Russians did not capture NATO officers in Ukraine

Macedonian media outlets that reported on the “capture of British officers” admitted that the news was unconfirmed or used expressions like “allegedly,” shifting responsibility for the news to Russian media outlets. Some Russian media outlets did indeed report on the “capture of British officers,” but the problem is that the news is fake, and it is a matter of extremely obscure and propagandistic Russian media outlets. The most relevant Russian news agencies, such as TASS and RIA Novosti, write about British volunteers fighting for Ukraine, but they did not go so far as to claim that “NATO officers” were captured

 

 

We analyze a post on the social network Facebook, which says:

Russian media outlets reported that forces had captured NATO officers. 

This was also reported by some other Macedonian media outlets on Facebook: here, here, here, and here , so the review below applies to them as well.

The post we started with also shared a link to an article from a Macedonian website, which says:

Russian Federation special forces have allegedly captured several NATO officers in the Ukrainian city of Ochakov, who were helping the Ukrainian armed forces fire missiles and drones at Russian civilian targets, the Telegram channel “Na Marshe” [On The March] reported, as well as several Russian media outlets.

The site then quotes those Russian media outlets:

Yesterday evening in Ochakov, Russian special forces landed from several ships and stormed the command center of the Ukrainian armed forces. They captured British soldiers who were coordinating the use of British missiles and drones.

Some Russian media outlets have indeed reported on such an event, but the problem is that the news is fake, and these are extremely obscure and propagandistic Russian media outlets such as Glavny, Info24, and Bloknot. Some of them used the equally obscure and propagandistic Telegram channel Na Marshe or its similar channel Militarist as a source, but both admit that the news is unconfirmed, and yet they spread it. Both channels attribute the news to unnamed Western sources, which is an extremely unconvincing argument.

The lack of information of this news is also acknowledged by Macedonian media outlets, which reported it, so the question arises why they report such unverified news from obscure and suspicious sources? This news was not published by any relevant Russian, Ukrainian or Western media outlets. The independent British security and defense portal UK Defence Journal (UKDJ), meanwhile, confirmed that it is disinformation.

The story, which lacks any independent verification, appears to have originated from Russian-aligned sources and includes fabricated images and fictional identities, according to a UKDJ investigation.

UKDJ also shares a photo, published alongside the initial disinformation, which appears to have been created using artificial intelligence, especially if you look closely at the attached passports, whose cover pages have no recognizable letters or words, but only undefined shapes. It is particularly noticeable that on one passport, in the upper part of the cover page, there are three rows of such undefined shapes, while on the other, there are only two rows, even though they are supposed to be the same British passports.

 

The capture of NATO officers by the Russians would be news that would have all the relevant world media outlets buzzing, especially since both Russia and Britain are nuclear powers, and Russia would parade the captives in front of the cameras, which would be a propaganda success for it, but we don’t see anything like that.

This is not the first time such disinformation has been spread. For example, in 2022, a fake news story was spread that during the capture of the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, the Russians had captured an American general, and the “proof” of this was a video clip of the arrest of an ordinary person in Crimea, which was falsely described.

The most relevant Russian news agencies such as TASS and RIA Novosti do not mention any Russian naval landing in Ochakov, but rather something quite the opposite: British volunteers fighting for Ukraine allegedly sailed from Ochakov in order to land on the island of Tendrovskaya Kosa, which they were prevented from doing by the Russian forces occupying it and shelling Ochakov at that moment. Most likely, this story was then distorted, thus resulting in the one about the “Russian naval landing in Ochakov” and the “capturing of British officers” there.

Russia calls foreigners who voluntarily fight for Ukraine “mercenaries,” which is not true, it is something we have already written about, and that label was used in this case as well, but as much as TASS and RIA Novosti are propagandist media outlets, they did not go so far as to claim that they were captured “NATO officers”.

Whether any British volunteers actually made such a landing at Tendrovskaya Kosa and whether they were thwarted by the Russians is not the question that this review deals with, but whether Russian forces landed at Ochakov and captured officers of the British regular military forces there. We have no evidence of such a thing, and Great Britain is not participating in the war in Ukraine.

If Great Britain is involved in the war, the Kremlin should expose it to the UN, break off diplomatic relations with Great Britain, and declare war on it, but the Kremlin is not doing any such thing.

To be fair, the Macedonian media outlets, which reported on the “capture of the British officers,” showed a dose of caution, and either admitted that the news was unconfirmed or used expressions like “allegedly,” shifting responsibility for the news onto the Russian media outlets. However, this does not absolve them from spreading disinformation and using dubious sources, which can mislead our public.

Taking into account everything stated so far, we conclude that some Russian media outlets did indeed publish such news, but our public should know that they are unreliable and irrelevant, and that news is untrue.

 

 

 

All comments and remarks regarding this and other Vistinomer articles, correction and clarification requests as well as suggestions for fact-checking politicians’ statements and political parties’ promises can be submitted by using this form