Too Little, Too Late

Germany’s “Take It Easy” Approach to Russian Hybrid Warfare

Published in: "Countering Foreign Information Manipulation in the Baltic Sea

Region: Patterns, Responses and Gaps", Geopolitics and Security Studies Center, GSSC, April 2026

Countering Foreign Information Manipulation in the Baltic Sea Region (GSSC).pdf

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It should have been a shocking revelation. On 11 December 2025, the German government attributed a major cyberattack and disinformation campaign during the federal elections to Russia. The Russian ambassador was summoned to the Foreign Office, a ministry spokesperson in Berlin announced. “Russia thus poses a very real threat to our security,” he said. The aim of Moscow’s activities had been to divide German society, fuel mistrust and undermine confidence in democratic institutions[1].

The government also stated that a cyberattack against German air traffic control in August 2024 could be clearly linked to the Russian hacker group Fancy Bear. “Our intelligence findings prove that the Russian military intelligence service, the GRU, is responsible for this attack.”

Ironically, the only real surprise in these statements was that they were made at all. Back in May 2015, a cyberattack paralyzed the Bundestag for several days and led to the theft of large amounts of sensitive data. Investigators quickly suspected Russian intelligence involvement, including the hacker group Fancy Bear, whose activity can be traced back as far as 2007[2]. Yet the incident triggered little public outrage, and it took the German government five years to formally attribute the attack to Russia and to impose largely symbolic sanctions[3].

Current influence operations had already been uncovered in summer 2022 and linked to Russia shortly thereafter. Independent research groups and cybersecurity experts documented their structure and methods in detail, and German and international media reported extensively on the findings. Russian interference was also detected in the run-up to the European Parliament elections in June 2024[4]. And yet, when Germany held snap federal elections in February 2025, the country once again appeared conspicuously unprepared.

For decades, Germany has served as a laboratory for Soviet and later Russian influence operations and active measures. Today, it has become one of the central battlefields of Russia’s hybrid war. Moscow’s objective is to weaken German support for Ukraine, fracture political consensus, and obstruct Europe’s ability for collective response. This strategy includes covert digital operations, targeted influence campaigns, real-world stunts and espionage, all of them exploiting and intensifying polarizing domestic debates, particularly on migration, Islam, defense spending, antisemitism and Israel[5]. Notably, antisemitic provocations were integrated into operational planning well before the global surge in antisemitism and anti-Israel sentiment following Hamas’s terrorist attack on 7 October 2023[6].

The threat picture is further complicated by the interaction between overtly hostile influence and independent, seemingly respectable voices. A constellation of Russian analysts, commentators and opposition-aligned figures in Germany and across the West consists of individuals with no demonstrable ties to Russian intelligence or state institutions, yet their commentary and public interventions often normalize and amplify Kremlin strategic frames.

Their work may be driven by their own convictions or incentives, but the net effect is to lend legitimacy and analytical weight to narratives that serve Moscow’s interests: that Russia is misunderstood rather than imperial, that sanctions are ineffective and only harm ordinary people, that Ukraine’s war of defense is morally compelling but ultimately futile, or that any further increase in Western support for Ukraine would inevitably provoke a devastating Russian response.

Understanding this dynamic is essential for any realistic assessment of Germany’s vulnerability in the information domain.

The “Doppelgänger” operation

One of the most consequential and best-documented recent Russian influence operations targeting Germany is the campaign known as “Doppelgänger.” It combines classic disinformation techniques with a high level of technological sophistication.

Doppelgänger was first uncovered in summer 2022 by the EU DisinfoLab, a Brussels-based NGO specializing in foreign information manipulation. In a detailed report published in September 2022[7], researchers documented a large network of fake websites that closely imitated the design, layout and branding of established European media outlets, including Der Spiegel, Die Welt, Bild, Süddeutsche Zeitung, and several international newspapers. These sites differed from earlier fake-news portals in that they were near-perfect replicas, often distinguishable only by minor changes in domain names.

