At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. military launched a secret campaign to counter what it perceived as China’s growing influence in the Philippines, a nation hit especially hard by the deadly virus.

The clandestine operation has not been previously reported. It aimed to sow doubt about the safety and efficacy of vaccines and other life-saving aid that was being supplied by China, a Reuters investigation found. Through phony internet accounts meant to impersonate Filipinos, the military’s propaganda efforts morphed into an anti-vax campaign. Social media posts decried the quality of face masks, test kits and the first vaccine that would become available in the Philippines – China’s Sinovac inoculation.

Reuters identified at least 300 accounts on X, formerly Twitter, that matched descriptions shared by former U.S. military officials familiar with the Philippines operation. Almost all were created in the summer of 2020 and centered on the slogan #Chinaangvirus – Tagalog for China is the virus.

  • bloodfart
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    5 months ago

    If you don’t feel disgusted by this enough: the Biden regime shut down the insulin price cap faster than it shut down this program.

    • assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      The article says Biden shut it down in Spring 2021. Turns out your comment is completely wrong – Biden shut down the program faster than it implemented insulin price caps.

      This is why the person replying to you mocked .ml. You can’t even read the damn article.

      Technically, accounts were still in place afterwards and they didn’t properly clean up the disrespectful mess of a program, but that isn’t what you said. You said shut down the program, which demonstrably happened quickly.

      • bloodfart
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        5 months ago

        The Biden regime stopped all trump regime executive orders on January 20th, 2021, two days before the trump regimes part d insulin price cap would have taken effect.

        The stop on January 20 was called a “pause” because after 60 days to evaluate the ones it wanted to keep, the Biden regime said it would continue the good executive orders. I can’t find any indication that the insulin price cap actually went into effect until a year and a half later as part of a huge bill I can’t remember the name of.

        The Biden regime shut down the insulin price cap before it shut down the cia antivax campaign.

          • bloodfart
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            5 months ago

            No, I say it to at least recognize that there is an entire apparatus behind these decisions as opposed to attributing them to one person.

            I choose to use the word regime to in some small way make reference to the different relationships to different power that each apparatus has. It’s important to not equate the two.

                • TachyonTele@lemm.ee
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                  5 months ago

                  Which state and city are you even in? Because I don’t believe you. I’ve already called out other non Americans for trying to influence the US elections here, I’ve been correct, and frankly you being a part of .ml is one of the biggest red flags on Lemmy.

                  Your wording is simply not something Americans use. So you can either stop trying to influence a different countries elections than your own, or you can sit back down in your mom’s basement and keep your immature opinions to yourself.

                  • bloodfart
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                    5 months ago

                    Of course, send any abuse or what have you over to my address:

                    200 N Blount St Raleigh, NC 27601

                    Surely you don’t think a person from the instance focused on open source and privacy would just dox themselves, right?

      • bloodfart
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        5 months ago

        I replied to the person with the longer comment even though they commented later, but if you like you can consider it a response to yours too.