Day 27
Deciphering truth vs fiction during times of war. Komsomolskaya Pravda "hack". What to read/listen to. Many perhaps unrelated thoughts on a day off from the train station.
This is a 1912 painting by Russian artist Kustodiev. I was just about to caption it “painting of Ukrainian women” because I took the photo in a Kyiv museum. I then googled the painting and learned it was painted in Ivanovo oblast, Russia. A perfect introduction to an important topic: how to figure out what is true during times of war. Fake news is a problem even during peacetime, but during war, everything is amplified, and propaganda is no exception. I don’t have an exact formula for how to combat this, other than to always ask for sources, keep track of sources you trust vs those who have appeared to do propaganda on behalf of whoever in the past, and don’t believe something until you have seen it in three different places.
Last night, a strange thing happened. A prominent, fearless reporter in Ukraine who has really travelled deep inside battle zones, noticed this:
That version of the article was quickly removed, but it could be found in search engine results. It made me wonder, when I saw the news, if perhaps team Ukraine had successfully hacked a major Russian tabloid. Because accidents like that don’t happen, there are too many eyes on each thing that goes online. So either it was a hack, or perhaps an internal job, much like Marina now formerly of Channel One. Either way, the figures published were higher than US government estimates but less than Ukrainian government claims. A shock, in any case, as Russia still has not published updated KIA and wounded figures since early March, as you see in Yaroslav’s tweet.
So I wrote this, thinking about how this might of happened, and stumbling across this fascinating Wired article about Ukraine’s digital ministry. I was cryptically trying to imply Komsomolskay Pravda might have been hacked on team Ukraine orders.
About an hour later, Komsomolskaya Pravda came out with a statement saying it had been hacked. Some then thought, well since Russia rarely if ever tells the truth, maybe it was really an inside job? Who knows. This one little episode illustrates the information wars, which especially in 2022, are right up there in importance with all other diplomatic and PR efforts. Of course they do not overshadow the war itself, of course not, but they do play a role and therefore it is important to always keep that in mind and to question sources.
Last night I also took a dive into TikTok and I didn’t post them because the content was overwhelming, and you could see the propaganda wars being played out there too. There were two Russian speakers from Mariupol talking about being liberated by Russian army guys. There is a woman from Donestk (DNR) saying she was told at work to gather donations to be prepared to welcome “refugees from Mariupol”. There were videos of roads in Ukraine with shot up civilians cars lined up on both sides of the street for as far as the video could shoot. Videos of Russian soldiers firing on unarmed civilians in Kherson. Empty grocery store shelves in Kharkiv.
There are videos of every unimaginable horror. At what point do you question who is telling you what message for what purpose? I don’t know. But I will try and show caution before I share something as truth. Truth is subjective when no one can verify.
The big picture black and white of this horrific war is absolutely clear to me, but the details can be murky. Russia is targeting Mariupol not just because of its strategic location, but also because it is hometown of Ukraine’s Azov battalion which, although fighting to defend Ukraine, does have historic ties to far right groups. To edit that fact out is not to tell the whole story. This 2014 report also provides a now historical perspective. None of this justifies in any way the war crimes Russia is committing by starving and entrapping Mariupol’s civilian population of several hundred thousand people, but you don’t understand the full story around Mariupol until you see what Russia is focused on.
Russia’s tactics have also clearly moved to punishing civilians and inflict more pain and death to push Zelensky towards being prepared to consider politically unpopular concessions should peace talks really happen. At the moment, I cannot find confirmation of a lot of the rumours surrounding what Zelensky supposedly said he is or isn’t willing to negotiate on. I therefore won’t speculate until we get more clarity.
I did find this fascinating about Belarussian railway workers blocking Russian deliveries to Ukraine, particularly in the context of rising fears of a southern invasion from western Belarus should Lukashenko through his country into the war, to the extent that he even still makes his own military decisions independent of Moscow.
Another news item I would not ignore was Medvedev’s recent rant on Poland:
Navalny has just been found guilty in his latest sham trial. The sentencing is expected to take hours even at the rapid fire speed with which Russian judges famously incoherently read out their verdicts.
A few more reading recommendations. This recent interview with Ivan Kravtsev:
And this which is sadly (strangely) behind a paywall, an interview in German with Ivan Fedorov, Melitopol’s mayor who was taken hostage by the Russians and then traded back to Ukraine in exchange for some POWs.
Also a few podcast recommendations for you today. This on how one Kyiv Ukrainian music station transformed itself into wartime realtime crowdsourcing, news briefs, and bedtime stories for kids:
This is also a good update on the global covid situation, and on China in particular. If you remember, if you have been reading me since the beginning, I wrote a lot in early January about how zero covid would fail in the face of Omicron and what that might mean for China’s huge population not yet exposed to coronavirus, and for China’s economy. This new wave of Omicron 2 (I can’t keep track of exact variant names anymore) is burning through Austria at the moment, and of course many Ukrainian refugees are also testing positive after having spent days in close quarters with hundreds of people escaping on overcrowded trains and buses.
An incredible photo from Turkey:
Thank you so much for reading! I hope to be back at Vienna’s central train station on Thursday and Friday. I am starting to get asked questions I have no answers too. Ukrainians want to know when they can register, how they can find long-term housing, when they can work, put their kids in school, etc. There are no good answers to any of these questions at the moment. Frustration is understandably rising. A few housekeeping notes just to put things in context, as the Austrian media has not been accurately portraying the situation on the ground:
1. Registration is not open for all Ukrainians yet. Vienna shut its doors at ACV and only processes there now those who were given the first appointments. The website, promised to come soon, where the remaining Ukrainians wishing to stay in Vienna can sign up for registration appointments, is not yet up and running. We don’t even have a link yet. Some people go and stand for hours at ACV because they think it will help. You can imagine what this all feels like in practice: no permanent housing, no answers, no money, tensions rise. This is Vienna. I would hope the situation might be better in other parts of Austria, but I read yesterday St. Pölten in Lower Austria is already a one month wait…
Temporary housing in shared private accommodation with Austrians, while it may be far more comfortable than an army cot or a hotel room, ultimately doesn’t solve the bigger issues. It would be very helpful though for those just passing through Austria, applying for visas here. But as a rule those people already have some savings to begin with.
I am getting anxious texts from Ukrainian women I met through my volunteering and I don’t have any good advice for them. I continue to match where I can, but it isn’t much. I don’t have a good idea at the moment if the refugee flows will continue in such volumes or if they will slow. It felt like yesterday was less busy but it might have been just a temporary lull. It’s really hard to tell. TikTok is also filled with happy and sad refugees in Europe stories. Some report really awful conditions, theft, the whole nine yards, while others got very lucky when kind European families with means took them in. So much at the moment comes down to pure luck. Unfortunately. Perhaps I can try to formulate on Twitter better what is needed and maybe we will get a few more collective miracles. Who knows. Worth a try.
Zelensky posted this and other images yesterday. I can’t stop thinking about it.
"This one little episode illustrates the information wars, which especially in 2022, are right up there in importance with all other diplomatic and PR efforts." Could not agree more Tanja.