The technique resembled phishing: instead of stealing passwords or financial data, it hijacked credibility. Users believed they were reading legitimate journalism while consuming manipulated or entirely fabricated content, typically critical of Ukraine, sanctions or German military aid. The imitation, however, was not always successful. Much of the content relied on automated translation, which at the time was still relatively crude and occasionally produced revealing errors. In some cases, for example, articles referred to the Russia-friendly German far-right party AfD using the Russian-language acronym ADG (from Alternativa dlya Germanii), an unmistakable marker of the operation’s origin[8].

Investigators identified several core components: cloned media sites, coordinated social-media amplification, paid advertising[9], and narrative coherence with recurring frames: Ukraine as corrupt or doomed, sanctions as self-harm, German elites as dishonest, and Russia as a rational actor seeking peace. From the outset, EU DisinfoLab, the French government agency VIGINUM and independent researchers suspected state-level coordination, pointing to the scale and persistence of the operation and its alignment with Kremlin foreign-policy goals.

Stronger indications of Russian state involvement emerged in late 2022, when further investigations linked Doppelgänger to infrastructure and tactics previously observed in Russian information operations targeting France and other EU countries. Clearer attribution followed in 2023. Meta publicly confirmed that it had dismantled a large network of accounts and pages linked to Doppelgänger and attributed the operation to actors based in Russia[10]. Meta and Google removed accounts, blocked domains and restricted advertising linked to the network. While these measures reduced its reach, they did not eliminate the operation, as new domains continued to appear. French authorities, who had already been monitoring similar clone-site campaigns ahead of elections, formally accused Russia of running the operation[11]. Germany, by contrast, preferred to downplay the case, folding Doppelgänger into broader threat assessments rather than issuing a clear political accusation. According to information obtained by the investigative group CORRECTIV in 2024, the German government had been aware for several months of German companies involved in the matter but failed to follow up on these indications[12].

From Doppelgänger to Storm-1516 and Pravda Network

While Doppelgänger relied on imitation, subsequent operations abandoned cloning altogether. The most significant was Storm-1516, a cluster of Russian information operations identified in 2023[13].

Storm-1516 built a loose ecosystem of generic “news” sites, pseudo-blogs and campaign pages presenting themselves as alternative media, citizen journalism or issue-driven platforms. These outlets functioned primarily as content feeders. Articles were recycled, lightly rewritten or automatically translated and republished under different bylines, creating the illusion of multiple independent sources. This model enabled rapid scaling and adaptation to national debates. Human users played a critical role by reposting and commenting on content, often unaware of its coordinated origin.

As with Doppelgänger, Storm-1516 was first uncovered by independent researchers and platform operators, well before official responses followed. By January 2025 CORRECTIV has identified more than 100 such websites activated after the snap elections were announced in November 2024, although lower-level activity had already been observable in the preceding months. Among the sources whose content was recycled, CORRECTIV names the Russian state propaganda outlet RT, as well as several established German right-wing and pro-Russian media platforms, including Compact, Philosophia Perennis and Nachdenkseiten[14].

A closely related operation is the so-called Pravda network, a large-scale content infrastructure of automated websites that repost and translate pro-Kremlin material from Russian state media, social platforms and Telegram channels into dozens of languages, including German.

According to the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRLab)[15], the network comprises several hundred portals worldwide. These sites are not meant to build audiences of their own, supplying ideologically aligned material for amplification by other influence operations, including Storm-1516. The scale and multilingual spread of Pravda content also appear intended to pollute the open web as a data environment. As DFRLab researcher Valentin Châtelet notes, this approach likely helps circumvent sanctions on Russian state media by inserting Kremlin-aligned content into Wikipedia and AI training pipelines, allowing such narratives to surface indirectly in AI-generated responses used by Western audiences[16].

Russia Today (RT), banned but not defused

For more than a decade, Russia Today (RT) served as the flagship instrument of Russia’s foreign media influence in Germany and across Europe. Presented as an “alternative” international news channel, RT combined professional production with a consistent editorial line aligned with Kremlin strategic interests.

