Kamikaze in Parallel Reality: A Digest of Russian Propaganda for July 26

Navigation and useful materials

Moscow wants to recognize Ukraine as “a terrorist country,” and it has already found its first representative in Zaporizhia oblast. The Centre for Strategic Communication and Information Security has collected the main fakes and narratives of the Russian propaganda of July 26.

1. The Kremlin is creating a parallel legal reality
2. “Sladkov’s Ukrainian plan” dedicated to Kadyrov
3. Quitting American dollars, Volodin style: theory and practice
4. Moscow has found the first Ukrainian kamikaze

The Kremlin is creating a parallel legal reality

On July 26, a subsidiary of the single United Russia party with a strange name “Fair Russia — Patriots — For Truth” has filed a draft law with the Russian State Duma to recognize Ukraine “a terrorist country.”

Mironov, who is one of the leaders of this pseudo-party, said that “now, some countries deliberately organize terrorist attacks, explosions targeting the civilian population. First, I mean Ukraine with its ‘office of Zelenskyy.’”

IN REALITY, this is a sort of preparation of a mirror response to the repeated calls of President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy to the global community to recognize Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism. They echo against the background of the occupiers’ war crimes, in particular the murders of civilians and missile attacks on civilian infrastructure.

And the steps in this direction have already been taken. The Verkhovna Rada recognized the Russian Federation as a terrorist state on April 14, having introduced a special term for this in domestic legislation.

On May 3, the Ukrainian Parliament appealed to the House of Representatives and the Senate of the US Congress to recognize the Russian Federation as a state sponsor of terrorism.

READ ALSO: A Country in Exile. What It Would Mean if Russia Were Recognized a State Sponsor of Terrorism

Also in May, members of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Republican Joe Wilson and Democrat Ted Lew, introduced a bipartisan resolution proposing to recognize the Russian Federation as a state sponsor of terrorism.

At the end of June, a similar resolution was approved by the US Senate Committee on International Relations. This document is also bipartisan, proposed by Republican Lindsey Graham and Democrat Richard Blumenthal.

The senators cited a long list of arguments in support of their demand, which includes not only the war in Ukraine.  They include the following items:

• at the direction of President Vladimir Putin, the Government of the Russian Federation has and continues to promote acts of international terrorism against political opponents and nation states;
• under the orders of President Putin, the Government of the Russian Federation engaged in a campaign of terror, utilizing brutal force targeting civilians during the Second Chechen War; actions by the Government of the Russian Federation against civilian centres, such as Grozny, the capital of Chechnya, left countless innocent men, women, and children dead or wounded;
• since 2014, the Government of the Russian Federation has supported so-called separatists engaging in acts of violence against Ukrainian civilians in the Donbas region;
• since the entry of the Russian Federation into the Syrian Civil War in 2015, the Russian Federation has targeted innocent civilians in Syria with attacks on civilian markets, medical facilities, and schools, and the Government of the Russian Federation provides material support to Syria, a nation currently designated as a state sponsor of terrorism, that has been used to target the Syrian people;
• the Russian Federation spreads terror throughout the world through private military networks of mercenaries, such as the Wagner Group, in an effort to project power cheaply and deniably, while the Wagner Group relies on the support of the Russian Federation and the Ministry of Defence to advance the foreign policy objectives of the Russian Federation;
• it was reported in February 2022 that more than 400 Russian mercenaries from the Wagner Group were dispatched to Kyiv with orders from the Kremlin to assassinate President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and members of the Government of Ukraine;
• armed forces of the Russian Federation have committed numerous summary executions against innocent civilians and have attempted to cover their atrocities with mass graves across Ukraine.

On July 20, Politico reported on the conversation between the Speaker of the US House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, and the head of the State Department, Anthony Blinken, during which she demanded that the Secretary of State declare Russia a sponsor of terrorism. Or, alternatively, that the Congress should do it.

And now Russia is trying to imitate it all, rather clumsily. It is just attempting to create a parallel legal reality in which it is Ukraine with its “office of Zelenskyy” that are guilty of the bloody war.

This “reality” has already been reflected in the so-called “international tribunal over Ukrainian militants”, which, according to the reports of Russian media, will be joined by “representatives of the Russian Federation, Belarus, and Syria.”

The Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation, headed by Bastrykin, is constantly working to create a parallel “legal” reality, regularly giving instructions to study the circumstances of “attacks by Ukrainian neo-Nazis on civilians of Donbas” and initiate criminal cases about these “incidents.”

Preparations for pseudo-referendums on joining the Russian Federation in the temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories also became this part of the Russian “parallel legal reality.”

The head of the Committee of the Federation Council on Constitutional Legislation, Klishas, has already “legitimized” it, declaring that “Ukraine will soon lose the status of a subject of international law, de facto it is already so.”

If that’s what they believe, it seems counterintuitive that Lavrov would urge Ukraine to engage in peace talks.

Sladkov’s Ukrainian plan” dedicated to Kadyrov

However, there are fantasies about a future “Russian Ukraine.” One of the “war correspondents” Sladkov explained his idea like this:

“In the territorial aspect: all of Ukraine will be under Russia. All of it. Because if you leave at least one square meter to the Ukrainian Nazis, they will not grow bread on it, but prepare anti-Russian saboteurs.

In the political aspect: no autonomous republics (only Donbas deserved it), but only full-fledged regions of Russia. In conquered territories, one should behave like a conqueror, not a humble guest. People love masters, not wusses.

