[7][3][4] Bäckman has been a prominent Finnish propagandist in Russia who has actively participated in long-standing operations to propagate anti-Finnish and anti-Western Russian propaganda.

As a proclaimed spokesman for the Finnish Anti-Fascist Committee, he is against the integration policies of Estonia and Latvia, claiming they are "apartheid polities".

[3][4] As revealed by the project, Bäckman has for years provided the Russian state radio and television company VGTRK with news material defaming Finland and other Western countries.

VGTRK is the Kremlin's most important propaganda and disinformation disseminator which controls all of Russia's largest radio and television channels.

[5] In his 2007 book Finland Washed with Anna Politkovskaya's Blood (Finnish: Saatana saapuu Helsinkiin, Literally: Satan Arrives in Helsinki, which alludes to Saatana saapuu Moskovaan, the Finnish language title for The Master and Margarita by Bulgakov) he supported the conspiracy theory that Anna Politkovskaya assassination was organized as an attempt to smear the Russian president Vladimir Putin.

[15] In a 2013 interview, the Finnish Academy chairman Arto Mustajoki said that Bäckman is five times more visible in the Russian media than then-Finnish Premier Jyrki Katainen or then-President Tarja Halonen.

In his highly controversial book about the Estonian Bronze Soldier Pronssisoturi: Viron patsaskiistan tausta ja sisältö, published in Finnish in 2008, Bäckman disagrees with the integration policies of Estonia.

"In connection to the publication of the book in September 2008, Bäckman gave several interviews, including one in which he claimed Estonia will join Russia within a decade.

[13][22][23][24][25] Bäckman also claimed that the "destruction" of the Bronze Soldier grave site and monument in April 2007 by the Estonian government was "the end of history of Estonia".

[13] After the publication of the book, Finnish and Estonian cultural figures, scholars, journalists and politicians, including Henrik Lax, Lasse Lehtinen and Sofi Oksanen, addressed the University of Helsinki in an open letter of protest, partly in relation to Bäckman teaching a course on "specialities of Estonian legal policy" in the Spring 2009 semester.

[26] Bäckman immediately threatened to sue the letter's authors for libel and later filed a criminal complaint, but the Helsinki Police refused to open investigation.

[27] The former minister of foreign affairs of Finland Dr. Erkki Tuomioja called Bäckman's book as "deliberate provocation", but condemned the open letter for violating the principles of freedom of speech.

[33] On 26 April 2009, Bäckman was detained after his disembarkation from a ferry in the Tallinn Passenger Port and expelled from the country under an entry prohibition.

[34] In December 2010, Tallinn regional court declared entry prohibitions against Bäckman illegal and ordered the Ministry of Internal Affairs to compensate his legal fees in sum of 16,600 Estonian kroons.

The Finnish Broadcasting Company Yle, quoting Timo Vihavainen, a professor of Russian history, speculated that this has happened due to fact that Bäckman's opinions match the interests of the Kremlin.

[37] Bäckman claims that children that are being taken care of by Finnish child protection authorities are living in "concentration camps", and explains that "this is a certain system of political terror".

[3][4] Journalist Jussi Konttinen of the newspaper Helsingin Sanomat characterised Johan Bäckman as a promising researcher in Russian studies in the early 2000s, who has since "marginalized" himself in Finland.

[43] Bäckman's first public appearance was in the late 1980s when he played bassoon in the EBU Young Soloists Competition on national television.

He speculates that Finland also planned an ethnic cleansing in Karelia in order to create a Finno-Ugric superpower (Greater Finland), possibly stretching as far as the Urals, or even to the river Yenisei, which he claimed is proven by vast amounts of documents and in several Finnish history books by Helge Seppälä, Osmo Hyytiä and Nikolai Baryshnikov.

He contends Finns are both anti-Semitic and Russophobic, Russophobia being a "racist political ideology"—both per "several academic works by Finnish authors.

"[46] In March 2002, during a military historical festival in Suojärvi in the Republic of Karelia which was dedicated to the 62nd anniversary of the end of the Winter War, Bäckman made a sensational claim that the modern authorities of Finland propagated the idea that the Russian people are genetically inferior and expected Russia to collapse in about twenty years.

In March 2009, as a member of the Finnish Anti-Fascist Committee, Bäckman arranged a series of protests in Helsinki attended by activists of the Russian Nashi, and Night Watch organizations, against what they called the "opening [of] a new anti-Russian front of information warfare on the territory of Finland by [the] Estonian embassy."

[52] Bäckman has criticized Yle journalist Jessikka Aro, who investigated pro-Russian Internet trolls, accusing her of "Russo-phobic" tendencies and claiming that she was "well-known assistant of American and Baltic special services.

[54] In February 2022, the Supreme Court of Finland upheld the verdict that Bäckman was guilty of stalking of Jessikka Aro, while the defamation charge was dropped.

[62] Bäckman claimed the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 shootdown was a United States provocation to justify a NATO intervention in Donbass conflict, and describes the Ukrainian government as "the Kiev junta".

[79] Johan Bäckman has litigated over child custody against his Soviet-born ex-wife for years in which both parties have received sentences for libel.

[81] According to Helsingin Sanomat, Bäckman has been treated with caution in the Finnish public media because he is sensitive to what he considers to be journalistic libel.

[44] Bäckman wrote a letter to the editor saying he had won seven libel cases during past couple of years, not two, as the paper claimed.