JRL NEWSWATCH: “For Putin, Even a Terrorist Attack Is a Chance to Spread Misinformation” – New York Times

“… In the past the Kremlin acknowledged its opponent and dealt ruthlessly with Islamist extremists. This time … Putin made no mention of the organization that credibly claimed responsibility, an Afghan offshoot of the Islamic State known as ISIS-K, and instead cast indirect and utterly unsubstantiated suspicion on Ukraine. … [T]he claim reflected Putin’s problem: coming on the heels of a staged election … intended to glorify him as the only leader who can assure the Russians security against sworn enemies in Ukraine and the West, the attack was an obvious and devastating failure of intelligence and policing. The failure was all the more acute since the United States had warned him that it had intelligence of an impending attack in Russia, a warning Putin dismissed. Many expatriate Russian bloggers — a population that has swelled with Putin’s repression — warned from the outset that Putin would seek to implicate Ukraine and the West in the attac … [and] use the attack to rally people behind the government and to launch another mobilization of men for the Ukraine war. …”

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