RT is by far the greatest Russian international media success in the age of Vladimir Putin. It’s only ten years old, was born as Russia Today, and today has a major impact on cable and TV and a huge following on Youtube. Sputnik is associated with it for print. In fact my own judgement is that RT is the most important and influential directly country-sponsored media effort so far in the 21st century, unless the UK’s BBC is considered in this same category (which it almost is). In this area the Chinese are way behind, but racing to try to become more influential.
The Russians however have, or I should say probably have, other things they have instigated and promoted, things far more masked, and also far less important, than RT. Here are two examples I’m aware of — one useful, the other a cleverly disguised hoax.
Strategic Culture Foundation: Some thoughtful analysts — many retired academics or spooks who are not welcome in the main-stream media — publish quite interesting geopolitical articles here. But who is really behind it, and who is in some cases paying out the honorariums and in charge, is unknown; and that surely is on purpose.
Creative Society : Presenting itself as a worldwide movement for peace and reconciliation this organization recently sponsored a day-long nearly 12 hours on-line international conference with speakers and endorsers from many countries in many languages and broadcast on many platforms. They even managed to draw in some biggies, like The Pope and business types from the likes of Morgan Stanley.
But in the end this newbie seems to be a very well financed attempt to draw in younger and malleable persons to enhance anxiety and confusion about capitalism, the climate crisis, and world peace, without actually revealing who they are and what alternative solutions they propose. Hard to know for sure just who is behind this unless one has access to the means available to the CIA and NSA. But the signs are there that this may also be a Russian front even more masked than others — and despite all the hoopla, money, and international choreography, not so credible if one really pays attention to detail (as most do not and cannot of course).
Mark Bruzonsky 