DISINFO: Ukrainians are ungrateful: they attacked Russians and now they attacked the bridge in Baltimore
SUMMARY
An official Ukrainian Armed Forces channel wrote about the Baltimore Bridge incident:
A picture of the damaged Baltimore bridge. GUR beauties! They work all over the world without hesitation. If you don't accept [send] the aid package, then get it! Look forward to our surprises throughout Europe. We will teach you to defend democracy and help those who need it!
Ungrateful people never change, Russia developed Ukraine, guess who is jumping and screaming to kill Russians today.
RESPONSE
Pro-Kremlin information manipulation operation, which includes the creation of a fake channel mimicking an official Ukrainian channel to spread a conspiracy theory aimed at deteriorating US-Ukrainian relations.
A massive cargo ship collided with Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge early on Tuesday 26 March 2024, causing the 1.6-mile structure to collapse and plunging cars and people into the cold water.
The Telegram channel odshbr_79 is a Russian fake channel imitating the official Ukrainian channel of the 79 окрема десантно-штурмова Таврійська (79th Separate Amphibious Assault). The only difference in the names of the channels is the underscore character, which the Russians used.
This practice of creating fake official accounts for Ukrainian military units is a tactic previously employed by Russia. For instance, the 46 Separate Air Assault Brigade also has a fake account associated with it.
Pro-Kremlin media also claimed that the captain of the ship was Ukrainian. In reality, the entire crew was Indian, and the ship was registered in Singapore.
This accident has been used as a pretext to advance the narrative that Ukrainians are ungrateful to those who have helped them, particularly Russia. The notion that Ukrainians have benefited from Russia and are now ungrateful is incorrect.
Read similar cases such as: the “ungrateful Baltic countries”, Finland is an ungrateful country, Kyiv and President Zelenskyy are bitter and ungrateful to their Western partners, Navalny was ungrateful to Putin despite his humanitarian and human attitude.