Russia is fighting against the forces of Antichrist. Nazis run Europe. Russia takes European leaders to The Hague to be tried as war criminals. The equipment of the Russian soldiers is in excellent condition.
Among other things, the number one name in Russian television’s war propaganda, i.e. systematic opinion manipulation, threatened during Christmas Vladimir Solovyov.
Solovyov is an energetic man. On weekdays, he hosts a television talk show and a several-hour radio program.
On Sunday, there will be no fewer than two propaganda programs by Solovyov on television. The name of the second one is succinctly Moscow. Kremlin. Putin. In addition, he messages his 1.3 million followers in the Telegram application.
Only Fridays and Saturdays seem to be days off from spinning propaganda.
The programs seem like talk shows, but they are carefully scripted. The drama is added or subtracted as needed, and the Featured Guests play their part.
In his propaganda theater, Solovyov is both a director and a performer, says the Russia expert Hannah Smith.
– He is thinking about the script and choosing guests. And he is deciding what can be talked about and what can’t be talked about, and how aggressively to talk this time, Smith says in a telephone interview with .
BBC journalist Francis Scarr follows Russian propaganda in his work every day. We included a few excerpts from his Twitter account for this story. Here Solovyov threatens that Russia will eventually send Europe’s “bastards” to the Hague war crimes tribunal.
Russians do not believe individual claims
Solovyov is just one of the many propagandists on Russian television. Their job is to shape Russian opinion so that they continue to support the war of aggression and the Russian leadership.
After the start of the war, the lengths of propaganda programs increased by the hour. For example, the program called 60 minutes is now shown five hours a day.
The main message of the propagandists is that the West threatens Russia’s existence, Ukraine is full of Nazis and that the “special operation” or offensive war will end with Russia’s victory. Part of the message is also that if necessary, Russia will destroy its opponents with nuclear weapons.
All the main channels show propaganda, and there is no alternative news on TV at all. The viewers are mainly middle-aged. They also support Putin and the war most strongly.
According to Hanna Smith, the purpose of the propaganda avalanche is not to convince the Russians of every false claim. Viewers do understand that the broadcasts are controlled by the state.
– But in creating a general atmosphere and in the fact that the West has been made guilty and the enemy, it has been clearly better, Smith estimates.
The speeches of Solovyov and other propagandists have taken on a new tone in recent months as Ukraine has been successful on the battlefields. Reality cannot be completely ignored even in propaganda.
– They have also had to bring up the fact that Russia does not always succeed in everything, says Russia expert Hanna Smith.
With the war, the messages of television and the Russian leadership have become closer, says Smith. While previously those in power seemed moderate compared to the excesses of propaganda, now Putin and other leaders also use extreme language.
The decadence of Western countries is a recurring theme in propaganda broadcasts. This Ykköskanava program claims that Europe’s children are going to be raised in laboratories in the future.
Solovjov pushed for an independent media
Solovjov started his career as a journalist in the 1990s in media independent of the Kremlin. He criticized the administration and interviewed, among other things, a journalist who has since been murdered Anna Politkovskaya, the newspaper Novaja Gazeta tells (you will switch to another service).
Solovyov originally studied to be an engineer. He is described as having been distinguished and talented when he was young. According to Novaja Gazeta, in his current job, he has lost his sense of humor and self-irony.
In the 21st century, Solovjov flew closer to the propaganda machine run by the administration and started to get more and more important hosting jobs.
At the same time, his speech changed.
As recently as 2013, Solovyov had considered it useless for Crimea, which belongs to Ukraine, to be annexed to Russia. The following year, when Russia had conquered the peninsula, he praised the regional union. For that good work, he also received an award from President Putin.
In this broadcast, Solovyov claimed that Russian soldiers are well equipped and only need letters from children on the home front. In reality, military equipment shortages have been widely reported.
Many propagandists do their work for money
It is an open question how much the propagandists believe their own stories. Researched Russian journalists in his dissertation Salla Nazarenko says that many are cynical about their profession and think that there is no independent journalism.
One of the journalists of the state-controlled channel Nazarenko interviewed described his work as some kind of game.
– This interviewee said that if you took it seriously, you would go crazy, says Nazarenko, who works as an expert on international affairs at the Journalists’ Association, in a telephone interview with .
Some of the journalists understood the idea that Russia is threatened by the West, and the suffering motherland must be defended. According to Nazarenko, some do their work for money.
According to him, the tradition of independent journalism in Russia is also short.
– There have been individual heroic journalists throughout the ages, but dependence on someone, be it the state or a businessman, is strong, says Nazarenko.
At least Vladimir Solovyov’s words and actions are inconsistent.
The presenter, who barks at the West every day, owns a 1,000-square-meter villa on the shores of Italy’s Lake Como. The owner of the property was revealed in 2017 by the opposition leader Alexei Navalny, the newspaper The Moscow Times says (you will switch to another service).
Italy confiscated the villa in the spring, when Solovjov was placed on the EU sanctions list. Solovyov’s property ended up being confiscated, worth a total of eight million euros, news agency Reuters says. (you switch to another service)
It has also been used as sources in the story story from The Guardian newspaper (you’ll switch to another service) and researcher Gregory Asmolovin article on the Riddle site. (you switch to another service)