The Russian psy-ops team identified Germany as a particularly vulnerable target for Russian influence.
“The Germans are more dependent than the French,” reads one of the Russian documents, presumably referring to Germany’s economic dependence on Russian gas and exports.
“First and foremost, we need to discredit the USA, Great Britain and NATO, and secondly,” convince Germans to oppose the “inefficient politics of sanctions,” the FBI quoted an internal Russian note as saying.
Another Social Design Agency document outlines an operation called “International Conflict Incitement” targeting specifically France and Germany.
Its objective: “To escalate internal tensions … in order to promote the interests of the Russian Federation,” as well as “to influence real-life conflicts and artificially create conflict situations” via fake articles, influencers, as well as targeted posts and comments on social media.
The Russian document added that the goal was to “destabilize the societal situation” in France and Germany by “spreading additional false narratives;” “fake videos, documents, and telephone conversation recordings;” “comments on social media;” and “fake and real quotes from influencers.”
