Dehai News

https://ericzuesse.substack.com/p/how-to-deconstruct-propaganda

https://theduran.com/how-to-deconstruct-propaganda/

How to Deconstruct Propaganda

15 December 2025, by Eric Zuesse. (All of my recent articles can be seen here.)

A good piece of propaganda was aired on America’s National Propaganda Radio (NPR, publicly called National ‘Public’ Radio) network on December 13th; and here it is along with (in parentheses) deconstruction comments by me documenting (by links) some of its lies:

“An international relations expert explains U.S.-Europe political split over Ukraine war”

DECEMBER 13, 20257:43 AM ET

HEARD ON WEEKEND EDITION SATURDAY

Rob Schmitz

4-Minute Listen

TRANSCRIPT

There are tensions between the U.S. and Europe over how to end the Ukraine war. NPR's Rob Schmitz talks to Nathalie Tocci from Johns Hopkins University about what's fueling these political divisions.

Sponsor Message

ROB SCHMITZ, HOST:

The war in Ukraine is exposing the growing divisions between the U.S. and Europe. President Trump appears to be increasingly frustrated by his failure to end the conflict. Here's what he had to say about some traditional allies during an interview with Politico earlier this week.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: In most European nations, they're decaying. They're decaying.

SCHMITZ: To get the European perspective on the state of transatlantic relations, we're joined now by Nathalie Tocci in Rome. She's professor of practice at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. Thanks for being with us, Nathalie.

NATHALIE TOCCI: Great being with you.

SCHMITZ: So let's start with Ukraine. We're seeing reports that U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff will meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and European leaders here, where I am, in Berlin this weekend. We've seen a flurry of diplomatic activity in recent days. What do you think are the chances of any deal?

TOCCI: Frankly speaking, extremely low, and extremely low because there seems to be no intention whatsoever on Moscow's side to actually see this war come to an end. (The war in Ukraine was started not by Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 like the propagandists imply, but by Obama’s coup in Ukraine in 2014 which installed the anti-Russian regime there which promptly started bombing to terrorize and kill the residents in the areas of Ukraine where the people refused to accept the Obama-imposed leader. Trump and Zelensky have consistently refused to accept what Putin and almost all Russians have repeatedly stated as neccessary and “absolutely legitimate demands” in order to be able to block the possibility of a blitz nuclear decapitation by the U.S. and its allies from inside Ukraine to take over and replace Russia’s Government in The Kremlin.) I actually think that the continuation of this war has become essentially fundamental to the survival of the continuation of the Russian regime. (That’s exactly the opposite of the truth, which is that consistently by margins of 75% to 25% the Russian population favor Russian victory against “the West” in Ukraine, versus 25% who favor “Seek compromise and make concessions to have the sanctions [by the U.S. regime and its allies] lifted.” Putin would probably be overthrown if he conceded to what The West has been demanding. His suppport from his population in the Ukraine war is probably far higher than any Western leader’s is.) And as far as the U.S. is concerned, there obviously seem to be very little incentive, it seems, to exert any pressure on Russia. And on the Ukrainian side, although, of course, there is quite a lot of leverage that the U.S. has on Ukraine, it's not as high as it used to be. And this is essentially...

SCHMITZ: Right.

TOCCI: ...Because the U.S. doesn't provide military support to Ukraine anymore, certainly not as much as it did. And so basically, Ukrainians rely on the Europeans, mainly, and Europeans continue to stand by Ukraine.

SCHMITZ: And meanwhile, President Trump has not been shy about criticizing Europe. Last week, his administration released its national security strategy, and it marks a very different approach to Europe for the U.S. I took a few notes. According to President Trump, European leaders are, quote, "weak," and the European Union, he says, was established to, quote, "screw the United States." How do you see these statements?

TOCCI: Well, essentially, if you take not just the national security strategy, if you take the statements made by Vice President Vance back at the Munich Security Conference, if you look at the actions of this second Trump administration, it actually paints quite a coherent vision. And the vision is one that I would describe as imperial collusion. There seems to be an interest in having good relations with Moscow, to an extent, with Beijing as well, so in a sense, great powers that understand themselves as empires. (The imperialism ever since 25 July 1945 and increasingly since 24 February 1990 has been by the U.S. Government to increase the number of its colonies or ‘allies’ in order to take over the world and especially Russia, China and Iran and now Venezuela; and NOT by any of those defending countries, which are determined to maintain their sovereignty and independence against the sanctions, coups, invasions, and other aggressions, from the hyper-aggressive U.S. empire.) And Europe is kind of inconveniently there (as-if imperialism hadn’t been The West’s specialty for hundreds of years even before the U.S. Government became after WW2 the world’s ONLY empire, especially after 24 February 1990), whereby if it stands united, it has a voice. If it stands disunited and fragmented, well, then it ends up on the colonial menu (by which that liar is saying The West needs to protect itself against the imperialism of the countries that The West is actually craving to colonize). And I think making Europe part of that colonial menu seems to be part of the intention (of the countries that are on the US, Government’s “menu” to conquer).

SCHMITZ: Yeah. I mean, another highlight from that Trump document is that it claims Europe is facing what it calls, quote, "civilization erasure." As you know from living in Italy, one of the biggest issues fueling the rise of nationalist parties in Europe is immigration. Why do you think the Trump administration is so interested in this issue on European soil?

TOCCI: OK. So, of course, you know, one reading of it is, you know, Trump has an idea - or rather, his administration have an idea of we, the white and Christian West. I mean, that's one reading of it. But I think, frankly speaking, scratching the surface, it's obvious that - so take, for example, my country. My country is led by a far-right leader that President Trump seems to like quite a bit.

SCHMITZ: Right.

TOCCI: Actually, Italy has seen over the last three years with this government an increase - a steady increase of migration flows because the government actually knows that there are labor shortages. There are other governments in Europe. Let's take the social democratic Danish government that has actually been far more restrictive on migration. Now, that doesn't seem to be one of the favorite governments of this administration. So I think, frankly speaking, the underlying this whole sort of cultural, you know, sort of embedding of a worldview, there is actually, I think, the deeper sense that by supporting far-right (that phrase “far right” is used by liberal fascists against anyone they disagree with who OPPOSES imperialism and supports the soverignty, freedom, and independence, of each nation — it is almost the OPPOSITE of what “far right” meant when the U.S. Government was anti-imperialist under FDR and waged war against the conservative-fascist imperialist Governments that comprised The Axis powers) governments in Europe, which tend to be - well, in fact, which are euroskeptic (the European Union was created by the U.S.’s CIA and is opposed not ONLY by today’s ‘far right’ but especially by Europe’s anti-imperialists or “progressives” — the CIA is anything BUT a progressive organization), you get to a weak and divided and fragmented and disintegrated EU, which is in the interest of a Trump administration that sees the European Union, as you were saying, quote-unquote, "screwing the United States" (ph).

SCHMITZ: That's Nathalie Tocci of Johns Hopkins University. Nathalie, thank you so much for joining us.

TOCCI: Thank you.

—————

Investigative historian Eric Zuesse’s latest book, AMERICA’S EMPIRE OF EVIL: Hitler’s Posthumous Victory, and Why the Social Sciences Need to Change, is about how America took over the world after World War II in order to enslave it to U.S.-and-allied billionaires. Their cartels extract the world’s wealth by control of not only their ‘news’ media but the social ‘sciences’ — duping the public.