In Germany, RT DE deliberately targeted a politically heterogeneous audience, reaching parts of the far right, the far left and segments of a broader protest milieu skeptical of mainstream media. As media scholar Susanne Spahn has shown, RT’s effectiveness lay in its ability to embed Kremlin narratives into domestic German debates by adopting the language of media criticism, anti-elitism and free-speech advocacy, while systematically privileging voices hostile to liberal democracy and Western foreign policy[17].

RT’s role changed fundamentally after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. In March 2022, the European Union banned the distribution of RT and Sputnik under its sanctions regime[18], citing their function as instruments of state propaganda. In Germany, RT DE had already been taken off air earlier, after the media regulator ruled that the channel lacked the required broadcasting license[19]. Since then, RT has adapted rather than disappeared[20]. Its content continues to circulate through mirror sites, Telegram channels[21], on X, as well as through recycling by third-party media, often embedded in broader influence operations[22].

As Spahn has argued, this shift illustrates a broader pattern: the ban constrained RT’s reach as a formal media brand, but it did not eliminate its narratives. Instead, those narratives have been diffused into decentralized networks that are harder to regulate, easier to deny and more compatible with contemporary strategies based on saturation, repetition and plausible deniability.

Critical Affirmation: Russian Experts and Exile milieus 

A separate, less obvious and often underestimated channel for the spread of Russian narratives has emerged in the wake of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. After February 2022, large numbers of Russian opposition figures relocated to Europe, particularly to Germany. Many arrived with credible records of repression, prosecution, or “foreign agent” designation in Russia and were welcomed as political exiles.

Given Germany’s strong commitment to supporting Russian dissidents, many of these exiles found employment in NGOs, think tanks, academic institutions, and political foundations. While this reflected legitimate solidarity, the resulting landscape has also created blind spots and, in some cases, functions as an amplifier for narratives that prioritize a Russocentric perspective and, intentionally or not, align with positions favorable to the Kremlin.

Intentionality may differ from case to case and is difficult to assess, not least because, even as these actors gain visibility and influence in their respective professional communities and in the media, they continue to attract little attention from law enforcement or public scrutiny.

In February 2025, it emerged that a Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU) member of parliament Christian Hirte had employed in his Bundestag office a former staff member of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation in Moscow who, as reported in the media, had apparent ties to the Russian domestic intelligence service, the FSB. According to the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung[23], in 2022 the MP offered the Russian exile a position and asked an unnamed security service to examine his biography more closely. The service responded only in the second half of 2023, stating that the employee had contacts with Russian intelligence, though this did not necessarily mean he himself posed a problem. The following year, Hirte was informed that the suspicions had been substantiated. He was, however, advised against immediate dismissal to avoid alerting the employee. The case raised uncomfortable questions about vetting practices and assumptions surrounding Russian opposition credentials, but led to no visible changes in institutional procedures or policy.

In the meantime, a number of newcomers who had faced repression in Russia and subsequently found employment in Germany’s opinion-shaping and policy-relevant institutions have openly articulated views at odds with liberal democratic values. So far, none of these cases has prompted law enforcement action or a public response from employers, host institutions, or sponsors. 

One telling example is Sergey Chernyshov, a visiting scholar at the Department of Eastern European History at Ruhr University Bochum, who has been designated a “foreign agent” in Russia. Chernyshov drew public attention after posting Facebook content sympathetic to the far-right AfD and containing hostile and derogatory statements about Ukrainian and Syrian refugees. Shortly before the federal elections, he also appeared in a smart-propaganda video by Russian influencer Ksenia Sobchak, in which the AfD was presented as a respectable political force with a legitimate agenda[24]. This remains a rare instance of visible cooperation between a Russian exile of the post-2022 wave and Russian propaganda. Unlike in comparable cases in the Baltic states, Chernyshov’s actions appear to have had no professional consequences for him in Germany.

A particularly institutionally significant case is that of the Carnegie Endowment Russia Eurasia Center, a subsidiary of the US-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Relocated from Moscow to Berlin in 2022, the center now operates from offices at Pariser Platz, in close proximity to the Brandenburg Gate and key political institutions. Given Carnegie’s standing as an influential international organization, affiliation with the center confers a high degree of credibility and positions its analysts as ostensibly independent experts, amplifying their influence in public and policy debates.

