These days, there are many reasons to wonder if Russian President Vladimir Putin and his cabal are getting carried away. But a Kremlin memo that was recently leaked to the press shows that Russian government officials are more disgusting than most of us realize, writes Foreign Policy, cited by Rador.

The memo, published by the exiled Russian publication Insider, reveals how the Federal Security Service (FSO), which protects dignitaries like Putin, is preparing to spread the war in Ukraine, or any other war, into Russian territory.

Unknown mystical and paranormal powers

The document emphasizes psychological training so that FSO agents have the “moral and psychological support” needed to withstand a potential “massive ideological attack.” But it’s not just the usual wartime propaganda, such as secret radio broadcasts or illegal newspapers, that worries Russians.

No, the Kremlin is preparing to “psychologically infect the military” with the enemy, who would manipulate them with the help of hypnosis, as well as with the help of unknown mystical and paranormal forces. The memo warns of “psi generators” and “hypnotic powers” being used by foreign militaries.

Belief in mystical powers is relatively widespread in Russia, where about 20% of the population turn to the services of fortune-tellers and more than 60% believe in certain types of magic.

Natalia Antonova, a Washington-based writer and Russia expert who spent seven years as a correspondent in Moscow, said: “I think the Russians really believe in this subject of hypnosis or telekinesis or whatever they’re trying to do there. Most of us are still trying to live in the real world again [conducerea rusă] No. They don’t even try anymore.”

Such fears may have been encouraged from above. Russian officials, including Putin, are rumored to have long believed in mysticism, astrology, numerology and clairvoyance, but also believe they are destined to rule a sprawling Russia.

The New York Times reported as early as 1988 that “horoscopes, folk medicine, paranormal healing and all manner of mysticism are prominent in Soviet society, part believer, part fraud, but by no means a joke.”

The means by which the FSO intends to avoid this type of paranormal attack

Mysticism merges with more traditional Russian Orthodox beliefs about apocalyptic scenarios and satanic influences. At the September ceremony on the occasion of the annexation of part of Ukraine, Putin explained how in the West “the very suppression of freedom has acquired the characteristics of a religion: pure Satanism.”

Later, in October, the Russian government changed its justification for the war, claiming that it had a moral imperative to “carry out the de-Satanization of Ukraine.”

If the concept of Satanism is sometimes used as a rhetorical hyperbole, then in other cases it refers to the concept itself. Russian Orthodoxy’s conservative ideas about spiritual warfare, in which the West is portrayed as literally demonic, have been incorporated into Russia’s official state lexicon – and mixed with the country’s enthusiasm for paranormal pseudoscience.

Don’t worry though. The memo describes the means by which the FSO intends to avoid such paranormal attacks.

Among the listed tactics we find the mental hardening of agents by telling them stories about the courage and heroism of their own colleagues:

• Another method of combating psychological contamination is the visit by agents of the FSO museum and the Kazan Cathedral in Moscow, allegedly in order to ward off the devil with prayers.
• The partnership system will also operate: “it is necessary that the most politically capable agents of the FSO are attached to the most unstable,” the note says.
• Or, as a precaution, psychologically vulnerable agents suffering from “neuropsychiatric instability” may need to be hospitalized during these mysteriously dangerous times.

Concerns about the psychology and morale of agents—crucial in a war that was about to be lost—mixed with more esoteric fears, such as paranormal attacks.

Mind control and telepathic dolphins

The Soviet state and its successor experimented with mind control (as did the US during the Cold War with its own secret paranormal project).

A Russian memo declassified in 2019 shows how Soviet researchers in the 1980s investigated psychic and other mystical abilities.

Also in 2019, a Russian military magazine claimed that the country’s soldiers have paranormal abilities – and that they have used them before. The article claimed that soldiers had learned to read minds from telepathic dolphins.

But we’re not just talking about mind control with dolphins. The author of the article, an army colonel, also wrote that telepathic soldiers are also capable of jamming communication signals and jamming computers with the power of their minds.

Telepathy? Telekinesis?

During the paranormal arms race of the Cold War era, no paranormal “weapon” was considered too strange to investigate—as long as researchers didn’t try too much occultism.

Investigative journalist Annie Jacobsen wrote in a 2017 book: “Soviet nomenclature associated with psychics was renamed to sound more technical, thus removing all links to psychics’ occult past.”

Telepathy? It was renamed “long-distance transmission of biological systems.” Telekinesis? Moving objects by simply thinking about them has recently been renamed “human non-ionizing radiation, especially electromagnetic radiation”.

The FSO memo explains that the agency’s deputy director, General Oleksandr Komov, is the highest-ranking person responsible for implementing a secret plan to repel paranormal attacks, should the need arise.

Komov, on the one hand, is fascinated by science, on the other hand, he is fascinated. Last year, he attended a conference organized by the Institute of Space Research of the Russian Academy of Sciences, dedicated to the possibility of observing the Earth from space. He is also said to be in charge of a group of independent advisers that includes astrologers, practitioners of black magic and soothsayers.

According to the FSO memo, strategies the enemy may use include “psychocorrective games,” “computer psi-viruses,” and “chemical and biological” psychological influence.

Psychocorrection, as far as I can tell, is a pseudoscience designed to “correct” the development of young children, often with the help of toys, and may also contain elements of experimental psychology. Its usefulness in dealing with high-profile individuals who may be targeted by foreign paranormal agents is questionable. And Insider notes that “computer psi viruses,” whatever they are, are unlikely to affect the Kremlin, given that agents are prohibited from using phones or tablets while on duty.

The initial invasion of Ukraine was backed by significant forces: an army of nearly 200,000 soldiers, accompanied by significant amounts of artillery, tanks and aircraft. Then Russian analysts announced an easy victory.

The situation that collapsed as a result of the Ukrainian resistance and the mass mobilization organized in conditions of panic did little to change the course of this failure. Which may have contributed to this whimsical atmosphere.

“With all these illusions that have been simmering for years,” said Antonova, “when they face the cold, hard reality of the impossibility of victory in Ukraine, they begin to mentally falter.”

Lauren Wolf (New York University Journalism Professor) – Foreign Policy (Rador takeover)