Trump Putin Puppet Propaganda Make Russia Great Again

Mikhail Fishman is the editor-in-primary of the Moscow Times, an English language-linguistic communication weekly newspaper published in Moscow. The paper is well-known for its criticisms of Russian President Vladimir Putin; indeed, it was targeted twice in 2015 past Russian hackers and has been attacked repeatedly by pro-Kremlin pundits.

A Russian citizen and an outspoken critic of Putin, Fishman has covered Russian politics for more than than 15 years. For the last couple of years, he has monitored the increasingly baroque relationship between Putin and Trump, with a particular focus on Putin'due south strategic aims.

In this interview, originally conducted in February 2017, I ask Fishman how Trump is perceived in Russian federation, why Putin is actively undermining global commonwealth, and what Russia hopes to proceeds from the political disorder in America.

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Sean Illing

From your perch in Moscow, how do you meet this strange relationship between Putin and Trump?

Mikhail Fishman

Information technology is strange. Information technology looks a scrap irrational on Trump's function to be sure. Why does he have this foreign passion for Putin and Russian federation? I accept to say, I don't believe in the conspiracy theories about "gold showers" and blackmailing. I don't believe it exists and I don't believe it's a factor. Merely this, absolutely, makes the whole matter that much stranger.

Sean Illing

You're obviously referencing the explosive Trump dossier published past Buzzfeed in January. What makes you so skeptical of the claims in that dossier?

Mikhail Fishman

2 things. One, I've been a political journalist for 15 years working and dealing with sources in Russia and elsewhere. And bluntly, a lot of this appears shallow to me. I'm certain Russian federation has plenty of dirt on Trump, but I tin't have without hard testify much of the what I've heard or read.

Second, this still has the band of a conspiracy theory, this idea that the Kremlin has blackmailed Trump into submission. I'm mostly opposed, on principle, to conspiracy theorizing. And then I'm just skeptical until there'south concrete show.

Sean Illing

Let's talk nigh Trump and Putin as individuals. How are they dissimilar? How are they similar?

Mikhail Fishman

I would prefer to talk nearly how they're different, because those differences are and then obvious and extreme. They come up from very dissimilar worlds. Putin is an ex-Soviet intelligence officer with all that that implies. Trump is a colorful American businessman and showman.

In their habits, they're radically dissimilar. Trump is a posturing performer, full of idiotic narcissism. He appears to exist a disorganized fool, to be honest. Putin, on the other hand, is computing, organized, and he plans everything. He likewise hides much of his personal life in a mode that Trump does not.

And then there's also the fact that Putin is so much more experienced than Trump. He has more than 15 years of global political experience. He knows how to do things, how to piece of work the system. He makes plenty of mistakes, but he knows how to think and act. Trump is a total neophyte. He has no experience and doesn't understand how global politics operates. He displays his ignorance every unmarried 24-hour interval.

Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a coming together to discuss the Ukrainian peace procedure at the High german federal Chancellery on October 19, 2016, in Berlin, Germany.

Photo by Adam Berry/Getty Images

Sean Illing

What is the perception of Trump in Russia? Is he seen as an ally, a foe, a stooge?

Mikhail Fishman

The vision of Trump is basically shaped past the Kremlin and their propaganda machine — that'southward what they do. During the election campaign, Trump was depicted not every bit an underdog but equally an honest representative of the American people who was being mistreated past the establishment elites and other evil forces in Washington.

Sean Illing

The Kremlin knew that to exist bullshit, right? This was pure propaganda, not sincere reporting, and it was aimed at damaging Hillary Clinton.

Mikhail Fishman

Of class. All of information technology was aimed at damaging Hillary Clinton. Putin expected Trump to lose, but the prospect of a Clinton victory terrified him, and he did everything possible to undermine her.

Sean Illing

Why was he so afraid of a Clinton victory?

Mikhail Fishman

Considering he knew that would mean an extension of Obama's harsh orientation to Russia, perhaps fifty-fifty more ambitious than Obama. Putin has experienced some difficult years since his 2014 invasion of Crimea, but he didn't expect this level of isolation. He saw — and sees — Trump as an opportunity to change the dynamic.