Concerns about the integrity of Carnegie Moscow, as it was known at the time, were expressed as early as 2015[25]. Critics argued that the once pluralistic and sharply critical think tank was shifting toward accommodation of Kremlin narratives after Russia’s annexation of Crimea. Following Vladimir Putin’s return to the presidency in 2012 and the tightening of pressure on foreign NGOs, Carnegie Moscow curtailed work on Russian domestic politics and lost several of its most prominent Kremlin critics.

A central role in this shift was attributed to Dmitri Trenin, the long-time director of the Moscow Center and a former Soviet army colonel. Under his leadership, the center increasingly emphasized “dialogue” and stability over critical analysis. Trenin and other senior Carnegie analysts repeatedly downplayed Russian aggression in Ukraine, minimized the effectiveness of sanctions, warned against arming Ukraine, and suggested that weakening Putin could make things worse.

Trenin remained in Russia and has since openly endorsed Moscow’s agenda as a member of the Council for Foreign and Defense Policy, a Kremlin-associated think tank widely known as the organizer of the Valdai Forum. On 1 April 2026, he succeeded former Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov as president of the Russian International Affairs Council, another Kremlin-linked foreign policy think tank founded in 2011 by then President Dmitry Medvedev. In his first interview in this capacity, Trenin framed the Council as a “sector of the front” assigned a “direction of advance” in Russia’s external engagement[26].

Trenin’s former subordinates continued their work from Berlin. Russian authorities closed the Carnegie Moscow Center in April 2022[27]. In April 2023, they designated the Carnegie Endowment a “foreign agent” and, in July 2024, declared it an “undesirable organization”[28], effectively criminalizing any form of cooperation with it while at the same time reinforcing its credibility as an institution critical of the regime.

At the same time, the composition of the Berlin-based team warrants closer attention. According to their biographies on the Carnegie website[29], several current fellows have significant professional backgrounds in Russian state or state-affiliated institutions; a number held such positions up to February 2022, while others had built careers there earlier. After relocating to Berlin, some were formally designated “foreign agents” or subjected to other forms of repression. Their analytical approach and core positions, however, have largely remained aligned with the framework established under Trenin’s leadership.

Alexander Gabuev, now head of Carnegie Russia Eurasia, was, until February 2022 a member of the Council for Foreign and Defense Policy, a Kremlin-associated body mentioned above. References to his membership have since been removed from the council’s website but remain accessible via archived versions[30]. Gabuev’s current biography on the Carnegie website does not mention this affiliation. In his high-profile interventions in German media, Gabuev has articulated positions that, while critical of the Kremlin, closely mirror its talking points on escalation and deterrence. These include warnings that allowing Ukraine to use long-range Western munitions would amount to direct Western involvement in the war[31], as well as arguments against supplying certain weapons systems on the grounds that this could provoke unpredictable Russian escalation[32].

Another example is Alexandra Prokopenko, a fellow at Carnegie Russia Eurasia who worked at the Central Bank of Russia until February 2022. In a recent contribution from December 2025[33], she criticized the European Commission for tightening financial restrictions on Russia in ways that, in her argument, primarily harm ordinary Russians while doing little to constrain the country’s war economy, thereby reinforcing the narrative that sanctions are largely ineffective.

A further prominent Carnegie-affiliated figure with a background in state institutions, Ekaterina Schulmann, is also a guest scholar at the Free University of Berlin and a widely sought-after commentator on Russian politics. On 4 December 2025, she appeared on Jung & Naiv, one of Germany’s most popular political podcasts[34]. Among other topics, Schulmann discussed what she described as best-case scenarios for both Russia and Ukraine, presenting them as equally plausible. For Russia, such a scenario would involve achieving its current military objectives; for Ukraine, it would mean a freezing of the conflict. This framing reproduces a core Kremlin narrative that treats Ukrainian victory as unrealistic while normalizing territorial loss.

