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The more shocking/interesting aspect of this interview, for me, is to hear how the KGB (and its successor organization(s) in Russia, I imagine) would work over
by cs702 5y ago
The more shocking/interesting aspect of this interview, for me, is to hear how the KGB (and its successor organization(s) in Russia, I imagine) would work over multiple decades to "subvert" the people of a country, in four stages -- demoralization, destabilization, crisis, and normalization:
1) demoralize the people of a country over a period of "at least 15 to 20 years;"
2) destabilize the country's institutions over a period of "2 to 5 years;"
3) precipitate a crisis that would normally unfold over a period of "up to 6 weeks;" and
4) normalize the new state of affairs.
Whether the KGB and its successor organization(s) could have or might have been successful is of course debatable, but no one can deny this kind of persistent effort to subvert another country's people over such a long horizon is... audacious (words fail me).
In particular, I find the idea of a long-term government-sponsored program whose goal is to "demoralize" people a bit upsetting: It stands directly against the let's-roll-up-our-sleeves, we-can-do-it optimism for which US entrepreneurs have long been known around the world.
- mantas 5y agoDemocratically elected governments have a very short shelf life. 4, 8 years if lucky. Meanwhile authoritarian governments have much much more time. And since authoritarian governments tend to have nepotistic tendencies, the play can even span generations.
- nradov 5y agoElected governments come and go, but the "deep state" bureaucracy and associated private think tanks serve to maintain some level of policy continuity. Very few autocratic governments in the modern era have successfully managed a transition to the next generation.
- baybal2 5y agoPutin was in power for around 23 years, during which he completely dulled Western sense of danger by constantly blowing hot, and cold. What Russians call "blowing fuflo" was certainly in use by the time the second flare up of second Chechnya war - 2003. They funded a gazillion of cheap academicians, for-profit journalists, and think tanks with no apparent goal besides just keeping the buzz about it going, no matter what the actual argument was. Basically they reduced the signal-to-noise ratio of sensible political discourse to near none, which then swayed the West into making bad decisions, and assured no high quality leadership can emerge, being outshouted by that cacophonic chorus of random opinion leaders. The inability to take things for what they are, "analysis paralysis," politicians, and business leaders not being able to put a single coherent paragraph without an army of advisers — this is what it is. They don't care what people keep arguing about for as long as they keep talking, and doing nothing.
- augstein 5y agoWith all the right wing support Putin is getting lately, I can‘t help but wonder if they were at least partially successful in subverting our society.
- mardifoufs 5y agoFunnily enough, if you watch the entirety of the videos from this guy he is pretty clearly talking about leftist subversion. Without taking any side here or agreeing with him, just listen to when he talks about subversive education (for example he talks about a push for more social sciences and other "unsubstantial" education ) or to what he refers to as demoralization (which is according to his definition is saying stuff like america was never great, we shouldn't feel proud of our past, and just in general a constant push for victimization). It's funny how I guess both sides ended up thinking he is referring to the other side though.
- noobermin 5y agoBezmenov is ideologically a conservative and pushed conservative ideology once he was in America, so it warrants taking this with a grain of salt. That said, today it feels like Russian misinfo targets anti-establishment groups on both sides, both far-right and far-left types.
- mardifoufs 5y agoOh I completely agree that he doesn't have a lot of credibility but I guess his message is still theoretically interesting even if it's potentially only fiction.
- inglor_cz 5y agoThis is also from 1984. Things have changed quite a bit from then. Back then, organizations like Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament were Soviet-influenced.
- panzagl 5y agoWell, to divide a country you need two sides...
- denormalized 5y ago> It stands directly against the let's-roll-up-our-sleeves, we-can-do-it optimism for which US entrepreneurs have long been known around the world. This is an interesting choice of contrast between the KGB and US entrepreneurs. How about when compared to US intelligence agencies? Do you think they are more similar or different in their methodologies?
- jka 5y agoHere's a thought exercise: next time you're reading a press release by the U.S. Department of Defense, try replacing "China" or "Russia" with "the CIA", and see whether the contents of the announcement continue to make sense. As with any country, different organizations have different missions and philosophies -- and so do the people within them.
