Thank you to everyone who joined Olga Lautman and me yesterday for our weekly chat about Russia’s election interference in the 2016 election. Hours after the show, which you can stream above, Russian drones invaded Polish airspace in what is a massive provocation of NATO.
Poland and other NATO allies scrambled to shoot down the Russian drones but make no mistake — this is the first time that Russian drones have been shot down over the territory of a NATO member nation.
The timing is not a coincidence. Yesterday, Polish President Karol Nawrocki held a joint press conference in Helsinki with Finish President Alexander Stubb. "We do not trust Vladimir Putin's good intentions," Nawrocki said. He added, "We believe that Vladimir Putin is ready to also invade other countries.”
The buildup to this moment has been happening for some time.
Last week, Putin attended the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Summit in Tianjin and a military parade in Beijing. where he held bilateral meetings with Chinese Premier Xi Jinping, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, North Korean Dictator Kim Jong-un and Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico, whose country is a member of NATO. In Beijing, Kim joined Xi and Putin in a symbolic walk of solidarity during a military parade. Also there were Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, Iranian president Masoud Pezeshkian, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and the leaders of several former Central Asian and Caucasian Soviet republics, as well as Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, another Putin ally.
While this was happening, the United States was abdicating its decades-long commitment to European security. The Trump administration signaled last week that it is ending several longstanding U.S. security assistance programs in Europe — most notably the Baltic Security Initiative, which has supported Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania in countering Russian aggression. In short, Trump is phasing out security assistance for countries bordering Russia, including those Baltic states.
This should come as no surprise. Almost as soon as Trump was back in the White House, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told European leaders that the United States was no longer “primarily focused” on European security and that Ukraine was largely Europe’s problem. At the Munich Security Conference earlier this year, Vice President JD Vance claimed that the biggest danger to Europe was not Russia or China, but rather “the threat from within”— including issues like migration, policies to fight disinformation, multiculturalism, what he termed “globalism,” gay rights and other matters anathema to the Trump Administration.
So it stands to reason that just as the Trump Administration was making good on its promise to cut Europe off, Putin chose this week to test NATO’s resolve.
Poland has now invoked Article 4 of the NATO treaty, which allows it to bring an issue before the North Atlantic Council. In nearly eighty years, Article 4 has only been invoked seven times, most recently when Russia launched the full-scale invasion of Ukraine over three years ago.
Polish Prime Minsiter Donald Tusk declared that Poland was “at its closest point to open conflict since World War II.” When Poles speak this way, pay attention. It was Hitler’s secret pact with Joseph Stalin to carve up Poland that led to Germany’s invasion of western Poland on September 1, 1939. On September 3, Great Britain and France declared war on the Third Reich, leading to the start of World War II. In accordance with the secret Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the Soviet Union invaded Poland from the east on September 17, claiming to protect Ukrainians and Belarusians.
Some things do not change. The only outstanding question — the outstanding question — is what Trump intends to do. This should raise serious concerns about what exactly he and Putin discussed in their secret, ten minute one-on-one chat at their Alaska summit last month. What guarantees did Trump give Putin? What, in return, did Putin promise Trump?
On Friday, Russia and Belarus will hold a major military drill called “Zapad,” the Russian word for “West.” And what lies west of Russia? All of Europe, on edge as he pokes and prods its defensive ever more. Don’t doubt for a moment that this “drill” is an excuse for Russia to move more of its military hardware to its western flank.
This is a deeply concerning moment.
Reminder
Olga and I are starting our Fall 2025 seminar: a 6-week discussion on information warfare, disinformation, and media manipulation— exclusively for paid subscribers.
If you’ve followed our work on Russia, Ukraine, authoritarian influence, disinformation, and the shifting U.S. media landscape, this seminar is the next step. We’ll look at how the Kremlin’s Cold War playbook evolved into one of the most important tools of modern hybrid warfare — and how those same strategies have been used here in the United States over the past decade to manipulate media, co-opt influencers, deepen polarization, and increasingly fuel real-world violence, including through MAGA-aligned and far-right disinformation networks in the U.S.
Starts: Wednesday, September 17 at 3:00 PM ETMeets: Weekly on Wednesdays (Sept 17–Oct 22)Format: Zoom meet
A Zoom link will be sent separately on Wednesday, September 17 at 2:30 PM ET. Cut-off for registration is September 17 at 2:00 PM ET.
Slides will be emailed the following day.
Registration Link:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSccVY1gdQvAJLIsN8ahz0oRRl1bsyqDupu1Ixx5SEcWZLZ6kg/viewform?usp=header
We’ll meet live on Zoom every Wednesday at 3:00 PM ET, and every session will include:
* A focused breakdown of disinformation and information warfare
* Global and U.S. examples — including Kremlin influence, MAGA media ecosystems, and GOP-aligned narrative laundering
* Resistance tools, resources, and discussion
If you are not yet a paid subscriber and would like to join, please sign up here. If you can’t make it live, we will be sending out slides of our talks the morning after the seminar to everyone who signs up.
The Substack Live above is based on this week’s chapter of Active Measures. If you missed it, here it is again, as well as some additional extras that did not make it into Monday’s newsletter.
Kremlin’s Troll Factory Extras
The Operations
Internet Research Agency (IRA) — The original St. Petersburg troll farm. Founded in 2013, disguised as a marketing firm, it was a Russian intelligence operation financed through Prigozhin’s Concord business. At its height, hundreds of staff churned out memes, fake personas, disinformation, and hoaxes that reached 126 million Americans on Facebook during the 2016 election.
