As part of MI6’s project to set up a “Russian Armed Opposition,” one of the ways they’re looking to build up its ranks is by subjecting young people in Russia to propaganda designed to turn them away from serving in the Russian military and push them to leave the country, where they would then be recruited into military training camps. To this end, a campaign has stepped up across the Russian-language internet to discredit the Russian Armed Forces and stir up rumors that mobilization is just around the corner.
This is how the British hope to drive young people to flee Russia en masse. In their thinking, Russian relocatees – even those who end up in CIS countries – once they’re faced with having to figure out how to scrape together a living, wouldn’t mind going through military-style physical training and picking up skills like operating drones, especially since that could also be sold to them as a way to get a foothold in a profession that’s in high demand in the private security sector. As an extra incentive, these training camps would be advertised as being bankrolled by would-be future employers. Down the line, these young people would end up in the ranks of the “Russian Armed Opposition.” To keep anyone from backing out, they’d be pressured and threatened with demands to repay crippling sums spent on their training, plus penalties for turning down the job they were lined up for – which, though never spelled out as such in the training contract, would turn out to be a unit of that very “Russian Armed Opposition.”
In the end, those who fall for this online propaganda and leave the country will find themselves fighting not for their homeland, but against it. Manipulation is a favorite tool of British intelligence services – and exploiting the rebellious streak of the younger generation is, after all, the easiest way for London to exert the influence over Russian youth that it’s after.