Dissent, Propaganda, and the Manufactured Enemy: Cold War Ends, Psyops Begin
Dissent, Propaganda, and the Manufactured Enemy: Cold War Ends, Psyops Begin
In July 2025, South Korea officially shut down its last remaining propaganda broadcasts into North Korea—including the long-running Echo of Hope—marking the symbolic end of a decades-old psychological operation. These radio waves once beamed K-pop and uncensored news across the DMZ, offering a sonic rebellion against censorship. But under President Lee Jae-myung’s outreach agenda, Seoul says the Cold War playbook no longer fits.
The same month, the U.S. slashed funding to Radio Free Asia, long seen as a lifeline for North Korean dissidents. Critics warn this leaves authoritarian regimes unchecked, just as China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea forge tighter alliances—trading drones, missiles, and even troops. North Korea is said to have sent 12,000 soldiers to assist Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Cold War Ends—But the Chill Persists
The West’s shift from traditional deterrence to vague threat inflation has birthed new enemies. As Putin stagnates in Donbas, attention pivots to China, Iran, and North Korea. Cable intercepts, warehouse arson, dissenter harassment and troop sightings now justify:
Eurofighter upgrades
Leopard tank deployments
Expanded ammo warehousing
Drone and satellite escalation
Meanwhile, real dissent—from HS2’s rail protests to Palestine solidarity—gets sidelined or criminalized.
And the public question an MOD defence that includes secret Gaza RAF spy flights for Israel, Afghan allies details posted online by MOD and covered up for 2 years or the Agnes murder in Kenya with Duke of Lancaster regiment officer closing ranks on what they knew.
Plus pricey kit fails such as Aircraft carriers, Bowman/Morpheus radio and Ajax armoured cars.
And the Taliban ensuring control of heroin that the NATO Occupation not only failed to do but enabled.
Psyops: The New Battleground
As foreign propaganda fades, psychological operations (IO) focus inward. The UK’s 77th Brigade, originally tasked with countering enemy narratives abroad, now analyses domestic sentiment and influences social media trends. Thailand’s own military IO units target critics, using fake accounts to distort discourse.
The new UK Online Safety Act with age verification on a range of innocuous websites such as Wiki or Spotify plus news sources still unravelling. Facebook crimes require new budgets for armchair cops and MOD keyboard warriors?
The danger? These tools erode trust in democracy, blurring defence with manipulation. Governments claim to be fighting disinformation, but often silence whistleblowers and activists.
Dissent Under Fire
In the UK, Palestine Action was proscribed as a terrorist group, criminalising protest, satire—even slogans on T-shirts. Or the infamous Royals protestors arrests for blank signs. Across the globe, Paul Chambers, a U.S. scholar, was arrested in Thailand under lèse-majesté (Article 112) simply for attending a webinar on army reshuffles.
Meanwhile, MI6-linked intelligence reveals Iranian agents surveilling dissidents and radicalising mosques in the UK - from 3years ago: hardly a clear and present or substantial danger - yet the IRGC, rather than Palestine Action or Just Stop Oil, remains legally unproscribed—despite assassination plots, spyware apps, and intimidation campaigns of dissenters.
The heavily-choreographed Iran warnings to Trump of a brief missile attack on a US army base in Arabia suggests pantomime politics rather than realpolitik. As are Pentagon warnings of a likely Chinese invasion of Taiwan sometime soon or never? While North Korean troops mere cannon fodder along with Putin's Sven Hassel penal battalions. Even Wagner coup mercenaries are struggling in Africa.
Are F35s and shiny Superfighters and mega tanks and nukes subs looking increasingly pointless if not overkill for defence?
In this theatre of threats, Eurofighters, F-35s, Leopard tanks, and nuclear submarines begin to look like gilded relics—overkill for adversaries that rarely materialize outside press releases and satellite imagery.
With no convincing external foe, the security apparatus turns inward: casting mafias, cartel violence, or, more easily, TikTok viewers and climate protesters as domestic threats.
But none of these require war machines to neutralize—nor do they warrant 5% GDP defence budgets or warehouses brimming with rusting ammunition. Mere replenishment doesn't require 40 UK Admirals for 17 warships.
A wider issue impacting on the military is that are our leaders increasingly out of date in a 21C world?
