The Espionage Web Expanding Across Europe

Europe is on edge, more so now that the U.S. has approved a $61-billion aid package to Ukraine after much stalling. The spy dens of the Cold War are back in operation, and the propaganda machines are running in full force, far beyond anything the Cold War could have produced and spread.

Germany has detained two suspected Russian spies for allegedly planning to sabotage U.S. military facilities there. Germany has also arrested four others for spying for China. One of those arrested was tied to the top candidate for European elections in June for the far-right populist party, Alternative for Germany–an extremist party accused of having ties to Russia. 

The espionage web will now further expand, with much greater intricacies, now that Putin has won another European country. Slovakia’s recent election of a new Russia-friendly president, Peter Pellegrini, has Brussels on edge. Hungary’s Orban was problematic enough, but now he has another EU ally. This is a fairly serious swing to the far right for Slovakia because it combines the power of Prime Minister Robert Fico (also Russia-friendly) with Pellegrini. This week, the new Slovak government moved to take full control of the public broadcaster, accusing it of being politically biased and not following the narrative preferred by the new Slovak government. 

So, espionage is undergoing a revival, and the propaganda machines have never run more smoothly, regardless of which side of the Atlantic you are on. There are two narratives here, and a multitude of news reports (very few from on the ground) are crammed into one or the other narrative until it fits. Russian think tanks take orders from Moscow. When Putin wants to escalate the rhetoric, he has military analysts and TV talk show hosts do it for him, with a controlled narrative, such as neatly packaged plans of attack for a potential war with NATO, which will invariably be picked up by “i-told-you-so” Western media. In the think tank alleyways of DC, a narrative is spun as well, but this isn’t Moscow, where Putin essentially dictates the narrative. This is DC, where two political parties and their far-right/far-left substratum draw a line in the sand and create diverging narratives of their own as to what is really going on in the Russia-Ukraine war. Less and less does it have to do with the actual war, and more and more does it have to do with domestic politics–just as it did for Putin until his re-election in March this year. 

The narratives change based on needs. Most recently, that was Moscow’s need for the Republicans to win their battle to quit sending military aid to Ukraine, and the White House’s need to get its aid package passed. 

The Russian narrative is now about spreading fear of entering a direct conflict with NATO, just to see what falls out of this tree Moscow is shaking. It’s also about sending a message to the Republicans, and to Trump, should he be elected in November. 

Russia’s key propagandist, TV talk show host Vladimir Sovolyev, is criticizing the U.S. Republican Party for betraying Moscow, and particularly Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, who flip-flopped on a $61-billion Ukraine aid package. Always hard at work, Solovyov then praised far-right Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, playing his audience a video clip of Greene vigilantly demanding an end to U.S. aid for Ukraine.