In the past, this policy was used to aid the military might of the old British Empire. It would bring certain dividends as far as the country’s colonial policy was concerned. The method of playing off countries and politicians against one another was also successfully used in the curtailing of competitors rivaling for new lands. Naturally, it is much easier to achieve one’s goals (often not very noble), including provoking countries toward armed conflict, by creating a nontransparent atmosphere contaminated by lies.
Though today Great Britain is not as capable and powerful as it used to be (with the exception of the City of London’s financial levers), London continues to use its core political tool of feeding unverified and in many cases outright false information.
Today the British monarchy practices this policy in respect of Argentina, threatening to repeat the Falklands War, despite the fact that the British, as well as everybody else, are well aware that Argentina cannot afford such a military campaign because of a weak army and lack of adequate financial resources.
British politicians also employ this tool to tame the EU, openly threatening Brussels with its withdrawal from the union, as we all have been witnessing recently.
As for the British mass media, it most eagerly plunges into any anti-Russian rhetoric and, by the way, gets paid well by Washington for doing so. Sometimes things get absolutely out of hand when the British media begins promoting clearly fabricated “sensational material,” plucked out of thin air, accusing the Russian submarine fleet of something as ludicrous as the mass death of whales. In the meantime, the highly topical social problems of the British society are deliberately neglected. For example, the issues concerning slavery in Great Britain, drug abuse, human rights violation, racism, social inequality, etc.
The British media does not hesitate to censor and clip materials ready for publication, which correctly reflect specific events involving Russia, to achieve the maximum anti-Russian effect. For example, a story on the investigation of the crash of the Malaysian MH-17 airplane prepared by anchor Olga Ivshina was deleted from the BBC’s Russian service website.
After a meeting in Munich, where the situation in Syria had been discussed, some western mass media accused Russia of the alleged slaughter of civilians and delays in the delivery of humanitarian aid to Syrian cities. They also blamed the stream of refugees from Syria to Europe on the actions of the Russian aerospace forces. And (no surprise here) it was precisely British media that was demonizing (clearly under Washington’s orders) the actions of the Russian aerospace forces in Syria with the greatest zeal. Examination of publications by British authors, however, reveals that they base they articles on assumptions and speculations rather than on facts and arguments.
Perhaps the British media “muddying the waters” should be reminded that their international counterparts have been (for some years now), on the contrary, blaming western air raids for the mass murder of civilians in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and many other countries. It would suffice to give just one example: recently USA Today publicly accused Obama of the murder of thousands of civilians. Some time ago The Intercept published a series of classified documents proving that 90% of the casualties caused by US strikes are civilians that have no connection to terrorist acts. The US, however, classifies the victims as the “destroyed enemies” and the British media, eating out of Washington’s hand, eagerly spreads this twisted truth.
Accusations that Russian air force strikes force the population out of Syria do not stand up to critical examination either. And it is well known today that the vast majority of refugees, driven by the fear of Daesh and danger of chaos caused by the poor judgement of the West and its military interventions in the Middle East, Afghanistan and Libya, have already fled from Syria to Europe (and it had happened well before the Russian aerospace forces set foot in Syria). As for the Syrian citizens, they mostly stay in the territories controlled by the Syrian government. The majority of refugees fleeing to Europe originate not from Syria, but from Turkey, Iraq and Libya. In many cases, they possess forged Syrian passports acquired from Turkish criminal groups or even from Turkish authorities and special services.
As for the British journalists fanning the flames of the story where Russia is blamed for the calamities of the residents of the blocked Syrian cities, they should review UN statistics reflecting the humanitarian aftermath of the western anti-Syrian sanctions: thousands of Syrians went jobless, the pharmaceutical industry and health sector are basically destroyed. And, actually, it was with the support of Russian aerospace forces that the air forces of Syria liberated Nubul and Al-Zazra after a two-year terrorist blockade, and soon thereafter the first humanitarian aid reached these and other Syrian cities and towns.
Western journalists, first of all British, should launch an investigation to answer the questions of where the humanitarian aid sent to the devastated Syrian regions via Turkey was really delivered to, and why it was ending up in the camps of Daesh, Jabhat al-Nusra and of other terrorist groups (if, of course, they really want to understand the true state of affairs in Syria, instead of participating in the distasteful anti-Russian propaganda spread by London and Washington).
As for the readers of the British “news,” we wish they would wise up, take off their blinders to finally discern why London puts so much effort into the demonization of Russia, stigmatizing it as the chief global troublemaker, while devoting very little attention to the social situation in its own country and hardly discussing any current problems with its citizens.
Valeriy Kulikov, expert politologist, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.”