#Opinion by Russian MFA Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova Just a fe | Russia in Canada

#Opinion by Russian MFA Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova

Just a few days ago, the former US defence, intelligence and security officials (once served, always serving, as the saying goes) called on the US legislators not to hamper the omnipotent IT corporations. In an open letter, they called on Congress to refrain from passing legislation that would limit Google, Meta and the like in their digital dictate.

Their rationale is quite straightforward: “A battle brewing between authoritarianism and democracy.” Authoritarianism, meaning, among others, Russia, uses cyberattacks and disinformation campaigns to bring about a change in the global order. At the same time, democracy, meaning the US, together with the champions of free speech embodied by US technology platforms “have given the world the chance to see the real story of the Russian military’s horrific human rights abuses in Ukraine.” They recommend a traditional set of methods: censorship and digital reprisals. It turns out that the intelligence community believes that you can build democracy and achieve free speech by silencing all those who disagree and by deleting from the information space everything at odds with what is being imposed from above, including by the intelligence community they represent.

There is no need to search for any further evidence on who was behind Facebook’s decision not to delete extremist materials targeting Russians.

It has to be noted that the ranks of the national security champions include prominent members of the US establishment, including high-profile figures like former Secretary of Defence and former CIA Director, as well as member of the Oracle board Leon E. Panetta, former Assistant to the President for Counterterrorism and Homeland Security Frances F. Townsend, former Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper, former Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh C. Johnson, and several other equally notorious figures.

You may ask what do the representatives of the US security and intelligence community have to do with all this? Why have they decided to take a stand on such a hot topic?

Let me explain.

Just like all other representatives of the American “deep state,” they have been successful not only in their public offices, but also in the private sector. Many of them own stock in major corporations or sit on their boards, including in the IT industry. This is how the US government, the defence, intelligence and security apparatus, corporations and major media holdings came to form a single whole. This makes it virtually impossible to understand where free speech begins and where it ends. Most importantly, this is what they refer to as democracy.

By the way, Frances F. Townsend and James R. Clapper used to work for CNN and CBS. This explains a lot.

Apart from their similar career patterns, what the intelligence community members share in common is a keen focus on our country. They all went to great lengths to spread fakes on what they misrepresented as Russia’s meddling in the US election. Panetta and Clapper went as far as become the central figures on the Advisory Board of the Committee to Investigate Russia, a nonprofit resource.

Some members of the US security establishment just cannot get over their fixation on taking Russia out. This is merely a pretext, a veil for ensuring that technology monopolies retain their unchallenged sway over the public opinion in the United States and around the world. The vociferous and at times appealing slogans about democracy conceal pragmatic and cynical calculations.

It is at this particular point in history that Elon Musk went shopping online…

https://t.me/MariaVladimirovnaZakharova/2492