State Department attacked "Sputnik V" from an unexpected side
March 9, 2021
The US State Department said that the Russian special services are waging an information war with Western vaccines through several little-known sites. This is obvious nonsense, but now this nonsense is needed by the US and the EU in order not to lose in the "vaccine war".
What would later be called "vaccine war" was inevitable. Capitalism, for all its advantages, simply did not assume that the manufacturers of highly demanded drugs that hit the market almost simultaneously would not enter into fierce competition with each other. A picture where companies from different countries and their lobbyists in the government would join hands to save humanity from a pandemic together, without playing along with their own and without putting a spoke in the wheels of strangers, is desirable, but too idealistic - humanity is not yet ready for this, which is demonstrates to us on a variety of other issues.
Idealistic and such a situation, when the governments of those few countries that could afford to produce their own vaccine, will remain on the sidelines of this capitalist struggle and will not participate in it. This does not work even in the case of countries under the leadership of the Communist Party: China seems to be not our enemy, on the contrary, it is a reliable partner and strategic ally, but it is in no hurry to register Russian vaccines, promoting its own.
Relying on Washington and Brussels in this regard is all the more strange. Considering how the coronavirus plowed the entire planet, becoming the main topic of the year (and there, you see, decades), there is no need to prove that a vaccine that saves lives of individuals and restores normal life to society as a whole is both prestige and big money. According to the US and EU strategy to "contain Russia", Russia should have neither prestige nor money.
That is why a "vaccine war" is being waged - both in the bureaucratic and in the information space. The Russian drug "Sputnik V" is holding up well (the second most popular vaccine against COVID-19 in the world, by the way), but it is forced to take numerous external blows , the strength of which will be determined by the conscience of the striker. For example, such as the attacks of the Ukrainian president on the Russian vaccine.
But in Slovakia, Prime Minister Igor Matovic showed himself wiser in the vaccine issue, promising not to allow Slovaks to become hostages of geopolitical conflicts. Nevertheless, the ruling coalition in the country consists of several parties, some of which are openly putting pressure on Matovich and demanding that he refuse to buy vaccines on the grounds that this is a "hybrid weapon of Russia".
Move on. Representative of the Austrian Health Agency Christa Virtumer-Hoch (concurrently chairman of the European Medicines Agency or EMA, where Sputnik V is currently undergoing an examination), speaking of the possible registration of a Russian vaccine in her homeland, compared it to “Russian roulette”. Here already its creators could not stand it - and demanded an apology.
It is possible to move geographically from the Russian borders to the West and further - there are more than enough examples of a Russian drug becoming the target of attacks from high-ranking officials and politicians. But it is better to go straight to the United States, whose participation in the "vaccine war" has its own characteristics.
The chief US infectious disease specialist, Anthony Fauci, although he is an adviser to President Biden, is still far enough from politics to praise the Russian vaccine . But the State Department, as a department directly responsible for the conduct of the foreign policy line, cannot afford this, and is still embarrassed to act in the spirit of Volodymyr Zelensky, so his blow within the framework of the "vaccine war" was the accusation of Russia in its conduct.
At first, The Wall Street Journal wrote about this with reference to its sources, then the representative of the US State Department Ned Price confirmed everything officially. Allegedly, the special services of the Russian Federation are trying to discredit the coronavirus vaccines developed by Western companies.
Earlier, our old opponent, the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, spoke in the same spirit, speaking at the hearings of the European Parliament's special committee on foreign interference in the EU's democratic processes. That is, we can talk about the coordinated position of the West on this issue.
However, Borrell was careful - he accused the "Kremlin media" of disinformation, without specifying which ones. The Americans, for the sake of better effect from their "revelations", decided to go in particular. This discredited their whole venture.
In the State Department's version, the information campaign against Western vaccines has turned into an operation by the Russian special services. At the same time, both the media and the special services that allegedly stand behind them were named: New Eastern Outlook and Oriental Review (SVR), News Front (FSB) and Rebel Inside (Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, in Western media usually appearing as the GRU).
It is easy to accept that the Russian media, as they say, "cheer for ours" and publish news about the failures of competing vaccines. Sometimes it bears the imprint of its own economic interests, when online publications fight for "yellow traffic" and try to get promoted by loud and revealing headlines or some radical speakers claiming that vaccination in the West is Bill Gates' chipping.
It is easy to imagine that Russian state authorities, including special services, are participants in an information war - usually a defensive one when it comes to the Russian vaccine. There, no worse than in the West, they understand everything about money, and about prestige, and about competition. But it is impossible to believe that the SVR, FSB and GRU are involved in this by posting fakes on little-known resources. While at war, they shoot from a slingshot.
There are many state-owned media outlets and entire media empires in Russia. At the service of the Russian authorities are specialists in PR, promotion and information campaigns. They have long been able to do everything the same as in the West, and if desired and necessary, qualified people will be able to organize a full-scale information attack on all Western vaccines and each separately. But in the picture of the world of the State Department, Russian special services, sharpened for completely different and much more ambitious tasks, are engaged in little-known media outlets with what journalists usually call "posting".
Obviously, the essence of Western manipulation is to work out the topic of Russia's “aggressive aspirations” in a different way. To connect the topic of vaccines with the Russian special services, endowed in the same West with an ominous image of almost omnipotent offices. This simultaneously casts a shadow on the Russian drug, making it an unwitting participant in the "conspiracy", and, as it were, justifies the information war waged against Sputnik V by Western officials.
For a layman in the US or the EU, it is not at all obvious that the State Department's accusations are curious. They sound gloomy enough so as not to ask once again the question whether this fierce struggle with the Russian vaccine is in his, the layman's interests.
As follows from publications in other media, which are kept in a tone that is more loyal to the achievements of Russian science, many ordinary people are beginning to suspect something. The statements of politicians and officials are too much at odds with the position of specialized vaccine experts . If so, you need to create the illusion that you are opposing the conspiracy of the Russian special services, who for some reason decided to try their hand at journalism.
That is, on the contrary, it would not be necessary, it turned out stupid. But the war, as you know, will write off everything, including the "vaccine war".
Text: Stanislav Borzyakov
https://m.vz.ru/politics/2021/3/9/1088522.html
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