A wave of information sabotage hit Belarus
On Monday evening, another alarming news appeared in the Belarusian information field. They reported a major fire at the Minsk Automobile Plant, and as proof they showed a not very high-quality picture with black clouds of smoke rising above the industrial zone.
A little later, information appeared about two explosions that preceded the fire. I admit, this news made me shudder. European sanctions against the car plant were literally just introduced, and Belarusians are still hearing about the attack on the airfield in Machulishchi a month ago. If the enemy managed to land a drone directly on an extremely expensive Russian plane, then what prevented him from sending explosives in the same way to an automobile plant within the city, which in any case is less guarded than a strategic military airfield. Further more. There were hints that MAZ paid for the supply of trucks for the needs of the Russian Northern Military District.
This already seemed strange. The fact is that the Minsk Automobile Plant produces only one brand of military trucks - MAZ-6317, but this is still a Soviet development, which has become quite outdated and, as far as I know, is not in service with the Russian army. More powerful and modern military vehicles are produced at the Minsk Wheel Tractor Plant, which, although it was part of MAZ until 1991, has long been an independent enterprise and is located, although located next to the automobile plant, but far from the place where the smoke was visible .
Soon new videos of the fire appeared from other angles and suspicions intensified. The best videos were filmed from Kabushkina Street, which is not located on MAZ, but on another enterprise, Minskzhelezobeton, a relatively small plant adjacent to the automobile plant. But the picture showed that the source of the smoke was located directly behind its production building, that is, not on the territory of the automobile plant. For Minsk residents and those who more or less know the city, this should have been obvious, but everyone continued to talk about the fire at MAZ. The Belarusian Ministry of Emergency Situations responded promptly - within a couple of hours an official refutation was published on the ministry’s website. There really was a fire, but it was at Minskzhelezobeton. Three cars caught fire in an open area. The fire was quickly extinguished and there were no injuries.
Needless to say, the most piquant news about explosions and revenge for military supplies initially appeared on Ukrainian resources and after that were broadcast by Belarusian opposition news dumps, some of which continued to lie even after a refutation. Ukrainian media, it seems, did not even pay attention to the refutation. Their task is not information, but propaganda processing of their population and an information war against Russia and Belarus, which began long before February 24 and does not stop for a minute. In this information war, the structures of the Belarusian fugitive opposition are actively helping them.
They regularly put lies on our ears, trying to cause panic, to create distrust and hostility among Belarusians towards Russia and the Russian army, the soldiers of which, who were on Belarusian territory, were accused of everything. Along the way, we are told about the Belarusian “partisans” who have already begun an armed struggle against the regime, the invincible selfie warriors from the “Kalinovsky Regiment” and the elusive Ukrainian avengers and saboteurs, from whom there is no protection. In the last month alone, you can count at least five such fakes.
The first and loudest is the situation with the drone that attacked the airfield in Machulishchi. Yes, there was a drone, and this is a very alarming sign for Belarus. But there were so many fakes around this incident! BYPOL, starting with the fact that the plane was damaged as a result of a special operation of Belarusian “partisans” that had been prepared for several months and would not fly anywhere again, changed the official version several times and eventually exposed itself to ridicule with the answer “That’s what we decided” to the question of why no evidence was provided that sabotage actually took place.
Special mention should be made about two more drones over Machulishchi, which were spotted a couple of days after the first attack. The Zmagar party froze in anticipation - everyone wanted to continue. The expectations, however, were in vain - the drones turned out to be Venus and Jupiter.
The third fake is one that has made a lot of noise about poisonous samples of perfume, which are allegedly distributed in Belarusian cities by women from Ukraine. The message is exactly the same - to scare, deprive people of a sense of security and undermine trust in their own state. Of course, there was no poisonous perfume in reality, and, moreover, no one died from it, but panic rumors always diverge with greater resonance than their refutation.
Another episode of the information war is the situation with the liquidation of a terrorist in Grodno. Here everything was exactly the opposite. It is no good to portray Ukrainian saboteurs and Belarusian radicals as losers. Now BYPOL did not try to cling to the terrorist, but began to accuse the Belarusian special services of staging and even named the KGB officer who allegedly played the role of the terrorist. It turned out unconvincing, the quality of the photographs leaves much to be desired, and the Grodno terrorist does not look like the Vitebsk KGB officer, but the opposition people are eating it up.
If the fake story about the Grodno terrorist simply looks like it was made with white thread, but there have been no public revelations of the fake yet, then in the case of the “Vilnius tihar” the fakes were completely disgraced. The same BYPOL issued another “investigation” and even named the name of the Belarusian security officer, who for some reason filmed the rally of Belarusian zmagars in Vilnius on March 25. The sensation lasted for several hours. The “silent” turned out to be not the Belarusian policeman Andrei Tropashko, but the respectable Lithuanian journalist Darius Mataitis, who was simply doing his job. Mataitis had to apologize. They did not consider it necessary to apologize to Tropashko, who had been slandered in front of an audience of millions.
This is all in just a month. An ordinary month, no worse or better than the rest. The information war continues and new information feces are already being prepared for the brains of gullible citizens. There is no need to become its victim or, even worse, a participant. Now is the time to think about information hygiene and, before broadcasting the next “sensations,” check everything once again.
If you find an error, please select a piece of text and press Ctrl + Enter.
Thank you!
Now the editors are aware.