This pattern corresponds to what may be described as “critical affirmation,” a mode of discourse characteristic of large parts of Russian media and expert commentary that took shape during the early years of Vladimir Putin’s rule. Analysts and journalists often criticized the regime’s methods, inefficiencies, or endemic corruption, while simultaneously affirming the legitimacy of its declared objectives, such as restoring national security, ensuring economic development, preserving stability, and maintaining pragmatic relations with the West, thereby obstructing scrutiny of the regime’s actual aims. Gradually, this logic extended into significant parts of the Russian opposition. For many years, opposition discourse focused primarily on corruption, electoral fraud, and administrative abuse, while questions of imperial ambition and the increasingly fascistoid nature of the system were treated as secondary. Such criticism conveyed an image of independence and professionalism while ultimately reinforcing the core assumptions the Kremlin sought to establish, both domestically and internationally. It also helped persuade domestic audiences and Western decision-makers that the regime’s primary objective was the accumulation of wealth, while systematically downplaying the risk of external aggression.

Increasingly, this mode of argumentation is being carried into Western contexts through the integration of Russian émigré experts into relevant institutions. Their positions may genuinely reflect personal convictions, yet these convictions were often formed within Russian institutional environments and continue to align, in part, with narratives long promoted by the Kremlin.

Conclusion and Recommendations

Germany’s response to Russian hybrid warfare has remained slow, cautious and fragmented. While the government has taken some steps, most notably the ban on RT and Sputnik, the broader ecosystem of Russian influence continues to operate with relatively limited constraints. Measures are often reactive rather than preventive, and political signals remain ambiguous.

Part of the difficulty lies in deeper structural factors. A mixture of historical guilt and a long tradition of Russophilia, what the historian Gerd Koenen has described as Germany’s “Russia complex”[35], continues to shape political reflexes. Germany has long struggled to perceive Russia as an adversary. A distinctive strain of pacifism also plays a role: militancy is associated primarily with aggression rather than defense[36]. In addition, Germany’s strong sensitivity regarding censorship and state interference in media has produced particular caution in confronting hostile propaganda. Legal constraints exist too, but the more decisive factor is the limited political willingness to revise them.

A particularly telling example is the Russian House (Russisches Haus der Wissenschaft und Kultur) on Friedrichstraße in central Berlin. Operated by the Russian state agency Rossotrudnichestvo, the institution is formally a cultural center but functions as a key hub of Russian influence activity and, according to critics[37], potentially covert operations in Germany. With around 29,000 square meters, it is the largest such center outside Russia. Despite the full-scale invasion of Ukraine and the intensification of Russian operations against Germany, the Russian House has remained open. The German government has been reluctant to shut it down, arguing that it is protected under a bilateral cultural agreement that places it on a similar legal footing as the Goethe-Institut. At the same time, the Goethe-Institut’s activities in Russia have been drastically reduced under pressure from the Russian authorities. The situation is further complicated by the fact that Rossotrudnichestvo has been under EU sanctions since 2022, which restrict its financial operations in Germany and effectively prevent it from conducting financial transactions. As a result, the federal government has been covering the property tax for the building, amounting to roughly €70,000 per year[38].

After the 2016 “Lisa case”, in which a fabricated story about the alleged rape of a Russian-German girl in Berlin was amplified by Russian state media and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov[39], German officials and analysts began to speak of a Russian hybrid war. Yet Germany’s response still treats these activities as if they were isolated incidents. In practice, the country is facing continuous hybrid attacks against its institutions, infrastructure and public debate. As long as these actions are handled as individual security or law-enforcement problems, the response will remain defensive. If Berlin describes the situation as a hybrid war, it must also draw the strategic consequences of that diagnosis: impose costs on the perpetrators, disrupt their operational infrastructure and respond with retaliation and countermeasures.

Meeting the scale of the challenge requires faster decisions, clearer signals and firmer action:

·       Accelerate responses and increase deterrence

Move more quickly from detection to attribution and response. Delays and symbolic measures weaken deterrence. Organized interference should trigger immediate, visible consequences, including diplomatic and legal action.

