The US general proposed to throw Lithuania out of NATO: a new Russian lie
“U.S. TV Army Brigadier General Robert proposed on the BBC to “temporarily limit” Lithuania’s rights within the framework of NATO. Otherwise, Vilnius’ position on the problem of the blockade of transit of goods to Kaliningrad may lead to a large-scale conflict between the North Atlantic Alliance and Russia,” the spread of lies declares (the language has not been corrected).
own this lie sounded in the program created by propagandist Vladimir Solovyov “Evening with Vladimir Solovyov” is considered the Kremlin’s mouthpiece by the Rossiya1 TV channel.
Andrejus Sidorovas, dean of the Faculty of World Politics of Moscow State University, spoke on the show about the fact that “one such three-star general Robert Jefferson” prevented the suspension of Lithuania’s membership in NATO.
Lies spread by Lithuanians are much simpler and easily distinguished from official sources.
According to the hoax, the general claimed that Russian military power is greater than it appears, which he allegedly learned “after conducting the most complex campaigns in simulators and games.”
The post, reminiscent of a news article, also claims that Lithuania may be kicked out of the European Union (EU). It is called “JevroSayuz” in the disinformation spread.
The experts “from Bulgaria, Hungary and France” who allegedly assert this are not named.
A non-existent general
The person introduced as “Robert Jefferson” is indeed a high-ranking US officer – Robert Nellerhe previously commanded the Marine Corps.
Used the photo was taken in 2015.
R. Nelleris can represent the positions of the Pentagon and the USA, because he is currently retired. Among other things, he has not made statements about the possible suspension of Lithuania’s membership in the military alliance.
The US general R. Jefferson named in the disinformation spread does not exist – no information about such a person has been found in any official sources.
Did not check the sources
The propagandists decided quite a bit when distributing this, see its original source – Russian satirical news site Panorama.
Although panorama.pub here it is clearly indicated that the news created is of a satirical nature and should be taken seriously, periodically it appears on Russian news sites, and sometimes it even spreads around the world, as happened this time.
This satirical page appears on the Internet around the end of 2017.
The project description notes: “Established in 1822 and since then operated as Count Rabinovich’s personal news service.”
Next to all the articles you can see an inscription in small font, the information of which is fictional, which is also made clear by the addition to the main logo: “satirical magazine”.
Panorama.pub the news created by the authors has been repeatedly supported as real information by the biggest news agencies and TV channels.
At the beginning of 2017 the publication Novyje Izvestya believedthat after the Olympic doping scandals of Russian athletes, the schoolchildren of this country were suspected of unfair behavior at the International Physics Olympiad.
Kliuvos and neighboring Latvians – after spreading panorama.pub for the created messagethat after the concert in Ventspils, members of the Russian balalaika orchestra were detained and later deported from the countrylaw enforcement was inundated with requests from journalists to comment on the incident.
Portal panorama.pub published an article that the president of Turkmenistan won the national programming champion, a couple of years ago Ingrida Šimonytė shared on the social network Facebook.
I.Šimonytė told the LRT.lt portal that the nature of the article and the page was known, but she decided to share the message because even if it is wrong, it well illustrates the current situation in Turkmenistan.
As reported by the Meduza news portal, panorama.pub page misled more than one influential Russian air agencyas well as state news agencies.
As Meduzai said in an interview panorama.pub the authors, for whom it was said to be a leisure project, for a while the editors rejoiced at the spread of falsehoods, then they were filled with the opposite feelings, seeing how casually verified both the Russian media and readers.
Not the first time
A. Sidorov, dean of the Faculty of World Politics of the Moscow State University, has already distributed the fabricated news of Panorama.
In March 2020, in that specialist show “Evening with Vladimir Solovyov” the political scientist claimedthat the Parliament demanded that the creators of the cartoon “Masha and the Bear” include characters from non-traditional European practical orientations.
After receiving criticism, A.Sidorov then apologized and claimed that the mistake occurred because he was reading the news on his phone before the broadcast.
The publication was prepared in 15 minutes in partnership with Facebookwhich aims to stop the spread of misleading news on the social network.
More about the program and its rules – here.