Sean Illing

A lot of commentators hither believe the well-nigh generous estimation of Trump's fawning orientation to Putin and Russian federation is that he's hopelessly naïve. Do you buy that?

Mikhail Fishman

That'due south a good question. Why does he similar Putin so much? I call back Trump sees Putin equally a kind of soulmate. Let's be honest: Trump is not a cogitating person. He'due south quite unproblematic in his thinking, and he's sort of attracted to Putin's brutal forcefulness. If anything, this is what Trump and Putin take in common.

Sean Illing

Has Putin fabricated a puppet of Trump?

Mikhail Fishman

Of course. This is certainly what the Kremlin believes, and they're interim appropriately. They're quite manifestly playing Trump. They consider him a stupid, unstrategic politician. Putin is confident that he tin can manipulate Trump to his advantage, and he should be.

Sean Illing

In other words, Trump's a useful idiot to them?

Mikhail Fishman

Exactly. The Kremlin is limited in their knowledge about what'south going on in Washington, but they run across the anarchy and the defoliation in Trump'southward administration. They encounter the clumsiness, the inexperience. Naturally, they're working to exploit that.

President Donald Trump tours the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History & Civilization on February 21, 2017, in Washington, DC.

Photo past Kevin Dietsch - Pool/Getty Images

Sean Illing

What'south the long geopolitical play for Putin? What does he hope to gain from the disorder in America?

Mikhail Fishman

The first thing he wants and needs is the symbolic legitimization of himself and Russia every bit a major superpower and world role player that America has to practice deal with as an equal. He wants to escape the isolation of Russia on the world phase, which was what the entrada in Syria was all nigh. Putin has 1000 ambitions for himself and for Russia, and nearly every motility he makes is animated by this.

Sean Illing

How much of this, from Putin's perspective, is about discrediting commonwealth as such?

Mikhail Fishman

He didn't believe Trump would win, so he was preparing to sell Clinton's victory as a fraud. And this is part of his broader bulletin across the board, which is that republic itself is flawed, broken, unjust. Putin actually believes this. He doesn't believe in commonwealth, and this is the worldview that he basically shares with Trump: that the establishment is corrupt and that the liberal world order is unjust.

Sean Illing

But Putin's interest in undermining democracies across the globe is nigh much more his personal disdain for this form of regime. He wants to bespeak to the anarchy in these countries and say to his domestic audition, "You come across, democracy is a sham, and information technology doesn't work anywhere." That serves as a justification for his own anti-autonomous policies. In the end, it'south nearly reinforcing his own power.

Mikhail Fishman

That's true. Merely again, this what Putin really believes. He does not believe a true and just democracy exists anywhere. This is the worldview they've been spinning for years and they've really internalized it.

For Putin, this is very much a naught-sum game. The West is the enemy. America is the enemy. Any you tin practise to damage the enemy, yous exercise it. The more unrest there is in America, the amend positioned Russia is to work its will on the world stage. He wants to divide democratic and European nations in order to so play those divisions to his reward.

Sean Illing

A pervasive business organisation in this country is that Trump admires Putin's strongman authoritarianism, and seeks to replicate it in America. Practise you call up this concern is well-founded?

Mikhail Fishman

I call back it is. Again, it comes to back what Trump and Putin have in common. They're both male chauvinists. Trump probably admires the fact that Putin is the kind of guy who feels the demand to ride horses shirtless; it appeals to his disciplinarian instincts. Just this is about much more than imagery.

They are both illiterate people in a way. They're not widely educated. They do not believe in institutions. They see autonomous institutions as burdens, impediments to their will. They don't believe that social and political life should be sophisticated; they think information technology should be simple.

And this sort of thinking naturally concludes in i-man rule. I think Trump will fail, but in that location's no doubtfulness that he shares these disciplinarian impulses with Putin.

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Sentry: A timeline of the 3 Trump-Russia scandals

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Source: https://www.vox.com/conversations/2017/2/22/14697718/trump-putin-helsinki-meeting-hillary-clinton

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