In the military aspect: first, there will be a period of defeat of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and national gangs. Generals of the Ministry of Defence are in charge at this stage. The second period is the search for and neutralization of leaders, the destruction of gangs and the underground. At this time, the FSB will be in charge. The third period is the complete cessation of force resistance of the remnants of the Ukrainian Nazis. This period up to the Russian Guard.”

IN REALITY, what Sladkov wrote in a crime in itself. Only the humanitarian aspirations of Europeans at the future international trial of information criminals will save Sladkov from a capital punishment, replacing it with a life sentence.

Second, even in Russia, this organized criminal information group is already getting some grief about such “geostrategic” publications. So far, in the Telegram channels of other Kremlin protégés. But the trend is there.

Third, it seems like Sladkov’s “plan” is dedicated to Kadyrov, who decorated the uniforms of his “TikTok warriors” with a sticker “to conquer Kyiv” in a feat of new pro-Putin creativity.

Fourth (and this is much more important than any commissioned publications), considering the “huge success” of the Russian army in Ukraine over five months of the “special operation” with 40,000 soldiers lost (which is more than in all wars that the USSR and Russia were involved in since 1970s), the “information warriors” are in danger of execution by their own people — for false reporting, no less.   

Quitting American dollars, Volodin style: theory and practice

While coming up with various stories of legal and military success, Russia is also engaging in financial fantasies. On July 26, State Duma Speaker Volodin announced the decline of the dollar in another anti-American rant.

IN REALITY, any freshman studying economics would crush Volodin’s reasoning without any particular effort. It is in the American currency that a huge amount of debt is nominated — approximately 40%. Accordingly, the hypothetical collapse of the USD will lead to the destruction of the entire global financial system.

Even during the financial crisis of 2008, non-American banks had international obligations equivalent to $27 trillion. About 18 billion of them were nominated in American currency. As a result, the US Federal Reserve had to increase its lines for foreign central banks — this was the only way to satisfy the demand for USD.

However, this financial crisis ultimately made the US currency even more influential as it expanded its use in global trade. In 2018, the liabilities of banks in Germany, France and the UK in US dollars were greater than those in euros and pounds sterling.

So in the near future, we can expect a boots in the demand for USD. This was proven by Russians themselves, since they rushed to buy American currency right after sanctions were imposed — rather than their own Russian rouble.

In addition, on July 22, the head of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, Nabiullina, said that “even under the most apocalyptic scenario, there will be cash dollars in Russia because Russians have about 85 billion of them in their hands.”

So, before trying to “stick it” to the US, Volodin, an engineer by education, should sign up for courses of basic financial literacy.

But all these Russian cries about how they can survive without the US dollar is nothing more than a manifestation of their mantra about the “multipolar world.” And these cries are connected exclusively with the financial sanctions introduced by the USA and the EU against the Russian banking system, which are causing numerous problems for Russia.

READ ALSO: Having Lost Europe and America, Putin Is Discovering Africa

Perhaps it makes sense to look at Zimbabwe, whose bill of 100 trillion local dollars 14 years ago has forever become the symbol of a full financial collapse.

At that time, the local authorities even classified inflation data. There were only expert estimates, and according to one of them, inflation in 2008 was 89.7 sextillion percent. A sextillion is a one followed by 21 zeros.

In 2009, Zimbabwe abandoned its dollar and switched to payments in foreign currencies. The local currency came back ten years later, but now, the Zimbabwean dollar dropped compared to USD by more than 150 times.

This time, Zimbabwe decided to fight inflation in a trivial way — by issuing gold coins, the value of which will be determined not by the face value, but by the market price of gold.

The value of each coin is equal to the price of an ounce plus 5% to cover minting costs. At the end of last week, an ounce was worth 1,724 — not Russian rubles, Chinese yuan or Indian rupees, but US dollars. 

Given the embargo on the export of Russian gold, Moscow, too, can make its own gold coins and fight against the US dollar. 

Moscow has found the first kamikaze

And finally, about another Russian parallel reality — the informational reality. Yes, everybody knows it, everyone is tired of it, and sane people feel nothing other than sarcasm about it. It is increasingly difficult for Russian propaganda to come up with something new to promote a bunch of its narratives, which must justify the main one: “we attacked so that we would not be attacked.” They have come up with a multitude of things, from Satanist Nazis to “birds carrying bioweapons under their wings.”

But on July 26, pro-Kremlin content creators came up with a new horror character called “a Ukrainian kamikaze.”

Of course, you could try to explain to the propagandists that Zaporizhia and a town in Zaporizhia oblast where the Russian Guard is temporarily stationed are different things. But we’ll let it go: they did their best. 

It seems that the “kamikaze” was born just to assist Mironov with his “terrorist state.” If propaganda continues to find “Ukrainian kamikazes” in the occupied territories, it can become another trend used to intimidate Russia’s own population. The story about suicide bombers was previously used only in the Wahhabi-Islamist context. But now, the Ukrainian “Nazi” content takes over. 

IN REALITY, opposition politician Illya Yashyn, who is currently in jail awaiting trial for a 10-year-sentence for “discrediting the Russian army” (telling the truth about the tragedy in Bucha), aptly described the entire parallel reality in which Russian society exists. 

He said that the UN must recognize listening to the “Radio of Russia” as a form of torture.

All these parallel realities (legal, military, financial, informational) point to serious problems for Putin. Primarily mental problems. Perhaps this “suicide bomber” is also looking for ways to avoid a real international tribunal in the future. But that’s not going to work anyway.