·       Improve strategic communication

Develop a coherent, proactive communication strategy that names hostile operations early and explains their mechanisms to the public. To coordinate this effort, Germany should establish a dedicated strategic communication office within the Federal Chancellery.

·       Disrupt organized disinformation decisively

Expand rapid and comprehensive blocking of coordinated disinformation networks, including fake media ecosystems and amplification infrastructures. Legal standards must reflect hybrid-warfare realities rather than peacetime assumptions about pluralism.

·       Remove remaining influence footholds

Close institutions that function as instruments of Russian state influence, including the Russian House, and act more consistently against suspected Russian assets.

·       Strengthen vetting and migration controls

Tighten visa and residence procedures for Russian nationals. Apply more rigorous background checks for politically active exiles seeking roles in NGOs, academia, think tanks or political institutions.

·       Apply stricter standards to platforms and funding

Exercise greater caution in providing visibility, legitimacy or financial support to Russian opposition figures and experts whose narratives consistently align with Kremlin framing.

·       Invest in media literacy as security policy

Make media literacy a compulsory school subject, update curricula to address contemporary disinformation tactics, and provide systematic training for teachers, educators, journalists and public servants. Without these capabilities, technical countermeasures will remain insufficient.

Taken together, these steps would mark a shift from reactive damage control to a sustained defense of Germany’s democratic resilience.

References

[1] Matthias Wyssuwa, „Bundesregierung sieht Beweise für russische Einmischung“, 12 December 2025, FAZ, https://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/ausland/bundesregierung-wirft-russland-hybride-angriffe-vor-110802674.html 

[2] Patrick Beuth, Kai Biermann, Martin Klingst and Holger Stark, „Merkel and the Fancy Bear“, Die Zeit, 12 May 2017, https://www.zeit.de/digital/2017-05/cyberattack-bundestag-angela-merkel-fancy-bear-hacker-russia 

[3] Germany summons Russian ambassador over parliament hacking, DW, 28 May 2020, https://www.dw.com/en/germany-summons-russian-ambassador-over-parliament-hacking-attack/a-53605178, EU sanctions Russian officials over Bundestag hack, DW, 22 October 2020, https://www.dw.com/en/eu-sanctions-russian-officials-over-cyberattack-on-germanys-bundestag/a-55364442 

[4] „Pro-Kremlin campaigns intensify in Germany ahead of European Elections“, Institute for Strategic Dialogue, 7 June, 2024

https://www.isdglobal.org/digital_dispatches/pro-kremlin-campaigns-intensify-in-germany-ahead-of-european-elections/ 

[5] “Investigation: How a pro-Kremlin ad campaign used the Israel-Hamas conflict to spread propaganda in France and Germany “, ISD, 11 October 2024, https://www.isdglobal.org/digital_dispatches/how-a-pro-kremlin-ad-campaign-used-the-israel-hamas-conflict-to-spread-propaganda-in-france-and-germany/

Steffen Kutzner, „Nein, in diese Berliner Moschee wurde kein Schweinekopf in einer Palästina-Flagge geworfen“, CORRECTIV, 10 July 2024, https://correctiv.org/faktencheck/2024/07/10/nein-in-diese-berliner-moschee-wurde-kein-schweinekopf-in-einer-palaestina-flagge-geworfen/ 

[6] Jörg Schmitt,  Ralf Wiegand, “Jan Marsalek und die gescheiterte „Operation Berlin““, Süddeutsche Zeitung, 17 December 2025, https://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/jan-marsalek-geheimdienst-russland-berlin-li.3354668 

[7] Alexandre Alaphilippe, Gary Machado, Raquel Miguel and Francesco Poldi, “Doppelganger – Media clones serving Russian propaganda”, EU DisinfoLab in partnership with Qurium, 27 September, 2022, https://www.disinfo.eu/doppelganger 

[8] Germany Targeted by the Pro-Russian Disinformation Campaign “Doppelgänger”, Technical Report on an Analysis by the Federal Foreign Office, 5 June 2024.

