countries include presenting the EU institutions as “weak” and promising an imminent collapse of the West (Chulitskaya, 2019). Many of those narratives align with storylines propagated by local junk news outlets that are linked to Russia, such as vitbich.org and mogilew.by (Chulitskaya, 2019). Trolling tactics rely on human users who spread pro-government information in the comment sections of leading independent media. Over the past decade, trolls praising the regime and denouncing the opposition have increased their operation significantly (Freedom House, 2019). Their purpose is to mobilize public opinion and to criticize any type of regime opponents. Several popular independent outlets claim that they have become victims of troll farms. According to the editors of leading news outlets that include Nasha Niva and Tut.by, these farms target comment sections on their websites to attack pro-democracy activists and regime opponents and to promote pro-government narratives (NN.by, 2015, 2020). There are also some signs of troll farms operating on social media platforms. However, it does not appear that they function as the major source of misinformation on social media. The platforms most impacted by disinformation are Facebook, OK, Telegram, VK and YouTube. Table 2: Observed Strategies, Tools and Techniques of Social Media Manipulation in Belarus Account Types Messaging and Valence Content and Platforms Communication Strategies Human Pro-government messages, Telegram channels, fake VK messages attacking foreign and Facebook accounts, states, attacks on the YouTube channels, memes, opposition, the government, misinformation websites polarization strategies, trolling and harassment Source: Authors’ evaluations based on data collected. Telegram, YouTube, VK, Facebook, Twitter Organizational Capacity and Resources The propaganda efforts appear to be both centrally coordinated and decentralized. Central coordination takes place through the government structures such as the office of the president, who controls all key figures in the police and state media. Certain groups of trolls operate in a more decentralized manner. However, their origins and affiliations are uncertain. There is scarce information available about the resource spent to support manipulation efforts. Statecontrolled media outlets are present in all regions of Belarus and require significant resources. As all of them share manipulative political content, we may safely assume that a portion of their 2020 state budget funding of $73 million (an increase compared to 2019) will be directed at propaganda (Law of the Republic of Belarus ‘On republican budget for 2020’, 2019). Table 3: Cyber Troop Capacity in Belarus Team Resources Spent Activity Levels Size (USD) >100 Coordination Capacity Measure 73 million to be spent to State backed media, troll Somewhat support state-controlled groups and Russiancentralized media in 2020 backed channels operate on a constant basis. Source: Authors’ evaluations based on data collected. 44 Belarus troops: Low. Russian troops in Belarus: high