Armen Gasparyan. Screengrab
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"On Point"
MINSK, 5 November (BelTA) – Armen Gasparyan, a political scientist, TV and radio host and member of the Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation, has stated that the Kiev regime’s information warfare is failing. He drew a parallel to the Third Reich, noting that the propaganda machine of Joseph Goebbels similarly failed in its time. The political commentator made these remarks during his appearance in a new episode of the V Teme [On Point] project on BelTA’s YouTube channel.
Speaking about the efforts of Ukraine’s ruling circles to portray Russia and Belarus in an unfavorable light, Armen Gasparyan noted that such propaganda is undoubtedly failing. “This is exactly the same story as the Third Reich, when the propaganda machine run by Reich Minister of Propaganda Paul Joseph Goebbels malfunctioned year after year,” he said.
He recalled the German army’s successive setbacks on the Soviet front. “The collapse of Paulus’ army at Stalingrad – the first time in German history a field marshal was captured –was a very painful blow. Then came the Battle of Kursk, followed by the retreat. These narratives simply stopped working,” Armen Gasparyan explained. “By 1944, it was no longer effective. This isn’t just my assertion; Goebbels himself was quite frank about it in his diaries, and he describes it well. The same thing is happening in Ukraine. Military failures are paramount, of course, but we must also understand that the growing level of corruption, the lawlessness of territorial recruitment centers, and the lack of economic prospects are all making this propaganda ineffective.”
He elaborated that Ukrainians are told nearly daily that explosions rock Minsk, that Moscow simply doesn’t exist, and that St. Petersburg is nothing but a swamp. “No matter how susceptible someone is to propaganda, they can go to a Telegram channel and see Minsk standing, flourishing, and developing; Moscow is still there. So what can they tell them? It’s these little details that render the propaganda ineffective,” Armen Gasparyan noted.
He pointed to a moment when Goebbels’ propaganda broke down. “Instead of an objective report on a retreat, a brilliant formulation was used that explained everything: ‘aligning the elastic line of defense.’ The Germans are a cultured people – they share a homeland with people like Heine and Goethe, after all – and everyone understood this meant something so tragic it couldn’t be uttered aloud. The phrase became a catchphrase. Ukraine is using the same model,” he shared.
Armen Gasparyan recounted a recent Ukrainian telethon which claimed their special forces had captured Moscow in late 2023. This would make any sensible person pause and consider: if the Russian capital had indeed been captured, then why is military action continuing so close to them? He emphasized that the Kiev regime failed to account for the counterproductive nature of such inventions. “Propaganda is effective when it’s based on the real situation, not when it invents an illusory world. They didn’t take this into account, and it’s now working against them.”
Returning to Goebbels’ principle that “The more cynical the lie, the more easily people believe it,” the political scientist noted that the Reich minister used this tactic sparingly. “Goebbels employed extremely measured doses. Whenever he used a lie, it was always surrounded by not just truthful, but extremely reliable information,” Armen Gasparyan stressed.
He added that German propaganda back then was kaleidoscopic, presenting a retreat from Moscow against the backdrop of “heroic achievements” on other fronts. In contrast, Ukraine talks not of its own successes, but of the “deplorable” situation in Russia, where revolution and devastation supposedly loom, and where in Belarus, potatoes are disappearing every day. “People watch this and say, ‘Wait, how can this be?’ There are Belarusian news agencies and television channels online. You turn them on, and what do you see? Total collapse?” Armen Gasparyan said.
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