After Russia’s attack on Ukraine in February, everyone who follows the news has had to interpret the war.
The task is not easy because war is Carl von Clausewitz accordingly (you switch to another service) the continuation of politics by violent means. A well-known saying (you move to another service) the first casualty of war is the truth. The lesser known addition (you switch to another service) according to, the second victim ends up being ambiguity.
Because of the political nature of warfare in war, one black-and-white “truth” is typically cherished.
This “truth” is not necessarily true. And even if it is, it lacks polyphonic as well as shades of gray.
War can be compared to black and white to photograph. It goes without saying that the white is us, the black is our enemy. Blackness is only accentuated with the violence that is essentially a part of war and the fear and hatred it arouses.
War is almost inevitably polarizing – after all, war is fought to force the opponent to do something that he would not agree to do without violence.
Polarization is a prerequisite for warfare, i.e. large-scale organized violence.
By repeating the image of the enemy and confrontation, one unites one’s own community against another.
Because violence is taboo in our societies, must dehumanize the opponent (you switch to another service), so that organized violence can be directed at him. For example, in Ukraine, Russians are called Orcs, and in Russia, Ukrainians are called Nazis.
The stakes of war can be high – many Ukrainians, for example, see themselves as fighting for the existence of their state and people. That’s why polarization is used domestically as well. By repeating the image of the enemy and confrontation, one unites one’s own community against another.
Polarization justifies the centralization of power and the silencing of dissenters. Views that deviate from the accepted truth are sensitively branded as treason. You are either with us or against us.
In practice, propaganda aims to promote one’s cause by shaping perceptions and opinions. Propaganda does not have to be false. Ukraine’s communication has emphasized the justification of the defensive war and has been based more on facts than in Russia, which has been constantly guilty of lying.
Views that deviate from the accepted truth and are harmful to us and our cause are tried to be censored during the war.
Because of censorship, we never have access to all the information needed to understand the war. Because of propaganda, not all the information we have is true.
A concrete example of this is the war in Ukraine constantly disputed (you switch to another service) loss figures. Both Kiev and Moscow downplay their own, and most likely exaggerate the enemy’s, losses.
In Russia, you can also go to prison for years if you call the ongoing war a war, or otherwise criticize the decisions of those in power. Long prison sentences are a way to limit the ambiguity of war.
But as with all human activitieseven war has its own shades of gray.
Shades of gray can be seen, for example, in the fact that even though the war is being fought in the name of Ukraine and Russia, not all Ukrainians and Russians support it, let alone participate. Hundreds of thousands have fled Russia Vladimir Putin those who are against the administration and the movement it has initiated. They have also escaped from Ukraine due to business launch (you switch to another service).
Collaborators—own citizens who collaborate with the enemy—challenge even more attempts to present the war in a black-and-white national framework. For example, Ukrainians who cooperate with Russians (you switch to another service) question the idea of a united Ukrainian nation fighting the Russians.
The Russians as well peace activists (you move to another service) and the women worried about their children and husbands taken to the war are proof that the Russians are not as united a group as the propagandists make it out to be.
War is difficult to interpret because it is politics, whose interests are served by offering one black and white “truth” about the situation.
Although restoring shades of gray may seem harmful during war, especially from the perspective of those in power in the community, it is absolutely necessary to understand complex phenomena such as war. War is difficult to interpret because it is politics, whose interests are served by offering one black and white “truth” about the situation.
Ultimately, the problem with single “truth” narratives is that they are like brooms that simplify as they sweep. While they can be politically and militarily useful, they do violence to individuals and to human life, which is rarely black and white.
Ilmari Käihkö
The author is a military scientist who has been trying to understand the war in Ukraine since 2017.
The column can be discussed on 10.12. until 23:00.