Russia and the United States use climate disinformation as a strategic information warfare weapon

True or False regularly tells you about foreign digital interference operations, which take the form of deepfakes of Emmanuel Macron, fake websites or false information on political decisions. We also talk to you, on the other hand, about climate disinformation which reached heights in 2025 with the broadcast of nearly 700 false climate information on television and radio, according to the Quota Climat association. For the moment, the two were not associated. But a report from the Climate Defense Observatory, coordinated by the Institute of International and Strategic Relations (IRIS) on behalf of the Directorate of International Relations and Strategy (DGRIS) of the Ministry of the Armed Forces, has changed the situation.

Published Tuesday May 19, this report explains that climate issues have recently been integrated into foreign interference operations, although disinformation on this subject is far from recent, since it has begun to appear from the 1970s and the first warnings about climate change. The exploitation of climate disinformation is increasing, specify the researchers who authored the report.

In just six years, between 2021 and the start of 2026, 120 cases of climate disinformation in Europe came from Russia or Russian operators, 41 came from the United States.

These campaigns are based on well-known narratives that are sometimes tinged with conspiracy. They say, pell-mell, that “global warming is a hoax”that anyway “Winters are always cold”which “climate change is a pretext to enslave the population”which “Natural disasters are deliberately triggered and manipulated by the government”that nuclear power and fossil fuels are “the only safe sources of energy” and that their abandonment would put “national energy sovereignty is at risk”or even would lead to “accelerated impoverishment”.

“Russian disinformation mainly targets European energy and climate policiesexplains the report : of the 120 cases of Russian climate disinformation identified, 89% target European energy and climate policies, while around 7% attack climate science and 4% attack extreme climate events. Furthermore, the institutions of the European Union, Germany and Ukraine are the most important targets of this climate disinformation.”

Although it sometimes passes through official or state-controlled channels, Russian climate disinformation is mainly hidden through dissemination channels aligned with Moscow’s policies, without being directly controlled by the Kremlin, such as the network Pravda and pro-Russian Telegram channels. American disinformation is also mostly hidden, but it is also disseminated more completely in a completely assumed manner by official state channels (24% compared to 2% for Russian).

The return of Donald Trump to the White House was a turning point in this matter. “No case of climate disinformation coming from an official state channel has been identified over the period 2021-2023, report the IRIS researchers. On the other hand, an increase is observable from the end of 2024, in 2025 and during the first months of 2026. This increase coincides in particular with the return of Donald Trump to the White House, who has led, since his re-election, a policy of head-on opposition to environmental and climate policies.”including removing any mention of climate change in official documents and deleting all data that had been accumulated on the subject.

“Of the 41 cases of US climate disinformation identified, 71% focus on European energy and climate policies, while around 22% attack climate science, 5% on geoengineering, and 2% on climate events extremes”report the IRIS researchers.

The motivations for this climate disinformation are twofold and have many similarities. On the one hand, these interferences are part of a more global informational war which aims to destabilize other countries, to polarize debates, or even to influence the ballots to promote conservative ideologies. Another pattern is also emerging. It is economical. According to the Climate Defense Observatory, both Russia and the United States have an interest in misinforming about the impact of fossil fuels on the climate in order to maintain the European Union’s dependence on these energies that they sell to it. Imports of liquefied natural gas (LNG) reached a record level since 2022 in the first quarter of 2026, increasing 16% year-on-year to reach almost 7 billion m3.

“Climate disinformation offers oil and gas states, like Russia, the means to contest the existence or severity of the climate crisis or the responsibility of fossil fuels in it, then allowing them to deny the need to put an end to the exploitation and consumption of hydrocarbons. It targets particularly the EU, a forerunner in the fight against climate change since the 2000s, and its climate and energy policies such as the European Green Deal, which encourage the decarbonization of the European energy market”explains the report.

The United States has the same interest in it. The Climate Defense Observatory even underlines that in this country the interests of large oil companies are closely linked to political interests, since Donald Trump had benefited from broad financial support from the oil industry during his campaign to return to power in 2024. “The international implications of this campaign orientation materialized from the start of his mandate, during which energy exports were used as a negotiating tool”explain the researchers, recalling that in 2025 the United States made certain defense guarantees and commercial access to the American market conditional on the purchase of American fossil fuels. The EU then committed to importing 700 billion dollars of energy.

IRIS researchers, who are producing this report for the Ministry of the Armed Forces, are warning of the risks that this climate disinformation poses to the preparation of the armies. It can delay or distort the anticipation of crises and conflicts that may arise due to the consequences of climate change, particularly around access to water or food, and slow down the reaction of the authorities.