The US alleges that Russia has been preparing to “fabricate a pretext for an invasion” of Ukraine, this time using a “graphic” video that would depict a fake attack on Russia.
A senior administration official told the CNN that the US has information to suggest that the Russian government, with the help of Russian intelligence services, has planned to produce a propaganda video depicting graphic scenes of a “fake explosion with dead bodies, actors portraying mourners, images of destroyed sites and military equipment”. ” said the official.
The US believes that Russia has already recruited actors to participate in the fake attack.
The US believes that the military equipment used in the video of the forged attack would be made to look like it is Ukrainian or from an allied nation.
The official said the video could include footage of Bayraktar planes, which NATO ally Turkey provided to Ukraine “as a means of involving NATO in the attack”.
The fake attack in the video would be directed against sovereign Russian territory or Russian-speaking people, the official said, and would be “released to underscore a threat to Russia’s security and to sustain military operations,” he said.
“This video, if released, could provide Putin with the spark he needs to initiate and justify military operations against Ukraine.”
The Washington Post first reported the story.
“It shows the level of cynicism, frankly, that is on the other side of this conflict,” Deputy National Security Adviser Jon Finer told MSNBC on Thursday.
“We’re definitely not saying that’s what they’re going to do. We are saying that this is a considered option, and that they have used this kind of pretext in the past to justify military action.”
The US disclosure of the alleged conspiracy is the latest in a series of revelations designed to mitigate the impact of any pretext Russia may use to invade Ukraine.
Russia has continued to build forces and military equipment along Ukraine’s borders, despite US and allied diplomatic efforts to defuse the situation.
Finer said the US is making the accusation public in order to “make it much more difficult for [a Rússia] after the fact that they said they had to do whatever they decided to do.
Last month, the CNN reported for the first time that the US had information indicating that Russia had prepositioned a group of agents to conduct a false flag operation in eastern Ukraine in an attempt to create a pretext for an invasion.
The senior administration official also said on Thursday that if Russia decides to change the way it views breakaway territories in eastern Ukraine – for example, if it decides to consider them as independent and not part of Ukraine following a legal change by the Russian parliament now under consideration – so Moscow “could claim that the push for independence led Ukraine to ‘attack’” pro-Russian forces in the east.
“To build the defense of independence, Russian politicians are pushing forward with this legislation on the false basis that Ukraine is preparing to forcibly retake this territory and that Kyiv has systematically denied local residents their basic rights,” the official said.
“In line with its previous interventions, Russia would portray its actions as defending ethnic Russians and coming at the request of assistance from a sovereign government.”
Source: CNN Brasil
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