Peter Pomerantsev

The story of Sefton Delmer (1904 - 1979), a British journalist who was born in Berlin and grew up in Germany as told by Peter Pomerantsev, a British journalist who was born in Kyiv. The book is principally about Nazi propaganda and Delmer’s important role in the production of British propaganda during the Second World War. Although entitled How to Win an Information War, it seems unlikely that British propaganda played much part in the Allies victory, and if one had to pick a winner in the battle between Sefton Delmer and Joseph Goebbels, I think the answer is clear.
It’s hard to read this story without thinking both of the deluge of propaganda that we are exposed to in the traditional media and of the layers of anonymous troll-driven propaganda on the internet - propaganda’s greatest friend. The story is one of a supposed necessity to fight manipulative lies with counter-lies. Ultimately the whole business is deeply depressing.
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Unless I missed it, the author never mentions or uses Delmer’s wife’s surname. She was born Isabel Nicholas.… (meer)

When the most brazen incidents of Russian interference into the 2016 US Federal Election were uncovered in the months following the election of Donald Trump, I must admit to have been a little surprised America didn’t take things into their own hands and lob a few (metaphorical, or not) grenades into the opposing camp.

Then again, Donald Trump was President. From his perspective no retribution was necessary. The right outcome had been achieved so he was at the very least indifferent to counter measures.

What we got was a taste of the kind of “full spectrum” war Russia had been waging against Ukraine for years. For years, NATO’s response was tepid. Propaganda is a big part of this warfare and the kind of propaganda we saw then — and are seeing following the full invasion of Ukraine — is intended to unmoor us from reality.

The Russian method blurs the line between war and peace.

During the Cold War the Soviet Union took similar measures to check American hypocrisy and adventurism.

But modern Russia is not the Soviet Union, so what is going on here?

I really don’ know. Past fears of encirclement don’t really make sense: if anything, Russia has more to lose from Chinese power in the future, whereas it rightly worried about the American block in the past.

The Russian tactic is to confuse, dismay, divide, and delay Western actions? Is Russia afraid of the west becoming united on climate change, or income inequality? Not likely. Is Russia afraid of a Libyan coup that leaves Putin in a ditch with his head cut off?

Is Putin afraid that people really don’t know how much money he and his cronies have syphoned out of the Russian economy? (The last estimate I saw was about US $800 billion.)

This book gives us an inkling about what life will mean when the powerful have no fear of facts. It includes references to a manual for dissidents and some examples in Russia and elsewhere where dissent is still possible.

America is stuck in its own information war which is having serious consequences for its own polity and the rest of us. American radicals have cottoned on to the Russian disinformation techniques.

That is worrisome on its own.

“Post cold war will be a period of sovereign murderers, where everyone invents their own “normal” humanity and their own “right” history.”

What is good for democracy in this age of information abundance?

Fact-checking for sure, but what else?… (meer)