The Soviet Legacy of Russian Active Measures: New Vodka from Old Stills?

Gioe, David V.; Lovering, Richard M.; Pachesny, Tyler

doi:10.1080/08850607.2020.1725364

Cited by 5 publications

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“…50 Soviet propagandist Ivan Philipovich Ivanov later confirmed that the 1930s variation on active measures was the best enabler for socialism and guaranteed against the restoration of capitalism. 51 Seeing success in shaping internal influence and perceived protections via external projection, the Soviets imparted a holistic view and incorporated active measures into allied and foreign policy as well. 52 The intelligence services that conduct these practices represent an integral function of Russian legislation and are based on a long tradition.…”

Section: Journal Of Advanced Military Studiesmentioning

confidence: 98%

“…48 One of the most commonly applied practices against the United States during the Cold War and today is active measures, which finds its heritage in the Bolshevik October Revolution of 1917. 49 Lenin's fear of ideological subversion had an enormous impact on the way in which narratives were controlled to stabilize Communism. 50 Soviet propagandist Ivan Philipovich Ivanov later confirmed that the 1930s variation on active measures was the best enabler for socialism and guaranteed against the restoration of capitalism.…”

Section: Journal Of Advanced Military Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…49 Lenin's fear of ideological subversion had an enormous impact on the way in which narratives were controlled to stabilize Communism. 50 Soviet propagandist Ivan Philipovich Ivanov later confirmed that the 1930s variation on active measures was the best enabler for socialism and guaranteed against the restoration of capitalism. 51 Seeing success in shaping internal influence and perceived protections via external projection, the Soviets imparted a holistic view and incorporated active measures into allied and foreign policy as well.…”

Section: Journal Of Advanced Military Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…51 Seeing success in shaping internal influence and perceived protections via external projection, the Soviets imparted a holistic view and incorporated active measures into allied and foreign policy as well. 52 The intelligence services that conduct these practices represent an integral function of Russian legislation and are based on a long tradition. 53 Indeed, the Red Army's Officer's Handbook expressed concern over a weakening of socialist ideals via external anti-Communist propaganda.…”

Section: Journal Of Advanced Military Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Tackling Russian Gray Zone Approaches in the Post-Cold War Era

Burkholder

2023

JAMS

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To undermine U.S. military strength, state actors are increasingly operating in the ambiguous environment between peace and war known as the “gray zone.” These actions test U.S. response by exploiting the West’s rigid notion of conflict. Soviet actions toward the United States and other nations during the Cold War shared many similarities with contemporary Russian strategy. There is no current uniform definition of the gray zone, and the United States has not developed doctrine to address this challenge. Russia has adapted Soviet Cold War techniques for the digital and globalized age and effectively integrates instruments of power against the United States by targeting seams within culture, maintaining ambiguity, and controlling narratives. Countering these tactics requires that the United States modify its mindset toward conflict and improve integration of its own instruments of power.

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Section: Journal Of Advanced Military Studiesmentioning

confidence: 98%

Section: Journal Of Advanced Military Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Journal Of Advanced Military Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Journal Of Advanced Military Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Tackling Russian Gray Zone Approaches in the Post-Cold War Era

Burkholder

2023

JAMS

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“…Russia's current influence operations involve "information warfare, psychological operations, and deception campaigns" (Bagge, 2019, p. 23). Russia has long recognized the value in controlling and manipulating information (Soldatov and Borogan, 2017) and it draws from deep Soviet experience with information and influence operations (Andrew and Mitrokhin, 1999;Bagge, 2019;Gioe, Lovering and Pachesny, 2020). Russia-backed active measures in cyberspace have repackaged Soviet techniques for stoking already tense social divisions.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

How the Russian Influence Operation on Twitter Weaponized Military Narratives

Weinberg

Dawson²,

Edwards³

2023

iccws

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Since 2016, Russia has engaged in a dedicated influence operation against the United States to exacerbate existing cleavages in American society and to undermine US national security. Although distinctly modern in its use of social media platforms, the current methods align with old Soviet doctrine using information warfare to gain a strategic edge over competitors. We examine Russia’s use of military-related content and profiles in their influence operation on Twitter and, in particular, the strategic deployment of military narratives. Using data from Twitter’s comprehensive data archive of state-backed information operations, we find that 12.14% of the 1,408,712 tweets in English from 2009 through February 2021 contain military-related content. In addition, of the 2,370 fake accounts on Twitter tied to the IRA and GRU, 148 were from accounts posing as military or military-adjacent, and these accounts posted 12.7% of the influence operation’s tweets. Together, tweets containing military-related content or coming from fake military and military-adjacent profiles account for 22.6% of the tweets identified as part of the Russian influence operation on Twitter. The Russians used narratives related to veterans, particularly sacrifice narratives and post-Vietnam government betrayal of sacrifice narratives. Patriotic sacrifice narratives were used to gather and engage an audience and to legitimize and amplify the content and accounts. In contrast, betrayal of sacrifice narratives were weaponized to amplify and escalate divisive social issues by tying them to veterans’ sacrifices. We conclude the Russians amplified existing military narratives in American culture and used fake American military profiles to wrap anti-government sentiment in patriotic trappings to exacerbate existing social divisions. Turning Americans against their government achieves Russian strategic goals of removing American influence abroad and allowing Russia to have greater impact on the levers of international power that serve Russian interests.

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Cyber conflict or democracy “hacked”? How cyber operations enhance information warfare

Whyte

2020

Journal of Cybersecurity

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Are cyber-enabled information warfare (IW) campaigns uniquely threatening when compared with traditional influence operations undertaken by state actors? Or is the recent “hacking” of Western democracies simply old wine in new—but fundamentally similar—bottles? This article draws on classical theories of democratic functionality from the political science and communications studies fields to deconstruct the aims and effects of cyber-enabled IW. I describe democracies as information systems wherein the moderating functions of democratic discourse and policy deliberation rely on robust mechanisms for asserting the credibility, origination, and quality of information. Whereas the institutions of democracy are often compromised in ways that force failures of the system’s moderating dynamics, influence operations in the digital age act to subvert the traditional mechanisms of democratic functionality in new ways. Sophisticated digital age information operations create a multifaceted attribution challenge to the target state that amounts to unprecedented uncertainty about the nature and scope of the threat. However, the promise of cyber-enabled IW capabilities emerges more from the rewiring of modern democratic information environments around new media platforms than it does from the cyber conflict faculties of state actors. Rather, cyber operations act as an adjunct modifier of IW abilities that allow belligerent governments to secure new sources of private information, to divert attention from other pillars of IW campaigns, to compromise the capabilities of domestic counterintelligence assets and to tacitly coerce important members of society.

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The Soviet Legacy of Russian Active Measures: New Vodka from Old Stills?

Cited by 5 publications

References 0 publications

Tackling Russian Gray Zone Approaches in the Post-Cold War Era

Tackling Russian Gray Zone Approaches in the Post-Cold War Era

How the Russian Influence Operation on Twitter Weaponized Military Narratives

Cyber conflict or democracy “hacked”? How cyber operations enhance information warfare

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