At the time of RT's founding, RIA Novosti director Svetlana Mironyuk stated: "Unfortunately, at the level of mass consciousness in the West, Russia Today is associated with three words: communism, snow and poverty", and added "we would like to present a more complete picture of life in our country".
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Russia Today appointed Margarita Simonyan as its editor-in-chief; she recruited foreign journalists as presenters and consultants.
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Russia Today told The New York Times that after the fall of the Soviet Union, many new young journalists were hired, resulting in a much younger pool of staffers than other news organizations.
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Russia Today drew particular attention worldwide for its coverage of the 2008 South Ossetia war.
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In 2009, Russia Today was rebranded to "RT", which George Washington University academics Jack Nassetta and Kimberly Gross described as an "[attempt] to shed state affiliation".
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Russia Today later explained that he actually was referring to "enemies" in Afghanistan, not the countries he mentioned.
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Russia Today added that this requirement has been applied to no other Facebook page.
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Russia Today wrote that in attempting to offer "an alternate point of view, it is forced to talk to marginal, offensive, and often irrelevant figures".
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Russia Today said that RT's task was not to polish Moscow's reputation.
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Chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov, speaking after the launch of RT America, said: "Russia Today is an extension of the methods and approach of the state-controlled media inside Russia, applied in a bid to influence the American cable audience".
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Russia Today asserted that if RT broadcast only "blatant propaganda", it would not retain its audience.
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In 2008, Stephen Heyman wrote in The New York Times that in RT's Russia Today, "corruption is not quite a scourge but a symptom of a developing economy".
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Editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan was sanctioned by the European Union on 23 February 2022 when Russia Today recognized the Donetsk and Luhansk breakaway states.
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Russia Today said: "We tried to be fair with them and as long as they abide by journalistic standards that are objective that's fine but it looks as if they have gone beyond that line".
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Russia Today wrote that RT wants to "make the United States look out of line for lecturing Russia".
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Russia Today's message fit RT's narrative that the United States is a huge bully.
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Russia Today said that "what Russia did is wrong", as she is against intervention by any nation into other countries' affairs.
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