Russian propaganda promotes narrative of Ukraine's inevitable defeat - IMI study

These are the results of IMI's research, which covered nine popular Russian online media in December 2023.

In particular, the Russians claim that Ukraine critically lacks weapons.

Next are the narratives "split in Ukrainian society" and "Ukraine as a bargaining chip", which account for 22.5% each.

For example, Russian propagandists claim that there is a conflict between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Ukrainian Armed Forces Commander-in-Chief Valerii Zaluzhnyi, and that the latter may be replaced by someone else, because the Presidential Administration allegedly fears a coup d'état due to Zaluzhnyi's high ratings.

10% of all Kremlin propaganda materials are aimed at convincing Ukrainians that the conflict will end in negotiations between Russia and the West with Ukraine losing a significant part of its territory.

According to IMI expert Olena Holub, there is a change in Russia's information war against Ukraine.

"Currently, the propaganda has focused on softening its aggressive rhetoric about Ukrainians, because the narratives about the Nazis in Ukraine seem to no longer work. Instead, there are messages that may yield a response in Ukrainian society. Almost all narratives can be boiled down to a single statement: 'The West has dragged Ukraine into a losing war to weaken Russia while refusing to help it, dooming it to internal conflicts and effective disintegration,'" Olena Holub believes.

The study was conducted from December 6 to 10, 2023 in nine Russian online media outlets: Komsomolskaya Pravda, Izvestia, RIA Novosti, Lenta, RBC, Moskovsky Komsomolets, Gazeta.ru, Rossiyskaya Gazeta, and NEWS.ru.

• In November 2023, the Slovak Foreign Ministry stated that the conflict in Ukraine had lasted for more than 600 days and "did not lead to any results," so peace talks were needed.
• On December 23, Italian Defense Minister Guido Crosetto announced the need for negotiations between Ukraine and Russia.
• At the same time, Ukraine insists that there can be no negotiations with the aggressor.