Russia interprets the February 24 invasion of Ukraine as “the birth of a new world order that is fair to Russia.” Russia’s motive is to strengthen its own national interests. They interpret own aggression as “protection of the Russian population”, claiming that “had we not attacked first, they would have attacked us.
” This is a convenient format for legitimizing the next acts of aggression against sovereign nations, in particular those that are part of EU and NATO, which are now actually portrayed by Russia as adversaries.
Russia has already faced grave problems in the economy as a result of massive sanctions. Narratives broadcast to the domestic audience claim that “there’s no big problem”, “we have sufficient stocks”, “we will switch to self-sufficiency”.
Certain consequences of western sanctions that simply can’t be concealed from the public will be interpreted as “genocide of Russians by the West.”
“Only the West is to blame for this war.” The narrative is as follows: “Had it not been for Belgrade and Iraq, there would have been no Syria and then no Ukraine.” This is an attempt to shift responsibility to the West through its allegedly unfriendly actions towards Russia, which has nowhere to retreat.
“This war has to do with every Russian, whose sacred duty is to rise up to fight the “fascist West.” The Kremlin pursues its efforts to form a conflict-driven consciousness in Russian society, postulating the West and all who stand with it as Russia’s enemies, laying down the message: “There is nowhere to retreat, Moscow is behind us.”
Russia interprets the war with Ukraine as a “holy war” for the Russian people, “the salvation of Russia and its greatness” – the formation of a new totalitarian ideology of the 21st century, a new marginal paraphernalia. Z is a new symbol that unites all “right kind” of Russians.
There’s substitution of concepts:
Russian now means “ethnic Russian”. Before our eyes, a manifestation of a new Slav-Nazi symbol took place, fully justified in the eyes of the bearers of this concept, combined with the perfect manipulation of people’s minds and the willingness of those who succumbed to it to bear any hardships.
Editor’s Monitoring Desk/ Islamabad/ Pakistan
