Know the Facts: The Ten Fundamental Principles Of "Dezinformatsiya"

The Ten Fundamental Principles Of "Dezinformatsiya" was part of the "Active Measures" program which began in the 1920s, as instituted by Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria (29 March 1899 – 23 December 1953) who was a Georgian Bolshevik and Soviet politician, Marshal of the Soviet Union and state security administrator, chief of the Soviet security, and chief of the People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD). Beria was the longest-lived and most influential of Stalin's secret police chiefs, wielding his most substantial influence during and after World War II.

As early as 1923, Joseph Stalin ordered the creation of a "Special Disinformation Office", however, it should be noted that it was the general practice of Beria to work from the shadows and attribute his work to his superiors, as can be seen in his climb in party status from his other earlier works of deception.

It is therefore theorised by many historians, that Joseph Stalin himself coined the term “disinformation” in 1923 by giving it a French sounding name in order to deceive other nations into believing it was a practice invented in France, since the noun “disinformation” does not originate from Russian, it is a translation of the French word désinformation.

The objective of the "Active measures" program included offensive programs such as disinformation, propaganda, deception, sabotage, destabilization and espionage. These programs were based on foreign policy priorities of the Soviet Union. The purpose of "Active measures" was to influence the course of world events, abroad and domestically, in addition to collecting intelligence and producing revised assessments of it. "Active measures" ranged "from media manipulations the strategy of  "Dezinformatsiya" to special actions involving various degrees of violence".

"Active measures" included the establishment and the support of international front organizations (e.g., the World Peace Council); foreign communist, socialist and opposition parties and wars of "national liberation" in the Third World. It also included supporting underground, revolutionary, insurgency, criminal, and terrorist groups.

Retired KGB Major General Oleg Kalugin, former head of Foreign Counterintelligence for the KGB (1973–1979), described the "active measures" program as "the heart and soul of Soviet intelligence":

"Not intelligence collection, but subversion: active measures to weaken the West, to drive wedges in the Western community alliances of all sorts, particularly NATO, to sow discord among allies, to weaken the United States in the eyes of the people of Europe, Asia, Africa, Latin America, and thus to prepare ground in case the war really occurs."

According to the Mitrokhin Archives, active measures was taught in the Andropov Institute of the KGB situated at Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) headquarters in Yasenevo District of Moscow. Vasili Nikitich Mitrokhin, was a major and senior archivist for the Soviet Union's foreign intelligence service, the First Chief Directorate of the KGB, copied documents certifying that the head of Soviet foreign intelligence. 

In light of the massive defeat of Arab armies, with their billions in Soviet Weaponry the Soviet Union in the 1956 Sinai and Six Day Wars, together with the withdrawal and lessing of sympathy for communism by Israelis, wanted to "repair the prestige" of "our Arab friends" at the hands of the Israelis.  Therefore, General Alexander Sakharovsky, who was head of the First Chief Directorate (foreign intelligence) of the KGB from 1955 until 1970 set out to destroy Israel through operation "SIG". 

Lt. General Ion Mihai Pacepa described the operation "SIG" ("Zionist Governments") which was devised in 1972, to turn the whole Islamic world against Israel and the United States in his meeting with KGB chairman Yuri Andropov who stated:

"a billion adversaries could inflict far greater damage on America than could a few millions. We needed to instill a Nazi-style hatred for the Jews throughout the Islamic world, and to turn this weapon of the emotions into a terrorist bloodbath against Israel and its main supporter, the United States."

He did so by helping them organize terrorist operations that would humiliate Israel through the use of the main KGB asset -- Yasser Arafat, who was the co-founder of Fatah. Yuri Andropov described Yasser Arafat to Pacepa as a; "devoted Marxist-Leninist since his days in the membership of the General Union of Palestinian Students (GUPS) from 1952 to 1956." .  

The Ten Fundamental Principles Of "Dezinformatsiya" 

1) The "Big Lie" - Always chose the greater lie at first over the lesser one, so that the masses (the listening or reading audience) can more readily accept it as fact and to make it harder for the real truth to be told.

2) Focus - Use one or two readily "acceptable"or"actual" events as the basis of "truth." 

3) Repetition - Always repeat the same line in your retelling of the event to to lend further credibility to hide the "lie".

4) Accusation - "Blame" be consistent in your libel of the "scapegoat". Do not leave room for doubt and use the three "D's"; Debase, Defame and Dehumanize." 

5) Issues - Critical or Crucial - events or concerns have no "gray areas" leaving no room for doubt regarding what immediate action should be taken. 

6) Terminology (Loaded language ) - Rhetoric used to influence an audience by using words and phrases with strong connotations associated with them in order to elicit an emotional response and/or exploit stereotypes. Provocative words like: "Genocide" "Apartheid" "Occupation".

7) Emotional triggers - the use of specific phrases or slogans that will induce an intense emotional reaction based on; memories, experiences, or events.

8) Denigrate - vilify, defame, denounce, malign, stigmatize and skewer your "scapegoat" as undesirables

9) Disregard Facts - Ignore intellectuals and reasonable arguments; target the least-able minded with powerful emotional pitches.

10) Unethical - be disingenuous, unscrupulous, amoral with no limitation -"The end justifies the means."