Agenda Setting: Russian Ukraine Conflict

 Found this blog post today. It sums up the entire Ukrainian war in a single post. The Western media wants to portray the Ukrainians as helpless victims besieged by the evil Russians while the Russians want to portray themselves as the good guys who are doing the right thing and are helping the world against the evil west (or the "Golden Billion") as Putin calls them. It ties up in a way to my earlier post about how Russian conspiracies want to penetrate into the developing world and convince them that the west is bad. In a way this will be bad if those in developing countries actually believe this. 

https://sites.psu.edu/jwaniewskicas272/2022/09/16/agenda-setting-the-russia-ukraine-conflict/

In any case, it will all be over once SHTF.

- Stay tuned 

Reviewing Commercials and the Intersection between Psychological Operations and the News Media

 Reading this weeks chapter about how the media can't really change perspectives but can enhance them by catering to them really reminds me of the current Special Operations Forces that we have and how they are doing psychological operations across the world and have been doing so for quite a while. Here's one example of the C.I.A working in the Phillipines. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3pfsSh_fTAc

Pretty scary stuff. But something you would expect out of the U.S during the Cold War. And to think that this is the stuff that they DECIDED to release to the public. Anyways, they most certainly exploited the superstitions to their advantage. In Psychological Operations they adhere to the idea that you can't change people's minds either. There was another thing that I am reminded of that plays into stereotypes, although it is about our superstitions. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_uNPZKJqbE8

The title of the commercial "Ghosts in the Machine" really says it all as it plays in on all of our conspiratorial beliefs like the illuminati and the idea of the U.S starting revolutions in distant countries (that one, though, is more routed in reality). In the end it encourages people to come join them in the most creepy but probably effective way to date (ignoring Emma and her two moms). 

Casualties Mounting on Ukrainian Lines? Positive Biases in the Ukraine war.

This week our learning material stressed nothing but the effects of media negativity on views of politicians. But what about when the media has positive biases? This can happen in wartime as there have been whole books written about how positive biases and overconfidence in winning can effect wars. 

https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674015760

There's also the fact that currently Ukraine is losing up to 1,000 men in the Donbass region since June. They also, of course, need more weapons to fight their war. 

https://www.axios.com/2022/06/15/ukraine-1000-casualties-day-donbas-arakhamia

There is also Russia's ability to effectively employ Shaheed-136 drones in Ukraine meaning that, "nowhere is safe." They will also soon be buying more missiles from Iran to shore up their dwindling missile supplies in the war against Ukraine. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpeSQ3ak3X8&t=305s

Now, overall Russia is still losing the war. What it needs to turn itself around is a battlefield victory to increase morale and then follow that up with more victories to secure their gains. All in all, highly unlikely, but you will never know what is true in the fog of war. 

- Stay Tuned