[9] https://www.isdglobal.org/digital_dispatches/russian-influence-operation-doppelganger-linked-to-fringe-advertising-company/ 

[10] Ben Nimmo, Margarita Franklin, David Agranovich, Lindsay Hundley, Mike Torrey, “Quarterly Adversarial Threat Report”, Meta, February 2023, https://transparency.meta.com/metasecurity/threat-reporting/ 

[11] “Doppelgänger : la France a déjoué une campagne numérique russe de désinformation”, France 24, June 13, 2023, https://www.france24.com/fr/france/20230613-la-france-a-d%C3%A9jou%C3%A9-une-campagne-num%C3%A9rique-russe-de-d%C3%A9sinformation-un-acte-indigne 

[12] Max Bernhard, Alexej Hock, Sarah Thust, “Russische Propaganda: Bundesregierung ignoriert Hinweise auf Spuren in Deutschland”, Correctiv, July 11, 2024, https://correctiv.org/faktencheck/russische-desinformation/2024/07/11/russland-propaganda-doppelgaenger-bundesregierung-ignoriert-hinweise-auf-spuren-in-deutschland/ 

[13] Darren Linvill, Patrick Warren, „Infektion’s Evolution: Digital Technologies and Narrative Laundering“, Clemson University Media Forensic Hub, December 15, 2023,  https://open.clemson.edu/mfh_reports/3/ 

[14] https://correctiv.org/en/fact-checking-en/2025/01/24/disinformation-operation-russian-meddling-in-german-election-campaign-exposed/ 

[15] https://dfrlab.org/2025/02/24/russia-pravda-network-expands-worldwide/ 

[16] https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/exposing-pravda-how-pro-kremlin-forces-are-poisoning-ai-models-and-rewriting-wikipedia/ 

[17] Susanne Spahn, “Das Russland Netzwerk“, Frankfurter Allgemeine Buch, Frankfurt, 2024

[18] “EU imposes sanctions on state-owned outlets RT/Russia Today and Sputnik's broadcasting in the EU”, Council of the EU Press release, March 2, 2022 https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2022/03/02/eu-imposes-sanctions-on-state-owned-outlets-rtrussia-today-and-sputnik-s-broadcasting-in-the-eu/ 

[19] Louis Westendarp, “Germany bans Russian broadcaster RT’s German-language channel”, Politico, February 2, 2022, https://www.politico.eu/article/russian-broadcaster-rt-ordered-stop-germany-program/ 

[20] Larissa Doroshenko, Peter Benzoni, Bret Schafer, „No Bahn on RT: How RT Deutsch Stays on Track Despite Content Bans”, Alliance for Securing Democracy, 21 February 2025, https://securingdemocracy.gmfus.org/no-bahn-on-rt-how-rt-deutsch-stays-on-track-despite-content-bans/ 

[21] Anastasia Mikhaylova,  Roman Dobrokhotov, Maria Ehrlich; “Talking points from Moscow: How RT and the GRU set the agenda on German-language Telegram”, The Insider, 6 February 2026, https://theins.press/en/inv/289149 

[22] “Investigation | Holding the line: Auditing the EU’s ban of Russian state media 3 years on”, Institute for Strategic Dialogue, 5 August 2025,  https://www.isdglobal.org/digital-dispatch/investigation-holding-the-line-auditing-the-eus-ban-of-russian-state-media-3-years-on/ 

[23] Reinhard Bingener, Robert Putzbach, Markus Wehner, “CDU-Bundestagsabgeordneter beschäftigte Russen mit Kontakt zum FSB“, FAZ, 12 March 2025,  https://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/inland/cdu-bundestagsabgeordneter-christian-hirte-beschaeftigte-russen-mit-kontakt-zum-fsb-110350864.html 

[24] “«Alternativa dlya Germanii»: spor o migrantakh, zakrytie granits, «Severnyi potok», druzhba s Putinym”, Ostorozhno, Sobchak,  17 Februar 2025, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28Q_Py5zMxE

[25] James Kirchick, “How a U.S. Think Tank Fell for Putin“, The Daily Beast, 27 July 2015, https://www.thedailybeast.com/how-a-us-think-tank-fell-for-putin/

