Watching Russian propaganda

I've been watching some Russian propaganda tonight- mainly because a friend of mine, an actor, sent me some links to it. Martin plays a cynical journalist for the BBC. If you don't speak Russian, you won't get much of it - although there are some parts in English.

The basic plot: An entomologist - born in Russia, raised in the US, travels to South Ossetia, just in time for the 2008 war to start. He's there to collect a rare butterfly - but his scientific mission is forgotten when the bullets start flying and the bombs start falling. Because he and his Russian assistant - a journalist - are there at the very beginning, they have proof that the Georgians started the war. But the Western Media doesn't want to hear their opinions or view the evidence. As my friend's character cynically tells them - it's a media war - and the news media collectively represent one of the most important weapons of war.

It was nice listening to Russian, and interesting to see Channel One's propaganda. It's not a very subtle piece. The Americans are at best clueless. Even the American "hero" is a ditz, accidentally inhaling a bug at one point. The Russian woman, at the other hand, is attractive, brave, gutsy, and honest.

The Georgians are brutal thugs who kill unarmed civilians.

The Russian are honorable soldiers, defending neighbors in need.

The South Ossetians are beleaguered and out-gunned.

I'm sure my friend got paid well.

A bomb from Russia

All of Saturday, I still felt the motion of the train, that gentle swaying back and forth. It was a long trip – nearly 11 hours – from Baku to Zaqatala. But the train ride itself was uneventful and even pleasant.

Of course, not everything is pleasant. The smell form the toilet down the hall, for example. But the people in general are friendly, and I frequently have interesting conversations on the train.

I met one man – a native of Zaqatala – who was returning after working in Baku. My acquaintance was not working in his profession exactly, so he didn’t really regard what he did as a real job. But it was a job.

He was quite open about his criticism of the government’s penchant for hanging posters of the president and the president’s father everywhere. He seemed to have some knowledge about how much each poster cost. I’ve wondered about this myself. He said that a small one costs 300 manat and they go up considerably from there – into the thousands of manat. This sounds realistic, and if you do that math – multiply how many such posters hang around the country – it is hard to escape the conclusion that a great deal of money is being spent on this propaganda.

My traveling companion wondered about different ways this money might be invested more profitably for the population.

Of course, the conversations nowadays nearly always turn to Georgia at some point, and today’s chat was no exception. My friend was full of nostalgia for the Soviet system – the equality, the social spending, the fact that people had reasonable jobs – but he was deeply suspicious of the Russians. In the ‘90s, he said, the Russians fired a missile of some sort at Zagatala, and it landed not far from the train station. Because the earth was so soft, it landed but didn’t explode immediately. The authorities detonated it specially, and it created a huge explosion.

As we rode by, he pointed out the crater. To be honest, I wouldn’t have noticed it otherwise. But the impact it made in people’s minds was deeper than the hole it created in the earth. People remember that Russia sent a bomb into Azerbaijan, and this colors their perception of the country.