Angela Stent

TRANSCRIPT:

[VOA] presents the American view or different American views, of what U.S. goals are, of what the U.S. is doing. It informs people about what’s happening inside our country, about what we are doing in terms of relations with other countries. And it really has been an important means of countering the propaganda and false news, fake news, if you like. It’s not in our interest to have populations all around the globe poisoned by disinformation and thinking that the United States is a danger, that it’s an aggressive, colonialist country.

And I’ve done studies, talking to people in parts of the Global South, and a lot of these populations believe, for instance, this Russian propaganda. So, it’s very important for the U.S. to push back against that, because it really serves our own national security interests.

I think if we lose again, a very successful arm of our soft power, populations in other countries are more likely to support anti-U.S. parties if they’re in countries where they do have competitive elections. And the populations of other countries will turn more against us. And that could result in aggression against Americans, for instance, if they’re going abroad, they’re in different countries or, you know, even governments and populations, that are not willing to negotiate in good faith with the United States because it would mean they would not have the understanding of what the U.S. really is.

Published January 26, 2026

Stent is director emerita of Georgetown University’s Center for Eurasian, Russian and East European Studies. She previously served on the National Intelligence Council and in the State Department’s Office of Policy Planning.