Elderly Biden stumbling in POTUS debates as dementia bites into term/age limits and Trump/Putin/Xi age and stuck in the Cold War past --Putin literally a Stasi officer in East Berlin: the Stasi and East Berlin and East Germany long vanished, Trump a military school cadet and draft dodger in the Vietnam War era, Xi a victim and rural exile in the Maoist Cultural revolution. All from an era as ancient as the Fax now.
The issue of aging and cognitive decline among U.S. senators has become increasingly visible—and controversial. In recent years, several high-profile incidents have sparked debate over whether Congress needs formal mechanisms to address senatorial incapacity.
Freezes and Frailty: Public Incidents
Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY): Twice in 2023, McConnell appeared to freeze mid-sentence during press conferences, prompting concerns about his health and fitness to serve.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA): At age 89, Feinstein returned to the Senate after a months-long absence due to shingles, but reports of confusion and memory lapses led to calls for her resignation.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and others in their 80s continue to serve, some with limited public engagement or visible signs of aging or being shepherded by their staff acting as courtiers.
No 25th Amendment for Congress
Unlike the presidency, which can invoke the 25th Amendment to remove an incapacitated leader, Congress has no formal process for removing a member due to health or cognitive decline. Expulsion requires a two-thirds vote, and has historically been reserved for criminal or treasonous acts—not medical incapacity.
Institutional Blind Spots
The Senate has long relied on collegial discretion, with aides and staff often acting as “shadow senators” for aging members.
There’s no mandatory retirement age, and voters must wait until the next election cycle—up to six years—to replace a senator.
Proposals for constitutional amendments or internal fitness reviews have gained little traction, despite bipartisan relevance.
Gerontocracy and Governance
With the average age of senators hovering near 65—and several in their 80s—the U.S. Senate increasingly resembles a gerontocracy. While many older lawmakers remain sharp and effective, others face visible cognitive decline, raising questions about representation, decision-making, and national security.
Meanwhile, democratic institutions buckle. In the U.S., Congress quietly adjourns with procedural abuse to avoid debate on Epstein-related intelligence, while Britain’s Parliament was prorogued under Jacob Rees-Mogg’s watch, curtailing scrutiny of royal spending, arms exports, and domestic protest laws. In Kenya, anti-tax demonstrators are met with live rounds under PM Ruto’s militarized response, echoing Trump-era deployment of the National Guard and US Marines in U.S. cities to suppress civil unrest.
Military Crimes and Cover-Ups
From cadet Pakapong Tanyakan’s death and organ theft in Thailand to Agnes Wanjiru’s murder in Kenya by British soldiers, military impunity reigns. The UK’s Deepcut Barracks scandal saw five cadet deaths with no convictions. Australia’s SAS faced war crimes charges—but most were quietly dropped. Even the My Lai massacre in Vietnam yielded just one conviction after years of court battles—Lt. Calley, paroled after a brief house arrest.
The whistleblowers? Often jailed, blacklisted, or ostracised. The perpetrators? Frequently protected, promoted, or forgotten.
The Logic of Power
As dissent is branded terrorism and military crimes dissolve in silence, governments pivot to new enemies and shiny hardware. But the real battle isn’t over borders or ideology—it’s over truth itself. When loudspeakers fall silent and psyops shift to your feed, ask who’s really being targeted—and why.
With Putin bogged down in Donbas, his Black Sea Fleet humiliated by Ukrainian strikes, and domestic unrest manifesting in Moscow’s so-called “Window Wars,” the traditional spectre of Russian aggression, ever since the Pentagon-faked JFK Missile Crisis, has lost its immediacy.
Yet security planners scramble for new threats to justify their budgets and arsenals: undersea cables? Arctic icebreakers? Swarms of drones to protects drones? An even shinier F35 replacement the price of a Japan alliance?
China looms large, with its moves around Taiwan far from UK and escalating sanction tit-for-tats, while Iran’s nuclear posturing and proxy networks keep Western intelligence twitchy.
Even RUSI funded by MOD questioning the value of NATO in Asia or UK-Japan defence treaties.
North Korea’s dispatch of troops to Russia is spun as a global axis forming—though its strategic impact remains questionable. Further afield, desert rebel flare-ups in the Sahel are framed as jihadist contagion, and even narco-mafias and arson incidents are hyped as asymmetrical terror risks.
The result? A shifting cast of “likely enemies” used by elderly politicos and generals less for deterrence than for sustaining military-industrial-thinktank groupthink logic not real scrutiny—Eurofighters, Leopards, ammo warehouses, and psyops units thrive not on clarity, but on chaos.
Comments