Russia’s Improved Information Operations: From Georgia to Crimea

In the Western press much attention has been focused on Russia’s interference in the 2016 U.S. election, by spreading disinformation broadly on the Internet and social media platforms. Russia (and of course the United States) has long used propaganda as a psychological weapon in hot wars, cold wars, and even times of relative peace. In an article published in the US Army War College journal Parameters, Emilio Iasiello, a cyberintelligence advisor to Fortune 100 clients, says “nonkinetic options” are now a core part of Russia’s military and geopolitical strategy: using information and deception to disrupt opponents and influence internal and global audiences.

But propaganda hasn’t always prevailed. Iasiello reviews Russia’s information operations in its 2008 invasion of Georgia, and finds that Georgia ultimately won the information war. Russia relied on pre-Internet propaganda tactics such as using traditional media to deliver key messaging to the international community, and trying to position Georgia as the aggressor and Russia as merely defending its citizens. But Georgia fought back with its own extensive counterinformation campaign, and ultimately won the battle for international support.

Iasiello says Russia may have lost the Georgian conflict, but learned that the Internet could be used as a weapon and began revising and expanding its information war strategy. In its 2014 annexation of the Crimean region in Ukraine, Russia applied the lessons from the Georgian conflict to orchestrate a rapid and nearly bloodless victory. Russian state actors directed cyberattacks to shut down Crimea’s telecommunications and websites, and to jam the mobile phones of key Ukrainian officials. Russian hackers intercepted documents on Ukrainian military strategy, launched DDOS attacks on Ukrainian and NATO websites, disrupted the Ukrainian Central Election Commission network, planted “fake news” on fake websites and Russian media, and employed a cadre of trolls to comment on news and social media for the purpose of distorting reality and confusing Ukraine’s allies.

According to Iasiello, the 2014 Crimean annexation was a case study in the use of social media to control messaging and sow discord among the Ukrainian population and the international community. Thus the birth of Russia’s new strategy for “hybrid” warfare, using trolls, fake websites, social media, and the international news media to massively spread disinformation and confusion about the conflict.

Iasiello says Russia is vastly outpacing the United States on information war tactics, and using its experience to refine its strategies for different conflicts. In essence, Russia is playing the long game to sow discord and division, so as to weaken Western alliances. His recommendations include developing a U.S. counterinformation center, using analytics and artificial intelligence to identify online disinformation, and increasing international cooperation to combat various forms of Russian propaganda. He concludes that the Internet and social media are now an international battleground, and Russia is currently winning the information war.

Reference

Iasiello, Emilio. 2017. “Russia’s Improved Information Operations: From Georgia to Crimea.” US Army War College: Parameters [Summer 2017], US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters, 47 (2): 51–63. https://www.hsdl.org/?abstract&did=803998.