Russian media coverage of the downing of a passenger flight over eastern Ukraine included a number of fanciful theories. A new book tells of how the Kremlin reshapes the truth.
But what is a Russian point of view? What does Russia Today stand for?” I asked.
“Oh, there is always a Russian point of view,” he answered. “Take a banana. For someone it’s food. For someone else it’s a weapon. For a racist it’s something to tease a black person with.”
Nothing Is True And Everything Is Possible, Peter Pomerantsev
When a Malaysian Airlines passenger flight was shot down over rebel-controlled eastern Ukraine last July, Russian media adamantly denied that rebel forces were responsible.
Instead they floated a series of alternative theories, among them that Russia’s enemies had secretly recovered the wreckage of a Malaysian Airlines flight that had gone missing the previous March and dumped it in eastern Ukraine. Another had it that the plane was carrying corpses and not live passengers when it left Amsterdam. Another that it was a failed assassination attempt by the Ukrainian military, which shot down the plane in the mistaken belief that Russian President Vladimir Putin was on board.
By generating a fog of fantasies, the Kremlin obscured the explanation that almost certainly is true: Russian-backed rebels blew the plane out of the sky. Continue reading