Fueling ecumenical extremism
What Alan Bloom’s “The Closing of the American Mind” left me with most, beside his “these kids today” tone, was how, in our congenital hubris, many Americans believe their thoughts are their own. With no real schooling in the evolution of ideas or in critical thinking, Americans may ignore what they’ve absorbed from their cultural melieu as having no real bearing except perhaps on their sartorial and musical preferences. Fundamentalists, of course, receive an upbringing not only in what to think but in what not to, and to distrust ideas not handed down by the patriarchs, the apostles and megachurch prosperity peddlers.
A habit of not interrogating one’s own thoughts make a mind fertile ground for those deliberately sowing weeds. The Washington Post has obtained a Russian document describing its government’s efforts at just that:
In a classified addendum to Russia’s official — and public — “Foreign Policy Concept of the Russian Federation,” the ministry calls for an “offensive information campaign” and other measures spanning “the military-political, economic and trade and informational psychological spheres” against a “coalition of unfriendly countries” led by the United States.
“We need to continue adjusting our approach to relations with unfriendly states,” states the 2023 document, which was provided to The Washington Post by a European intelligence service. “It’s important to create a mechanism for finding the vulnerable points of their external and internal policies with the aim of developing practical steps to weaken Russia’s opponents.”
The document for the first time provides official confirmation and codification of what many in the Moscow elite say has become a hybrid war against the West. Russia is seeking to subvert Western support for Ukraine and disrupt the domestic politics of the United States and European countries, through propaganda campaigns supporting isolationist and extremist policies, according to Kremlin documents previously reported on by The Post. It is also seeking to refashion geopolitics, drawing closer to China, Iran and North Korea in an attempt to shift the current balance of power.
Using much tougher and blunter language than the public foreign policy document, the secret addendum, dated April 11, 2023, claims that the United States is leading a coalition of “unfriendly countries” aimed at weakening Russia because Moscow is “a threat to Western global hegemony.” The document says the outcome of Russia’s war in Ukraine will “to a great degree determine the outlines of the future world order,” a clear indication that Moscow sees the result of its invasion as inextricably bound with its ability — and that of other authoritarian nations — to impose its will globally.
It’s hard to imagine more fertile ground for sowing such weeds than the minds of a nihilist, anti-democratic movement led by a malignant narcissist with dictatorial ambitions, unless it is social media that rewards anger, divisiveness, and conspiratorial content with engagement. The Mueller Report documented in detail how the Russian Internet Research Agency skillfully played Americans for suckers in 2016. They watched as seeds of disinformation sprouted and choked reality until Donald Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway could proudly speak her alternative truths on Meet The Press.
Ecumenical extremism
Yes, they mean it:
The academic, Vladimir Zharikhin, called for Russia to “continue to facilitate the coming to power of isolationist right-wing forces in America,” “enable the destabilization of Latin American countries and the rise to power of extremist forces on the far left and far right there,” as well as facilitate “the restoration of European countries’ sovereignty by supporting parties dissatisfied with economic pressure from the U.S.”
Read: Undermine NATO.
For Mikhail Khodorkovsky — the longtime Putin critic who was once Russia’s richest man until a clash with the Kremlin landed him 10 years in prison — it is not surprising that Russia is seeking to do everything it can to undermine the United States. “For Putin, it is absolutely natural that he should try to create the maximum number of problems for the U.S.,” he said. “The task is to take the U.S. out of the game, and then destroy NATO. This doesn’t mean dissolving it, but to create the feeling among people that NATO isn’t defending them.”
The long congressional standoff on providing more weapons to Ukraine was only making it easier for Russia to challenge Washington’s global power, he said.
Moscow has plenty of help on Capitol Hill. Some MAGA types may be bought. Others willingly volunteer. Other volunteers may not even know it:
“I think Russian propaganda has made its way into the United States, unfortunately, and it’s infected a good chunk of my party’s base,” Representative Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told Puck’s Julia Ioffe last week. Representative Mike Turner, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, went further, telling CNN’s Jake Tapper a few days later, “We see directly coming from Russia attempts to mask communications that are anti-Ukraine and pro-Russia messages, some of which we even hear being uttered on the House floor.”
It’s not paranoia if they really are out to get you.
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