- baybal2 5y ago> How about when compared to US intelligence agencies? Read my another comment below, by having a whoping 23 intelligence agencies, USA condemned its leadership to a shower of opinions out of which no correct one can be synthesized. Only the size of antenna maters, not how powerful is the receive amplifier, or the number of them. If you link up 23 pre-amps in a row, you will not get a 23 times clearer signal, but 23 times more noise.
- elahieh 5y agoIf there’s 23 times more noise, but the opinions are uncorrelated, that’s where the random forest approach comes into its own for a decision tree based on classification or regression. Like time series forecasting, and you can choose the weights based on how well the agencies performed in similar situations in the past. “In the multitude of counsellors there is safety” — Prov 11:14
- credit_guy 5y agoCountries need to have multiple intelligence agencies. Having a single powerful one is absolutely courting disaster. Dictators understand this simple fact, and all dictatorships have lots of intelligence agencies spying on each other, so a coup becomes less likely. Coups still happen, obviously. But democracies shouldn't fear coups, you say? 6 of January, I say back. Or Charles de Gaulle (wait, you didn't know that Charles de Gaulle successfully executed a coup in France in 1958? [1]) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_1958_crisis_in_France https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_1958_crisis_in_France
- pvg 5y agoThe GRU is an intelligence service that's existed in parallel with other ones and is not a 'successor to the KGB'. Perhaps you're thinking of the FSB.
- cs702 5y agoThanks. You're right. I meant both. I edited the comment to reflect as much.
- tablespoon 5y ago> Whether the KGB (and its successor, the GRU) could have or might have been successful is of course debatable, but no one can deny this kind of persistent effort to subvert another country's people over such a long horizon is... audacious (words fail me). > In particular, I find the idea of a long-term government-sponsored program whose goal is to "demoralize" people a bit upsetting: It stands directly against the let's-roll-up-our-sleeves, we-can-do-it optimism for which US entrepreneurs have long been known around the world. Though, IIRC, their subversion projects use a similar strategy to VCs: throw a bunch of efforts at the wall, and see which ones stick. For a lot of it, I don't think they had a big master plan, but tasked agents with coming up and implementing ideas for subversion and disinformation.
- jostmey 5y agoI don't disagree with the sequence of events, just the cause and effect. I don't think these historical events are orchestrat-able or controlled by governments; rather, these events evolve over time when problems in society are not addressed.
- walkhour 5y agoCan't it be both? Problems get worse when they are not addressed and foreign governments contribute to demoralizing the population?
- foobarian 5y agoI am skeptical because of how small the sample size is. This could well be a case of, a bunch of "spy architecture" astronauts in the KGB come up with this brainy scheme, a bunch of years go by, they find one place where it worked, and go "A ha! Our thing works!"
- tremon 5y agoWhy specifically government-sponsored program? I see parallels with how the free press (i.e. not government) of England undermined the EU over a period of 25 years with misinformation, and then capitalized on the destabilization of the Euro (the Greece bailout) to precipitate a referendum.
- walkhour 5y agoYou could argue the English press did it because they thought it was the best for the country. This is obviously not the case of this particular government-sponsored program, they have no problem seeing blood on the streets, in fact they know at least some blood is unavoidable.
- doopy1 5y agoCheck out the book "Confessions of an Economic Hitman" - it's about the US playboook. It's not any better.
- throwoutway 5y agoI got the feeling that book was fanciful, and maybe only 30% accurate and 70% fantasy. Has anyone corroborated it?
- doopy1 5y agoI don't doubt that the mechanics of how it's done are embellished to make a fun narrative, but the theme of tricking small nations into debt to secure a foothold is very believable to me.
- throwoutway 5y agoI agree with that assessment. China is doing this right now with their belt and roads initiative
- shostack 5y ago[flagged]
- ericmcer 5y agoThis seems like a really effective technique, I am sure left leaning people are pointing at conservatives as being turned Trumpers and Russian shills while conservatives look at liberals as socialists and communists who don't want to work. The reality is that a society made up of people who think their country is terrible and don't feel any responsibility to work to support it is probably not going to last that long.