Before the missiles: How disinformation could spark Asia's next war

Asia Times

26-04-2025

'The problem with fake news is not that people believe it. The problem is that they don't believe anything anymore.'
— Yuval Noah Harari, 21 Lessons for the 21st Century
In February 2022, Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine triggered the largest European conflict since World War II. But this war isn't just being fought with tanks and missiles — it's also a relentless battle over truth and perception.
From Kyiv to Moscow, and from Washington to Beijing, propaganda, disinformation and media manipulation have become critical tools of modern warfare.
While most of the spotlight remains on physical battlegrounds, the struggle for narrative dominance is strongly shaping the war's trajectory. The information war is being waged globally — and Asia is watching closely.
As geopolitical tensions rise across the Indo-Pacific, particularly in Taiwan, the South China Sea and as ever the Korean Peninsula, the Russia-Ukraine conflict offers sobering lessons in how disinformation can be used to destabilize, divide and dominate.
Propaganda has long been used to manufacture consent, justify aggression and suppress dissent. In the 21st century, however, its scope and scale have grown exponentially thanks to digital platforms, algorithmic amplification and a fragmented media landscape.
Russian state media outlets such as RT and Sputnik have become central to the Kremlin's narrative strategy. These platforms don't simply broadcast news — they shape realities.
By framing Russia's actions as 'defensive' and painting Ukraine as a Western puppet state, Moscow has rallied domestic support and muddied international waters.
But the West has its own narratives. US and European media frame the conflict as an unprovoked invasion of a sovereign nation — a framing reinforced by NATO, EU institutions and global human rights organizations.
The result? Competing realities where audiences consume drastically different versions of the same event.
The World Economic Forum's Global Risks Report 2024 lists 'misinformation and disinformation' among the top threats to global stability. In conflict zones, this threat is magnified.
False narratives, deepfakes and coordinated campaigns blur the line between fact and fiction, weakening public trust in journalism, governance and even democracy itself.
This erosion of trust extends far beyond Ukraine. In Asia, governments from India to the Philippines have faced and used disinformation campaigns—both foreign and domestic—that polarize societies and distort elections.
In Taiwan, digital propaganda from China aims to discredit the democratic process and sow division. These aren't isolated incidents — they're previews of a future shaped by invisible warfare.
Media framing plays a decisive role in how populations understand conflict. According to Erving Goffman's Framing Theory, how information is presented influences how people perceive reality.
Consider the 2022 missile strike on a shopping mall in Kremenchuk, a city in Ukraine. Western media labeled it a deliberate Russian attack on civilians, citing satellite imagery and Ukrainian sources. Russian outlets claimed the target was a military facility and accused Western media of exaggeration.
The incident exemplifies how the same event can generate two divergent truths — one for the West, another for Russia's domestic audience.
Propaganda doesn't just manipulate facts — it manufactures consensus. During Russia's annexation of Crimea in 2014, state media claimed 95% of residents supported the move, despite reports of coercion and a lack of international observers.
The goal wasn't just to legitimize the annexation — it was to silence dissent by presenting unity as fact.
In Asia, similar tactics have been used to frame controversial actions. China's handling of Hong Kong protests, India's narrative around Kashmir or Myanmar's coverage of the Rohingya crisis all show how governments use media control to build the illusion of national consensus while marginalizing opposition voices.
One of the most troubling consequences of information warfare is the creation of parallel realities.
In Russia, the invasion of Ukraine is widely seen as a 'special military operation' to protect ethnic Russians and counter NATO aggression. In the West, it is viewed as a blatant breach of international law.
This polarization makes diplomatic dialogue nearly impossible. When populations are fed mutually exclusive worldviews, compromise becomes a sign of weakness, not progress.
This pattern is visible in Asia as well — from cross-Strait relations between China and Taiwanto domestic divides over foreign policy in Japan and South Korea.
Despite intense propaganda from Russian media and its allies, Ukrainian public opinion has remained largely pro-Western. A 2023 poll by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology found that 89% of Ukrainians support NATO membership. Even in historically pro-Russian areas, support for Ukrainian sovereignty is rising.
However, war fatigue is setting in. Gallup reported that support for fighting until total victory dropped from 73% in 2022 to 38% in 2023. These shifting sentiments highlight the psychological toll of prolonged conflict — a reality that authoritarian regimes often exploit through information manipulation.
The Russia-Ukraine war offers a grim forecast of what unchecked disinformation can do — not just to nations at war, but to the international system at large.
For Asia, the implications are clear: if disinformation remains unchallenged, it will continue to erode public trust, undermine democratic institutions and inflame regional tensions.
The Indo-Pacific is already a hotspot for narrative battles. China's media expansion, North Korea's cyber propaganda, and growing domestic disinformation in Southeast Asia all point to a future where digital influence operations become the norm.
Asia must invest in media literacy, cybersecurity and cross-border collaboration to defend against this invisible warfare. Otherwise, the next major battle may be fought not with weapons, but with words — and Asia could be the next front line.
The Russia-Ukraine conflict isn't just reshaping Eastern Europe — it's redefining how wars are fought and understood. As Harari suggests, the greatest threat may not be that people believe lies, but that they cease to believe anything at all.
For Asia, the stakes couldn't be higher. As information becomes weaponized, the region must act decisively to protect truth, transparency, and trust — before reality itself becomes just another battleground.
Zaheer Ahmed Baloch is an international relations scholar focused on security & media dynamics in global affairs