Social Design Agency (SDA) — The IRA’s heir. Directed by Ilya Gambashidze under Sergei Kiriyenko, SDA absorbed ex-IRA staff after 2018 and ramped up the operations with AI tools, deepfakes, and fake local news sites. A disinfo center, testing new methods across Europe and the U.S.
Storm-1516 — One of the networks seeding fake U.S. news sites during the 2024 election.
Key Characters
Yevgeny Prigozhin — “Putin’s Chef,” the face of both Wagner and IRA.
Vladislav Surkov — Kremlin puppet-master behind early web brigades.
Vyacheslav Volodin — Helped impose controls on Russia’s internet.
Mira Terada — Runs the fake human rights “Russian FBI” (FBR) operation.
Sergei Kiriyenko — Kremlin deputy chief of staff; he currently oversees SDA, the next-gen troll factory.
Ilya Gambashidze — Now steering the Social Design Agency, IRA’s heir.
John Dougan — Former Florida cop and U.S. defector living in Moscow. His DC Weekly and other cloned “local news” sites became vehicles for Russian disinformation, fusing Kremlin narratives into the U.S. media stream.
Timeline Snapshots
2013: Internet Research Agency (IRA) founded.
2014: Crimea annexation; trolls flood comment sections.
2014 July: MH17 disinfo blitz (40,000 tweets/day).
2015: Hoax “Columbian Chemicals” plant explosion.
2016: Blacktivist & Heart of Texas pages hit hundreds of thousands.
2018: Mueller indictments.
2024: AI-driven disinfo campaigns with Storm-1516 during the 2024 election.
The Troll Factory
Quotas: 100 comments/posts per troll per shift.
Shifts: 12 hours, two days on / two days off.
Training: Watch House of Cards, learn slang, memorize NFL trivia.
Formats: Memes, hoax news, fake protests, sock-puppets.
Budget: $1.25M/month by 2014.
Russia’s Notable Operations
Columbian Chemicals, 2014: Fake explosion at a Louisiana chemical plant. Dozens of fake accounts + doctored video.
Ebola Panic, 2014: Fake reports of outbreaks across the U.S. to stoke fear.
MH17, 2014: 40,000 tweets in 24 hours pushing four contradictory lies.
Fake Police Shootings: Exaggerated or invented claims designed to inflame race relations.
Top Fake Persona Accounts
@TEN_GOP — Posed as the Tennessee Republican Party, racked up 100,000 followers (including real politicians).
Jenna Abrams — Fake “All-American girl” blogger, quoted by major U.S. outlets and even politicians.
SouthLoneStar — Masqueraded as a patriotic Texan, pumped out anti-immigrant and pro-Trump memes.
Blacktivist — Pretended to be part of Black Lives Matter, drew 350,000+ followers, bigger than real BLM pages.
Heart of Texas — Called for secession, pushed anti-Muslim hate, gained 250,000+ followers.
Being Patriotic / Secured Borders — Targeted conservatives with pro-Trump, anti-immigrant propaganda.
United Muslims of America / LGBT United / Black Matters US — Progressive masks designed to splinter left-leaning coalitions and suppress turnout.
Top Disinfo Topics of 2016
Clinton’s Emails — Trolls amplified WikiLeaks dumps and pushed conspiracy theories about “deleted” emails.
Clinton’s Health — Memes and fake stories claimed she was gravely ill or unfit for office.
Immigration & the Border — Fear-mongering posts about migrants, Muslims, and “open borders.”
Race & Policing — Fake BLM pages vs. Blue Lives Matter memes to deepen divides.
Religion — Anti-Muslim propaganda, “Christian values under attack” themes.
Traditional Values & Anti-LBGTQ+ — Posts portraying LGBTQ+ rights as a Western assault on morality, while pushing “family values” rhetoric “aligned” with Russia.
Election Integrity — Claims of “rigged voting machines” and ballot fraud, seeding distrust before Election Day.
Third-Party Boosts — Troll accounts urging votes for Jill Stein or Bernie Sanders to siphon support from Clinton.
Repetitive Memes
Hillary in prison stripes.
Hillary’s “illness” memes to question her fitness.
Anti-immigration “keep out migrants” graphics.
Fake BLM protest graphics designed to inflame divisions.
“Heart of Texas” memes railing against Muslims and immigrants.
Endless recycled slogans like “Crooked Hillary” and “Lock Her Up,” amplified until they felt organic.
A Few Samples of False Flag Protests (All Staged by the IRA)
Houston, 2016: Anti-Muslim rally vs. “United Muslims of America” counter-rally — both sides summoned by trolls.
Dallas, 2016: “Blue Lives Matter” vs. “Black Lives Matter” dueling protests (same time and location).
By The Numbers
126 million Americans reached on Facebook.
50,000 bots on Twitter.
2 million+ tweets about the 2016 election.
$100,000 spent on U.S. ads that helped spark street protests.
IRA vs. Wagner
Wagner: Mercenaries; operations in Ukraine, the Balkans, Latin America, Syria, and Africa.
IRA: Trolls, memes, fake personas, fake pages, fake news sites, operations online.
Both were built to give the Kremlin deniability while carrying out Russia’s hybrid war.
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