Russia: history as myth?

On 31 October 2016, the world learned that a branch of the Russian National Security Council (NSC) has been discussing how to combat the ‘falsification of history’ in the run-up to the centenary of the October Revolution in 2017. It was a striking, but not wholly surprising, demonstration of the importance of history to the Russian security services.

Russian military doctrine states that the falsification of history is one element in the wider information war between Russia and the West. Western states are supposedly distorting the past in an attempt to exert psychological influence over the Russian people and weaken their will to resist. The Kremlin responds by promoting historical narratives designed to reinforce Russian patriotism, regardless of their truthfulness, while suppressing facts or interpretations that challenge these shibboleths.

This Alert looks at how and why Russia is developing alternative historical narratives. Moscow hopes to achieve two goals: to propagate a black-and-white version of the past that it can deploy in foreign policy and, more importantly, to minimise the chances of domestic unrest by inhibiting freedom of thought.

• Primary Source

ESO: Background information: The ‘new Oprichnina’ and the engineering of souls http://www.europeansources.info/record/the-new-oprichnina-and-the-engineering-of-souls/

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