Since the beginning of the Ukraine War, there has been a media blackout in Russia. Russians don’t have access to clean information anymore.

It is common knowledge that Putin, the Russian president, used to work for the KGB (Komitet Gossoudarstvennoï Bezopasnosti or State Security Committee). He started as a foreign intelligence officer and rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel, which is the equivalent to being the head of the KGB. He resigned in 1991, when he redirected himself in politics. Even though he changed jobs, he still kept his habits from the past. Propaganda and disinformation; they are his politics. He knows how these techniques work perfectly and can make them work. He knows how to manipulate people.

An example of how good he is at this is one of the first disinformation campaigns led by the KGB, Operation Infektion. Operation Infektion was a campaign set on AIDS, leading many people to believe that AIDS was a man-made virus created by the United-States in a conspiracy against people of color and homosexuals. They started by publishing an article about it in a local communist newspaper in India, letting the rumors spread until a French biologist, Jakob Segal, published a report about it. Of course, even if Segal was a french citizen, he was born in Russia and studied in Germany. The KGB used this to their advantage, taking a man with their ideals to publish a report without it being associated with them.

Basically, comparing this to the present, we can notice that when people control the information, they control the population. It still is in use today, in 2022.

Take the Ukrainian War. The Russian people are told by the media that it’s not a war, it’s a “special operation”. If people call it war, they score 15 years of prison, without a mandate being issued or a trial. People are being arrested for telling the truth. 

Then, civilians are told that Russian soldiers are proceeding the a “Denazification”, which means they are exterminating Nazis. But a large portion of Ukrainians, including the president, are Jews. Vladimir Putin must’ve forgotten about World War II because the Russians are acting like the “Nazis” in this situation. 

Most importantly, the Russian people are made to believe that civilians aren’t targeted in this special operation. But there are civilian casualties everyday. Either from the bombing or the kidnapping, civilians are not safe. 

These fake news are fed to the population by the government. After all, who wouldn’t trust their government in a time of crisis? 

Who is the mastermind behind this big scheme? Vladimir Putin.