What are we afraid of? Why do many politicians think that “our propaganda is losing”?

On December 1, the law “on persons under foreign influence” comes into force. There are more and more grounds on which a citizen can be included in the register of “foreign agents”.

Generally speaking, “a foreign agent is understood to mean a person who has received support and/or is under other forms of foreign influence.” What kind of support? If material – even more or less clear. And if “moral”? How to define it?

Then it turns out “a person under foreign influence in other forms.” What others? Reading foreign books and newspapers, watching foreign films, communicating with friends living outside the Russian Federation?

There is something like an attempt at clarification in the law: “Foreign influence, specified in Part 1 of Article 1 of this Federal Law, is understood as the provision by a foreign source of support to a person and (or) the impact on a person, including by coercion, persuasion and (or ) in other ways. Bribed, coerced, intimidated, maybe even beaten, threatened with torture, blackmailed – this is more or less clear. But in what other ways? After all, anything can be summed up under any “other way”. And here you are, you are a “foreign agent”.

That is, there are very wide, practically uncontrolled possibilities for arbitrary interpretation and application of the law. This is probably why he lay under the cloth (adopted by the State Duma and approved by the Federation Council) for six months. But now signed, comes into force on December 1.

Also, from December 1, the FSB Order “On approval of the List of information in the field of military, military-technical activities of the Russian Federation, which, if received by foreign sources, can be used against the security of the Russian Federation,” comes into force. It is important that all this information is NON-SECRET, NOT RELATED TO STATE SECRET. The document is 11 pages long. The first paragraph reads: “Information on the assessment and forecasts of the development of the military-political, strategic (operational) situation.”

In principle, this first point is already more than enough. For example, in order to close all comments in newspapers, and even more so – TV programs. Even the most loyal TV channels, which not only support, but also widely promote the decisions of the authorities. After all, these channels constantly talk about geopolitics, give an “assessment of the strategic situation.” So close?

I believe that all these and other actions are caused by a completely incomprehensible fear and conviction (?!) that “Russia is losing the information war.” The statements of officials, politicians, media headlines are panicky:

“Our propaganda: what is wrong with it?”, “What are we losing in? Weak Point of Propaganda”, “Why State Propaganda Loses?”, “The Failure of Russian Propaganda”. And so on. Recently, State Duma deputy General Andrey Gurulev suggested creating a special department within the government:

“As for the information war. Of course, you can shout that we are losing a lot. The main problem, in my opinion, is the lack of a unified management of this topic. I would generally create, to be honest, the Ministry of Information and Propaganda … Up to the fake. We must work with the same means by which they work with us. What is there to be ashamed of here?”

That is, he proposed to the future (according to his plan) ministry to disseminate false information? He also said that conclusions about the information war can be drawn from the example of his native Transbaikalia: there the level of trust in the president is more than 70%.

All this is more than strange. First, the mass character and aggressiveness of Russian propaganda are obvious. All state and pro-government TV channels broadcast about our successes and the intrigues of enemies almost around the clock. An example of effectiveness is far and not only in Transbaikalia with a level of trust in the president of more than 70%. We can say that Transbaikalia “lags behind”.

According to the All-Russian Center for the Study of Public Opinion (VTsIOM) as of November 25, the level of trust in President Putin throughout Russia is 78.7%, 75% of Russians approve of his activities. Such ratings have never been dreamed of by any president or prime minister of Western countries. Then what is the government afraid of? Why is it increasing and increasing prohibitive measures, expanding the list of “foreign agents”? In the register as of November 25 – 62 individuals. Why is it said in certain circles that “Russian propaganda is losing”?

Does anyone really think that 62 people, who are also limited in some rights and actions, can lead 145 million people astray? With his level of trust in the government at 78.7%.

Sergei Baimukhametov.