Recycled narratives: how the “Russian Crimea” myth resurfaces again and again

An amazing coincidence of three events has occurred in the information space, namely:

• The scheduled phone conversation between U.S. President Donald Trump and the war criminal Vladimir Putin;
• A publication in the media outlet Semafor, citing its own sources, claiming that the temporarily occupied Crimean Peninsula could be recognized by the U.S. as Russian territory;
• March 18 marks the anniversary of Russia’s declaration of Crimea as “Russian” territory.

Coincidence? Of course not!

It appears that right now, we are witnessing a deliberate escalation of stakes in the negotiation process within the information space. Semafor and The New York Times are actively being used for this purpose, with the latter also spreading claims that Russia could be given control over Odesa… One has to wonder how they even envision such a scenario. But let’s not dwell on that nonsense for now—there’s something else to discuss…

In 2018, all Russian media enthusiastically reported that then-U.S. President Donald Trump, during a dinner with G7 leaders at the Canada summit, allegedly stated that “Crimea is Russian, at least because the people living there speak Russian.” However, not a single official source from any party present at the dinner confirmed this claim. The “sensation” was initially spread by BuzzFeed News, a platform notorious for its manipulations and fake news, which, incredibly, cited two unnamed sources in diplomatic circles.

And now, the most interesting part…

Semafor is a project founded by journalists Justin Smith and Ben Smith. Ben Smith, in particular, is of great interest—he is a former columnist for The New York Times and the former editor-in-chief of BuzzFeed News. Yes, the very same BuzzFeed News that in 2018 spread the fake story that Donald Trump called Crimea “Russian.” And now, Semafor is fueling the same narrative.

Let me remind you that BuzzFeed News has often been cited by Russian media and was behind the spread of various anti-Ukrainian fake stories, such as:

• Accused the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) of organizing the wiretapping of phone conversations between former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, thereby supporting the narrative of Andrii Derkach’s leaked tapes.
• Claimed that during Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation, Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign manager, Paul Manafort, stated that Ukraine interfered in the U.S. election process.

These and other anti-Ukrainian fake stories were published by BuzzFeed News under the editorship of Ben Smith. And now, the same narrative about “Russian” Crimea is once again being pushed into our information space—this time through Semafor, also linked to Ben Smith—all in sync with the upcoming conversation between Trump and Putin, as well as the aforementioned anniversary date.

Years pass, but the narratives remain unchanged, and the same players are still in the game…

Critical thinking to all of us, friends! And it would be nice if our favorite media outlets didn’t just mindlessly drag all sorts of nonsense into our information space but at least accompanied it with explanatory notes. The days of blind copy-pasting are over, and society needs clarifications—so we don’t completely lose our minds in this whirlwind of events.

Alexander Kovalenko

Ukraine Front Lines