Keep it in mind next time you Tweet.