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Wartime communication via memes has been a successful strategy used not only by independent accounts such as @uamemesforces, but also---for the first time in a full-scale interstate war---by official Ukrainian government accounts such as @Ukraine and @DefenceU. We study this prominent example of memetic warfare through the lens of its narratives, and find them to be a key component of success: tweets with a 'victim' narrative garner twice as many retweets. However, malevolent narratives focusing on the enemy resonate more than those about heroism or victims with countries providing more assistance to Ukraine. Our findings present a nuanced examination of Ukraine's influence operations and of the worldwide response to it, thus contributing new insights into the evolution of socio-technical systems in times of war.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1145\/3711037","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2025,5,3]],"date-time":"2025-05-03T01:35:05Z","timestamp":1746236105000},"page":"1-28","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1145\/crossmark-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":4,"title":["Narratives of War: Ukrainian Memetic Warfare on Twitter"],"prefix":"10.1145","volume":"9","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-5560-4109","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Yelena","family":"Mejova","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"ISI Foundation, Turin, Italy"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-1996-1800","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Arthur","family":"Capozzi","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"ETH Z\u00fcrich, Z\u00fcrich, Switzerland"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-6846-5718","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Corrado","family":"Monti","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"CENTAI, Turin, Italy"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-2415-494X","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Gianmarco","family":"De Francisci Morales","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"CENTAI, Turin, Italy"}]}],"member":"320","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2025,5,2]]},"reference":[{"key":"e_1_2_1_1_1","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1177\/20563051241261277nolinkurl10.1177\/20563051241261277"},{"key":"e_1_2_1_2_1","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1016\/j.pubrev.2023.102338"},{"key":"e_1_2_1_3_1","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.14361\/9783839446706nolinkurl10.14361\/9783839446706"},{"key":"e_1_2_1_4_1","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1057\/s41254-022-00277-z"},{"key":"e_1_2_1_5_1","volume-title":"Algorithms of resistance: The everyday fight against platform power","author":"Bonini Tiziano","unstructured":"Tiziano Bonini and Emiliano Trer\u00e9. 2024. 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