Behind the Enemy News: Issue Salience in the Russo-Ukrainian War

Agenda-setting theory and warfare studies hold that setting the national agenda is strategically advantageous to foreign policy goals. We probe this theory on the Russo-Ukrainian War by analyzing the conflicting agenda set by RIA Novosti, RT Russian, RT International, BBC News Russian, and BBC News from February 2022 to July 2023. In contrast to previous work that identified press coverage misalignment to be largely concentrated in the framing of events, our study provides evidence of substantive and sustained misalignment in the event selection by revealing that Russian state media tailored a specific version of the news for Russian-speaking audiences, often downplaying key developments of the conflict, such as the mobilization crisis in Russia, the Wagner group rebellion, the Ukrainian counteroffensive, and the prospect of nuclear escalation. Our results contribute to understanding how modern Russian propaganda has shaped the public perception of the invasion of Ukraine.