An Expert Weighs in on Ukraine Bioweapons Lab Conspiracy
by Michael Mechanic
March 24, 2022
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/20 ... -fox-news/
Introduction:
(Mother Jones) The New York Times ran a piece Wednesday about US right-wingers parroting Kremlin talking points and swapping pro-Russian conspiracy theories with Moscow—most notably the unproven claim that the US government has been funding bioweapons labs in Ukraine.
As the Times reported, war-related mentions of “bioweapons labs” in Russian- and English-language media and social media have more than doubled since early March, when Moscow gave the theory a fine boost. On March 6, its Defense Ministry released a televised statement in which Russian officials claimed to have uncovered “traces of a military biological program being implemented in Ukraine, funded by the U.S. Department of Defense.”
Just a few days later, on March 9, Fox News host Tucker Carlson—whose clips, as my colleague David Corn first reported, are being incorporated into the state media’s official propaganda strategy—dutifully aired the Defense Ministry’s statement. “Nuland just confirmed that the Russian disinformation they’ve been telling us for days is a lie and a conspiracy theory and crazy and immoral to believe, is in fact, totally and completely true,” Carlson said.
“Whoa!” (He was referring to Senate testimony by Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland, who responded to a question from Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fl.) by saying that Ukraine does have “biological research facilities,” which US officials are worried could fall into Russian hands.)
On the day after Carlson’s broadcast, as Corn reported, Putin’s minions issued a memo with “recommendation for coverage” that ordered state media outlets to use Carlson clips on their programs. The same memo also dealt with the biolab conspiracy, Corn writes:
- [It] highlights this bioweapons allegation as a top talking point for Russian media, noting the message should be that the “activities of military biological laboratories with American participation on the territory of Ukraine carried global threats to Russia and Europe.” The document goes further, encouraging its recipients to allege that the “the United States is working on a ‘biogenocide of the Eastern Slavs.’”