‘When Will the Last Democracies on Earth Grow a Spine’ — My Latest Hot Type Column in Byline
In my Saturday Hot Type column for Byline Supplement, I argue it’s time for democratic nations to band together to kick out Russian infiltration operations for good. An excerpt
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“At this point, it should be obvious that the war for our minds is real, and that too little is being done to stop the tsunami of Russian narrative warfare from flooding democratic shores. So the question is, why?”
Multiple stories broke last week about Russian infiltration operations in democratic nations — from a global non-profit that functions as an arm of Russian intelligence, to a London house that functions as an arm of Russian intelligence, to Brazil being turned into ‘an assembly for deep cover operatives’… I also included mention of RadPod’s recent interview with Russian propaganda whistleblower Steven Lacey, who explained how the Russian Orthodox Church is an arm of Russian intelligence, that targets and recruits young men. Unsurprising, when you consider the head of the church is KGB.
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Below is an excerpt of today’s column:
Hot Type: When Will the Last Democracies on Earth Grow a Spine
It's time for democratic nations to band together and kick out Russian infiltration operations for good, argues Heidi Siegmund Cuda
If Europeans woke up one day to find toxins leaching into their air and water, what would their leaders do? More than likely, they would unite across borders to isolate and diffuse the source of the pollution and begin a massive and well-coordinated cleanup effort to ensure the safety and well-being of all citizens. Summits would be held to devise ways to ensure it never happens again.
For more than a decade, pollution of the mind has been occurring at scale in democratic countries — the perpetrator is well known — the impacts, catastrophic, and yet, year after year, nothing is ever done about it. Sure, there are talks, and talks that lead to more talks, a few strongly-worded letters, limited prosecutions and legislation, but in practical terms, the cost seen by the perpetrator never rises and the mind war rages on.
Citizens are left defenseless, often unaware of the mental toxins they’re consuming through media manipulation, and through organizations that are fronts to push false worlds on people — what cultural archaeologist Stephen Douglas calls ‘disinfolklore galaxies’. People’s minds are being carpet-bombed at scale.
Reporters at Byline Times and Byline Supplement have written exhaustively on the dark fairytales pushed by Russia on social media, on Russian state media, muled by throwaway agents and ‘influencers’ in the West, and trafficked by pro-Kremlin useful idiots throughout the world.
It turns out people are cheap, and will betray their countries for small sums of money and a used car.
Writing from the point of view of someone who just lost her country, it seems to be a kind of madness that a very real war is being ignored, when we know the players and the techniques, and investigative reporters keep breaking variations of the same stories over and over again.
What will it take for the last democracies on earth to grow a spine?
Russia is at war with all of us, and we need real leadership, which currently seems to be coming only from the women leaders in Eastern Europe. They need backup.
I have documented the techniques over and over again, Russia is not particularly inventive. The tricks are cheap and effective and duplicated globally. And every week, there’s another breaking story or three.
Among the latest: the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) reports that the Foundation for the Support and Protection of the Rights of Compatriots Living Abroad — a Russian-funded foundation operating throughout the world known as ‘Pravfond’ — has “collaborated with spies, funded propaganda efforts, and built points of influence along the way”…
According to documents, Pravfond gave cover to spies, criminals, and pro-Russian mouthpieces, while masquerading as a human rights organization…
Also this week, Romania Journal, Intelligence Online, and Snoop.ro revealed that a house in London “is reportedly the hub of Russian intelligence operations in Europe”…
In more Russian spy news, the New York Times reported this week how the Russians essentially “turned Brazil into an assembly line for deep-cover operatives.”
And in my recent interview with Russian propaganda whistleblower Steven Lacey, who described his descent into narrative warfare hell after becoming a member of the Russian Orthodox Church, he said that the church functions as a recruitment arm of Russian intelligence. In fact, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church is a former KGB spy. Lacey explained that the church is primarily targeting young men.
At this point, it should be obvious that the war for our minds is real, and that too little is being done to stop the tsunami of Russian narrative warfare from flooding democratic shores.
So the question is, why?
“We, in almost the entire Western world—including the United States, of course—have a serious problem in how we perceive the malign activities of autocratic states, their proxy organizations, front NGOs, or agents of influence. We almost do not care about it, as long as they are not stealing information from us,” Dietmar Pichler, a disinformation analyst from Vienna, told Byline Supplement.
“The spreading of disinformation, Russian narratives, or lobbying for Russian interests is something we almost do not have on our radar. We tend to wrongly consider it simply a side effect of open societies, because it is protected by freedom of speech.”
Pichler, who founded the Disinformation Resilience Network, said that he would argue that the “organized spread of malign, anti-Western influence campaigns without any consequence” is not in practice, free speech, but part of the covert activity one finds in spy craft.
He also points out that when reporters exercise their free speech to expose these pro-Russian covert influence operations, they are met with a barrage of disinformation aimed to denigrate their work and make them radioactive. That doesn’t sound very much like freedom.
At bare minimum, Pichler said, the West “could invest more in building resilience—not only at the level of the general public, but also by preparing opinion leaders to recognize these activities and avoid falling for them, or worse, unknowingly supporting them”…
The former President of Estonia, Toomas Ilves, once told me that it’s not just one politician that was compromised by Russia but many, which may be part of the answer to why Russian operatives continue to operate freely in the West, spreading their toxins, and hacking vulnerable minds.
More sanctions are coming, and more talks will undoubtedly occur. But sanctions can be circumvented, and talk is cheap.
But at least we can see some countries defending their democracies. Like Ukraine, which banned the import and sale of books printed in Russia, music and media produced in Russia, Russian influencers, the Russian Orthodox Church, and Russian news programs.
All it took was an invasion.
Is that what it will take for us?
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The above is an excerpt of my Hot Type column, which was originally published Saturday, May 24, 2025, in Byline Supplement.
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