As expected, Russia and its agents of influence from other countries launched a large-scale psop against Ukraine, namely, spreading through certain foreign media and “trustworthy sources”a fake report about the “humongous” losses of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
But, as happens with Russian propagandists, the psyop was executed just too clumsily. But first things first…
So, from Sunday afternoon, reports about the Ukrainian military losses were being thrown in waves into the Russian information space. At the same time, none of these reports, let’s say, were consistent in terms of the figures voiced.
The locomotive of the narrative on the “colossal” losses of the Armed Forces of Ukraine was Trump-loing Colonel Douglas McGregor, who, on the Judging Freedom YouTube channel said that during a meeting with Lloyd Austin, Ukrainian CinC Valeriy Zaluzhnyi allegedly told him about the actual losses of the Ukrainian army at 257K, and that the population of Ukraine had shrunk to 18M.
I think not everyone remembers or knows who McGregor is, so let me remind you that this “colonel” in 2014 supported the occupation of Crimea by Russia, of which he spoke with RT. On February 27, 2022, it was he who declared that the Ukrainian army was done, and that Russia’s victory was obvious.
Even on September 12, on the air of the infamous liar and manipulator Tucker Carlson, McGregor said that the Ukrainian army had practically been defeated, and other nonsense of this kind… Well, you get it. The Trumpist minion, who is also playing along with the Kremlin propaganda, got involved in executing the psyop, thereby failing the effort in the bud.
After all, everyone knows, even in the GOP, who Douglas McGregor is, how much his petty soul is worth, and how “valuable” and “reliable” his statements are.
In addition to Douglas McGregor, a certain message from a certain Turkish media, Hurseda, was thrown into the information field, referring to a leak from Israeli intelligence that the Armed Forces of Ukraine had 157 thousand dead, 234 thousand wounded, and thousands more dead foreigners from the USA, Poland, Lithuania, etc. d.
At the same time, according to this media outlet, and, consequently, the Israel “intelligence”, Russia’s losses amounted to only 18,480. It remains to wonder why Russia, with such insignificant losses and such devastating death toll among the Ukrainian troops decided to flee from Chernihiv, Kyiv, Sumy, Kharkiv, and Mykolaiv regions and part of Kherson regions, announcing additional mobilization to call up 300,000 new soldiers?
Thus, in just a day, two sources at once, represented by the corrupt conspiracy theorist Douglas McGregor and information dump Hurseda, issued conflicting data on the “colossal” losses of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, which was immediately echoed by Russian propagandists.
In fact, the task of spreading this fake report was immediately picked up by all Russian law enforcement and security agencies, but due to the lack of coordination, which is a classic for Russia, they started circulating radically different data. But you know what’s the funniest thing?
Douglas McGregor reported the Ukrainian army death toll at 257K, while the Turkish dumpster Hurseda wrote 157K. It seems that either McGregor or Hurseda’s handlers made a mistake in one digit when transferring the guidebook, or it was one of the actors involved in the act who allowed this blunder while sharing the narrative.
In general, this wide-reaching psyop resulted in a wide-reaching embarrassment. But here’s what’s interesting about this whole story. When Russian propagandists launch such spins, they try to divert public attention from Russia’s own failures and often use manipulative data similar to their own, actual figures. “It was not our plane that was shot down, it was Ukrainian.” “It was not our convoy of tanks that was burned, it was Ukrainian.” “This is not our battalion tactical group that was obliterated in Makiivka, it was Ukrainian…”
This psyop came as a response to publications by respected Western media outlets and statements by a number of experts that the Russian army’s losses in Ukraine range from 180K to 200K. I noted that there could be more than 320K, KIAs, WIAs, and POWs combined.
Now that Russia launched this psyop, this once again exposed their propaganda’s complete incompetence, as well as the approximate data on their own losses.
The only thing that remains to be cleared out is whether they have 157K or 257K KIAs, not to mention the real figures for the wounded?