The world in black and white

The last few months have seen subtle and less subtle shifts in the pro-Kremlin messaging about Ukraine and ongoing international diplomacy to end Russia’s illegal war of aggression.

Go positive on the US

While Moscow consistently frames Ukraine and the European Union as warmongering and hostile to Russia, the framing of the United States had a distinctly different, more positive tone. Russian state-controlled and other pro-Kremlin outlets have been praising President Donald Trump – sometimes effusively – and suggested that his administration’s views on Ukraine and on the war that Moscow is waging against it were gradually aligning with those of the Russian leadership.

‘Europe vs America’

The Kremlin’s flagship disinformation project RT English quoted a commentator alleging that ‘we have reached a point where, with regard to Russia, the US is more reasonable and less bellicose than its currently semi-rebellious European vassals’. Meanwhile, its French-language edition, targeting audiences across Africa, summed up this false narrative with more streamlined headline – ‘The United States wants peace, Europe wants war’.

Russia continued to showcase itself as the epitome of rationality. In this twisted reality, Moscow only wants peace – albeit a peace that meets all its maximalist demands. Here, too, pro-Kremlin pundits rushed to highlight the alleged alignment between views in Moscow and Washington. One claimed that President Trump supported Putin’s position that Ukraine’s acceptance of Russian conditions was a precondition for a ceasefire, while another described the US President as probably the only leader on Earth who recognises the need to address the supposed ‘root causes’ of the Ukraine conflict.

Friendly reminder – in the Kremlin-speak ‘root causes’ is shorthand for Russia’s demands for a total surrender of Ukraine and a carte blanche to Russia to erode the sovereignty of its neighbours and the wider security architecture in Europe. This include having the US reducing its footprint and role in Europe.

A desire for peace?

As is usually the case, pro-Kremlin outlets prominently quoted Russian officials parroting the official line. For example, RT in English quoted Russia’s First Deputy Ambassador to the United Nations, Dmitry Polyanskiy, as saying that ‘Trump’s desire for peace is genuine’. A TV commentator implied that the US and Russia are a united force, saying that ‘Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump will achieve their goals in Ukraine’.

To sum up Moscow’s imaginary White House-Kremlin alliance against Brussels and Kyiv, one pro-Kremlin outlet asserted that ‘Trump considers Putin not only a “friend” but an equal with whom he hopes to conclude excellent deals in the future’. In truth, this the Kremlin’s gushing about newfound ‘alliances’ only betrays Moscow’s long-running manipulative effort to be perceived as an equal, a superpower underpinned by the purposeful cultivation of the myth of Russia’s invincibility.

Ups and downs

Some ebbs and flows were visible, however, in the Kremlin’s praise of US President Donald Trump.

Pro-Kremlin commentators addressing Polish-speaking audiences appeared more sceptical of Trump and US peace efforts than their counterparts operating in other languages. They claimed that the contentious meeting between Trump and Zelenskyy in the Oval Office on 28 February was ‘staged by the deep state’, that Trump is deceiving Russia and wants to deploy European troops inside Ukraine, and that ‘the USA is a treasonous negotiator despite all of Trump’s promises’.

A few stories pushed variations of a narrative arguing that Trump is either not really Russia’s friend, or that the US is simply following its own interests by disengaging from the negotiations, even if such disengagement might benefit Russia. A German-language piece in early April suggested that President Trump’s approach to the war had become ‘more confrontational and militaristic’ while a commentator on Russian TV said that Washington’s ‘refusal’ to participate in peace talks ‘would suit Russia well’.

Such manipulative narratives often appeared linked to specific events. Many pro-Kremlin commentators turned sour on Trump after the US President claimed repeatedly in early and mid-May that the US ‘won’ World War II – a claim that ran counter to Russia’s official historical revisionism which was on full display in a pompous military parade on Red Square on its 9 May Victory Day.

Friends again

But after a phone call between President Trump and Vladimir Putin on 19 May, pro-Kremlin pundits once again softened their tone, with some resuming their praise of President Trump and foregrounding an alleged transatlantic split. A commentator described the call as ‘a failure’ for those ‘who had already begun to gloat in advance, anticipating a quarrel… between the presidents of the Russian Federation and the United States’.

One outlet quoted Russian Federation Council Deputy Speaker Konstant Kosachev saying that ‘two negotiating camps have evolved, with the Russian-American one working towards peace in Ukraine and the other camp, led by Ukraine and Europe, seeking to continue the conflict.’ On Russian TV, a commentator alleged that ‘for European warmongers, this [call] means one thing: they will no longer have a place at the negotiating table’.

‘European warmongers’

On the theme of ‘European warmongers’, pro-Kremlin messaging has been consistent throughout the last few months. It intensified as it sought to exploit alleged divisions between the US and Europe. In particular, pro-Kremlin outlets and commentators often framed Russia’s war against Ukraine as a partial proxy war with the US and Russia on one side and Ukraine, the EU, and the UK on the other.

Examples of this narrative are too numerous, and tedious, to list here. But a selection would include an outlet in Uzbekistan portraying Europe as determined to continue the war at all costs; an article in Armenian asserting that the EU’s goal is to ‘break’ Russia; a segment on Russian TV featuring a ‘US political commentator’ claiming that the EU is ‘obsessed with… prolonging this conflict as long as possible’; and commentary in an Azerbaijani outlet also alleging that ‘some circles in Europe will try to prolong the war as long as possible’.

Other articles picked up their habitual anti-elite, anti-globalist messaging, claiming that powerful European business families are against peace because they want to continue making and selling weapons and that ‘globalist elites’ want a war with Russia.

No peace to keep

The Kremlin was particularly concerned with skewing, tainting and manipulating the idea to deploy a European peacekeeping force to Ukraine as part of a negotiated peace. A Russian diplomat quipped that Russia would never agree to have a ‘toxic’ neighbour – Ukraine – hosting such a force. Others described such a force as unfeasible and escalatory and one commentator referred to the idea as ‘completely unrealistic and reckless’. Moscow’s efforts to prevent the deployment of European forces to Ukraine has traditionally been using nuclear sabre-rattling rhetoric.

Isolate Ukraine and the EU

In recent months, pro-Kremlin messaging has increasingly portrayed Europe as the aggressor and the U.S., particularly under President Trump, as a potential peace partner, framing the conflict in stark, binary terms to exploit transatlantic divisions and legitimise Russia’s demands. This narrative shift underscores a strategic propaganda effort to isolate Ukraine and the EU while courting perceived alignment with Washington.

The recent meetings, hosted in Turkey, between Russian and Ukrainian delegations directly do not alter this Russian narrative and tactic since the profiles and mandate of the Russian delegation is rather limited. Having a light-weight as Vladimir Medinsky leading the Russian delegation is a message of low esteem of the process.

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Article and pictures first time published on the EUvsDisinfo web page. Prepared for publication by volunteers from the Res Publica - The Center for Civil Resistance.