[26] Yelena Chernenko, „”My — natsiya samoderzhavnaya: ni pod kem ne khodim i ne dayom upast’ miru.”Novyy prezident RSMD Dmitriy Trenin — o partnerakh i protivnikakh Rossii.”, Kommersant, 02 April 2026, https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/8553915                       

[27] “Statement on the Closing of the Carnegie Moscow Center“, Carnegie Endowment for Piece, 18 April 2022, https://carnegieendowment.org/posts/2022/04/statement-on-the-closing-of-the-carnegie-moscow-center 

[28] “Russia Bans Carnegie Endowment for International Peace”, The Moscow Times, 18 July 2024, https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2024/07/18/russia-bans-carnegie-endowment-for-international-peace-a85760 

[29] Carnegie Russia Eurasia Canter Experts, https://carnegieendowment.org/russia-eurasia/experts?lang=en&center=russia-eurasia 

[30] https://web.archive.org/web/20220123181846/http://svop.ru/%D1%8D%D0%BA%D1%81%D0%BF%D0%B5%D1%80%D1%82%D1%8B/%D0%B3%D0%B0%D0%B1%D1%83%D0%B5%D0%B2-%D0%B0%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0%BA%D1%81%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%B4%D1%80-%D1%82%D0%B0%D0%BC%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%BB%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B8%D1%87/ 

[31] Hannah Wagner, “Putin warnt vor Einsatz weitreichender Waffen: „Die Frage ist, was Russland zu tun bereit ist““, Der Tagesspiegel, 13 September 2024, https://www.tagesspiegel.de/internationales/putin-warnt-vor-einsatz-weitreichender-waffen-die-frage-ist-was-russland-zu-tun-bereit-ist-12369053.html 

[32] Dana Heide, “Russland-Experte über ukrainische Offensive: „Putin ist gedemütigt und möchte das wiedergutmachen““, Handelsblatt, 20 August 2024, https://www.handelsblatt.com/politik/international/russland-experte-putin-ist-gedemuetigt-und-moechte-das-wiedergutmachen/100061016.html 

[33] Alexandra Prokopenko, “Including Russia on the EU Financial Blacklist Will Hurt Ordinary People, Not the Kremlin“, 11 December 2025, https://carnegieendowment.org/russia-eurasia/politika/2025/12/eu-new-money-restrictions-russia 

[34] „Russische Politologin Jekaterina Schulmann über Putin & den Ukrainekrieg“, Jung & Naiv: Folge 796, 4 December 2025,  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CH3HAERVXw&t=6542s 

[35] Gerd Koenen, „Der Russland-Komplex: Die Deutschen und der Osten 1900–1945“, München, 2005.

[36] Nikolai Klimeniouk, “Germany's Stance on Russia: No Lessons Learned. A weak response to Russia's aggression against Ukraine has damaged German democracy”, Strategic Pathways to Ending the Russo-Ukrainian War. The Conference on Russia Papers, University of Tartu Press, 2025 https://www.klimeniouk.info/post/germany-s-stance-on-russia-no-lessons-learned

[37] James Rothwell, Freya Jones, “Cultural asset or spy hub? Inside the Russian centre Germany is under pressure to close”, The Telegraph, 20 July 2024, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/07/20/cultural-asset-or-spy-hub-inside-the-russian-centre-germany/ 

[38] Nick Wilcke, „70.000 Euro im Jahr: Bundesregierung zahlt die Grundsteuer für das umstrittene „Russische Haus“ in Berlin“, Der Tagesspiegel, 16 June 2025, https://www.tagesspiegel.de/berlin/70000-euro-im-jahr-bundesregierung-zahlt-die-grundsteuer-fur-das-umstrittene-russische-haus-in-berlin-13862737.html 

[39] “Don't politicize teen 'rape,' Berlin asks Moscow“, DW, 27 January 2016, https://www.dw.com/en/germany-warns-russia-against-using-teen-rape-case-for-political-ends/a-19007807