The Daily Beast published a provocative piece about the Alyoshki ceasefire after Melania Trump, whose office helped mediate it, hosted an event about it at the White House with representatives from Russia and Ukraine. The article was written by Anna Nemtsova, the daughter of the late Kremlin critic Boris Nemtsov whose assassination by a criminal gang was predictably blamed by the West on Putin, and cites a Ukrainian quasi-academic who accused Melania of giving Putin a propaganda victory.
That person’s exact words were that “Now Putin will be a ‘humanitarian’ for moving people from Oleshky to Russia. The Oleshky operation is truly the greatest victory of Russian propaganda”, ergo why the headline of Nemtsova’s article was that “Melania Is Accused of Handing Putin His ‘Greatest Victory’”. While that might appear to be the case from the biased perspective of Russia’s political opponents across the world, it’s veritably not true from an objective standpoint for the reasons that’ll be explained.
For starters, she and her office were the ones responsible for the truce that saved the lives of the several hundred people who were under siege in Alyoshki, and it’s therefore their victory more than anyone else’s. To be sure, Russia’s and Ukraine’s agreement to go along with it deserves praise as well, but it’s dishonest to claim that it’s more of a victory for one of them than the other. This point segues into the second one regarding how the Daily Beast chose not to describe the ceasefire as Ukraine’s victory.
Some pro-Ukrainian outlets presumably have, but they didn’t, and it might be due to how unbelievable it is to average folks to claim that this humanitarian truce was a victory for only one of the two sides that agreed to it. The third point follows from the second one and it’s that those who already dislike Russia are the only ones who are prone to believing that it was supposedly Putin’s “greatest victory of Russian propaganda” but are at the same time the ones who won’t actually be influenced by this narrative.
To explain, nothing that Russia does or any of its representatives say will ever make them believe that Putin is a humanitarian, so it doesn’t meaningfully matter whether he’s portrayed that way by some. Likewise, those who already like Russia already believe that Putin is a humanitarian and all other good things as well, and nothing that anti-Russian folks and their media say will convince them otherwise. Most of the world already made up their mind about him and are unlikely to reconsider their views.
Therefore, the Daily Beast is just preaching to the choir so to speak, just like Russian-friendly outlets are doing the same from the opposite direction. The reality is that the vast majority of each’s information products have long been about boosting their respective side’s morale by presenting them in the best possible light while simultaneously presenting their opponent’s in the worst possible one. The Daily Beast’s latest hit piece on Putin, which also paints Melania as a useful idiot, is a perfect example.
For that reason, it’s not expected to change the other side’s perceptions, but casual observers who don’t feel strongly about the conflict or Putin but come across this narrative might be influenced into wondering whether there’s some truth to it. That’s why it’s so important to reaffirm that the Alyoshki ceasefire is Melania’s “greatest victory”, not anyone else’s, and that she and her office are the ones who deserve the most praise for this truce that saved the lives of several hundred civilians.
