{"id":8958,"date":"2017-04-13T05:56:26","date_gmt":"2017-04-13T05:56:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=8958"},"modified":"2017-04-14T06:02:28","modified_gmt":"2017-04-14T06:02:28","slug":"8958-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/8958-2\/","title":{"rendered":"In the wake of Syrian missile strike, a look inside Russia’s alternate media reality"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cynthia Hooper<\/a>, College of the Holy Cross<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

On April 11, the White House released an intelligence report<\/a> accusing Russia of trying to cover up the use of chemical weapons by Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad through a global disinformation campaign replete with \u201cfalse narratives.\u201d \"The<\/p>\n

As a professor of Soviet history with an interest in media studies, I\u2019ve been following Russia\u2019s response to the chemical attack and subsequent U.S. missile strike \u2013 the various television and print news stories, tweets and analyses put forth by Russia\u2019s domestic and international media outlets.<\/p>\n

Together, they\u2019re reflective a larger Russian information strategy: Stress a unified message at home but sow discord abroad. <\/p>\n

Jumping to the wrong conclusion<\/h2>\n

Inside Russia, all state-run media outlets and many independent ones are emphasizing that the Trump administration has wrongfully (or at least prematurely) condemned Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for being behind the April 4 attack; has taken military action overseas without congressional or U.N. authorization; and has indirectly helped terrorists by damaging an airbase essential to fighting ISIS.<\/p>\n

Their stories echo positions championed by the Russian government. When news of the chemical attack broke, a spokesman for the Ministry of Defense posted a YouTube video<\/a> explaining that the Syrian Air Force hadn\u2019t dropped chemical bombs on civilians. Rather, it had destroyed a warehouse where militants \u2013 unbeknownst to the Syrian government \u2013 were producing land mines packed with toxic chemicals.<\/p>\n

And after the U.S. missile strike, the Russian Foreign Ministry published a report<\/a> detailing numerous cases in which (it claims) terrorist groups have deployed chemical weapons and then blamed Assad. <\/p>\n

What about Mosul?<\/h2>\n

Meanwhile, Russia\u2019s Kremlin-funded, English language media, intended for a foreign audience, are echoing these claims, but with a twist. <\/p>\n

With its slogan \u201cQuestion More,\u201d the international television agency Russia Today (RT) is promising to expose its viewers to certain \u201ctruths\u201d of the Syrian story that, it says, are being clouded by Western spin. <\/p>\n

For example, RT\u2019s English website published an editorial<\/a> deploring the \u201cabsolutely psychopathic knee-jerk reaction\u201d of Western media in voicing immediate support for the U.S. decision to retaliate against Assad through military action. <\/p>\n

In particular, RT is emphasizing the difference between the international outrage over civilians killed in Syria\u2019s recent chemical weapons attack, compared to what it casts as the Western world\u2019s relatively subdued response to the deaths of between 150 and 200 Iraqi noncombatants<\/a> in a U.S.-led bombing raid on Mosul in mid-March.<\/p>\n

\u201cMedia, officials react to Syria \u2018toxic attack,\u2019 not to Iraqi deaths,\u201d read an RT graphic this weekend that scrolled across multiple TV reports.<\/p>\n

Show us the evidence!<\/h2>\n

\u201cShow us the evidence\u201d was another mantra of the weekend, with networks pointing to \u201csuspicious\u201d American reliance on secret information to implicate Assad. <\/p>\n

Between stories, the network repeatedly ran a montage of U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley holding up pictures of young children killed in the chemical attack, followed by a soundbite of President Trump referring to the \u201cbeautiful babies cruelly murdered\u201d in Khan Sheikhoun. The sequence then cut to a shot of former Secretary of State Colin Powell speaking to the U.N. Security Council in 2003 and holding up a vial of powder (meant to resemble anthrax), followed by a soundbite of former President George W. Bush warning of Iraq\u2019s vast stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction. <\/p>\n

Such a montage aims to remind viewers that U.S. \u201cevidence\u201d of Iraqi WMDs was inaccurate, and subsequently deemed a massive intelligence failure. Further, it suggests that U.S. government officials can \u2013 and do \u2013 use images to play on the emotions of citizens and conceal lack of concrete proof. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we see heart-wrenching images of dying children on our TV screen, it\u2019s hard not to be moved,\u201d a voice off-camera intones. \u201cBut we should ask ourselves \u2013 are our better instincts being manipulated?\u201d<\/p>\n

Souring on Trump<\/h2>\n

And then there\u2019s Trump. During the presidential campaign, most Russian media outlets were staunchly opposed to Hillary Clinton<\/a>. They often mocked Trump\u2019s various foibles, but when he was elected, the Russian Parliament burst into applause<\/a>. Since then, he\u2019s been consistently portrayed as a successful pragmatist, a leader with whom the Kremlin could do business<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Now some in Russia are branding him a crazy cowboy<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cTrump \u2013 more insane and dangerous than Obama?\u201d one analyst queried<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n <\/a>\n <\/p><\/blockquote>\n