In article 56 of the “Kazan Declaration” made public on October 23 and translated in these pages, Russia expressed concern, together with the representatives of the BRICS invited to the Tatar capital, “about the exponential growth and the proliferation of disinformation”, as well as hate speech favoring the radicalization of conflicts. However, it is common knowledge that Russia, in addition to its interference in the electoral processes of many countries in its immediate area – such as, recently, in Georgia and Moldova – or far away – from the United States to the Central African Republic -, practices mass media propaganda, tending as much to improve its own image internationally as to undermine the foundations of regimes which are – or which seem – hostile to it.
To mention only the case of France, we remember these red hands painted on the “Wall of the Righteous” of the Shoah Memorial last May, quickly identified as a Russian destabilization operation. The idea of an intervention by the Kremlin had also been favored on the occasion of the sabotage of the railways which preceded the opening of the Olympic Games, before the Minister of the Interior rushed into the exploration of a hypothesis attributing it to the ultra-left. Moreover, we have not spoken again about this terrorist from Donbass who was arrested last June near Roissy airport, while he was preparing an improvised explosive device. Politically, the Kremlin's influence was manifested by its formal and financial support for the campaigns of the National Rally, from which it is proven that it benefited from several million loans from the Russian Federation. Finally, what many suspected was confirmed by the investigation by David Chavalarias, of the CNRS: the media overinvestment in the question of Palestine, at least in the first months of the deadly Israeli response, was partly due to the efforts of Kremlin to promote anxiety-provoking content on
Therefore, for many months the political and journalistic world has had its eyes riveted on the way in which Russia intended to influence the US presidential elections, especially since it has been perfectly established that cyberattacks, disinformation campaigns and propaganda operations had sought, in 2020 as in 2016, to polarize the US electorate and call into question the integrity of the electoral process itself. However, we would be deluding ourselves about the way in which Russia perceives its political and geopolitical interests by immediately considering that it used all the means at its disposal to make Donald Trump win.
The 2024 elections were in fact a real headache for Russia. The political ambitions of Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump are clearly in agreement on a certain number of points: the questioning of democracy, the subjection of all political and administrative mechanisms to the wishes of a plenipotentiary president, the reign of traditional values and even the hunt for migrants – since we have recently witnessed, in Russia, a racist hardening of migration policy, which goes so far as to divert flows from Central Asia towards Europe and other Asian countries. However, Vladimir Putin's vision is less ideological than strategic. No one in the Kremlin has forgotten, as its spokesperson Dmitri Peskov recalled, that the worsening of sanctions targeting Russia and the arming of Ukraine did indeed take place under the Trump administration. Furthermore, Kremlin experts and the Russian-speaking media space are questioning the concrete content of the potential plan to end the war in Ukraine that Donald Trump would have in mind: they also attach particular importance to the elements of this program recently put forward — although hypothetically — by Mike Pompeo, Secretary of State from 2018 to 2021.
It appears from the available analysis that Donald Trump, who has just won the American election, is not Russia's objective ally on an international scale.
Published the day after the election, the official one-page press release published by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation betrays a fairly clear analysis: if the victory of the Republican candidate remains the best option for Vladimir Putin, it is because of the destabilization it inflicts on the entire political and social life of the United States.
We could indeed summarize the Russian president's interest in a simple formula: maximizing both the predictability of international politics and political uncertainty within the countries of the “collective West”. Vladimir Putin needs, to carry out his policy, to “anticipate the moves” that Ukraine’s supporters may consider or attempt. From this point of view, the European institutions suit the Kremlin perfectly, since they appear to it as perfectly predictable actors; any confusion within the countries that stand up to him, starting with the United States, will be to his credit. But a question remains after the election night of November 5: while Trump, now closely advised by Musk, remains an unpredictable force, how long can Putin's strategy of uncontrolled chaos hold?
Official statement regarding the US presidential elections
The victory of Donald Trump in the United States presidential elections, which marks his return to the White House after an interval of four years, undoubtedly manifests the discontent of the American population, which disavows both the results of the administration of Joe Biden and the electoral program presented by the Democratic Party, which hastily installed Vice-President Kamala Harris in place of the current head of state.
Despite the powerful propaganda machine unleashed against Donald Trump by the Democrats, who mobilized all possible administrative resources for this purpose and benefited from the support of the liberal media, the Republican candidate, with the experience of his first presidential term, made the challenge of confronting the issues that really concern voters, starting with the economy and illegal immigration, as opposed to the globalist orientations of the White House.
Under these conditions, the small group in power was unable to prevent the defeat of Kamala Harris, even taking into account the chronic vices of American “democracy” – an archaic democracy, breaking with modern standards which define direct elections, fair and transparent.
This victory will not be enough to abolish the deep divide in American civic life, where the electorate finds itself, in fact, divided into two almost equal halves: Democratic states and Republican states; supporters of “progressivism” and defenders of traditional values. We can reasonably expect that the return of Donald Trump to power will only exacerbate these internal tensions and the hostility between the different camps present.
However, we have no illusions about the newly elected president, who is well known in Russia, nor about the new composition of Congress, where the data now available indicates that the Republicans will have the upper hand. The political elite in charge in the United States, regardless of its affiliation with the two competing parties, maintains the same anti-Russian sentiments and unanimously adheres to the project of “containment” of Russia. This line remains constant as the domestic political climate of the United States changes, whether it is promoting “America first” according to Donald Trump and his supporters or defending “a rules-based world order », a real obsession of the Democrats.
Russia will work with the new Administration once it is installed in the White House, fiercely defending Russia's national interests and continuing to pursue the goals set by the special military operation.
Our conditions have not changed and are well known in Washington.
