Russian z-bloggers process their shock and outrage over Assad’s overthrow in Syria
The sudden overthrow of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has dumped a bucket of ice on the infamous “z-blogosphere,” triggering a mix of emotions and rationalizations among Russia’s most militaristic and widely read Telegram channels. As journalists at The Insider report, some “war correspondents” have retreated into denial, arguing that Moscow never really “needed” Assad, while others have expressed outrage with the Kremlin for leaving Russian troops encircled in Syria. (Kremlin sources later told the state media that leaders of Syria’s armed opposition have “guaranteed” the safety of Russian military bases and diplomatic missions.) Meduza summarizes The Insider’s report.
With regime change arriving in Syria, Russian propagandist and military blogger Alexander Kots took the chance to remind readers that the Syrian authorities under Bashar al-Assad were often rude to Russian journalists and soldiers. According to Kots, Syrian border guards literally snarled at incoming Russian journalists, “rolling their eyes and curling their upper lips in disgust”:
I remember all too well how, back in 2012, we Russian journalists were “squeezed” at border control. They turned out our luggage and confiscated our cameras. […] Meanwhile, they practically carried the Western reporters on their shoulders.
Kots also blamed the Assad regime for impoverishing ordinary Syrians. “Bread disappeared from the stores and electricity from the outlets,” he explained, writing that “the metropolitan gloss of Damascus” gradually became overgrown with the “moss” of corrupt “smoky offices.”
Russia may have helped keep Assad in power, but the important thing about this intervention, Kots argued, is that Moscow “never played anyone against each other” once in Syria and didn’t try to impose Western values and democracy, unlike the United States. In this regard, he said, comparisons to the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan are unfair. “The only commonality is the rapid degradation of local state institutions,” Kots wrote, admitting that “there is unlikely to be a place for Russian bases in Tartus and Khmeimim in the new Syrian order.” (Kremlin sources later told the state media that Syria’s armed opposition has “guaranteed” the safety of Russian military bases and diplomatic missions.)
The Insider notes that Kots shared very different sentiments four years earlier, reposting a Telegram message that celebrated Assad’s “kind and straightforward approach” to his Russian allies and his capacity for “creating a favorable, calm atmosphere for conversation.”
Meanwhile, propagandist Anastasia Kashevarova commented on the news in Syria with biblical motifs (“The first murder on Earth happened 30 kilometers from Damascus: Cain killed his brother Abel”) before concluding that Russians “got screwed.” The fight between “interested parties” over Syria, Kashevarova warned, poses a greater risk of starting World War III than the war in Ukraine: “It seems the U.S., Turkey, and Israel have won, while Iran, Russia, and Syria have lost control. But everything is so fragile.”
Meanwhile, VGTRK military correspondent Alexander Sladkov criticized Russian military intelligence for failing to alert the authorities about Syria’s impending cataclysm. He also noted that the Russian public never understood why their country intervened in Syria in the first place. Ask ordinary people to explain Russia’s presence in Syria, “and I doubt we’d hear anything coherent,” said Sladkov. “Certainly, nobody would say anything now about ‘all the awesome combat experience’ we got, especially after [our] questionable debut [in Ukraine].”
As The Insider reports, other “war correspondents” shared posts on Telegram faulting Russian propaganda for painting too rosy a picture of Assad’s hold on power and portraying Russia (incorrectly, it turns out) as “a key player in this theater of military and political action.” This fantasy world resembled the U.S. media’s embellishments of American power in Iraq, two decades ago. “Tuned in for so long to endless triumphs of cosmic proportions, [Russian] audiences are now experiencing ‘cognitive dissonance,’ which you can see easily by scrolling through any online comments,” wrote one popular Telegram channel.
Meanwhile, Russia Today’s editor-in-chief, Margarita Simonyan, was uncharacteristically laconic, writing on Telegram: “Militants in Damascus. The TV center has been captured. Criminals have been released from prison. The airport is shut down. What a gloomy morning.”