A stack of telegrams for a million
A very interesting lot called “Documents of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine” was exhibited on September 9 on the online trading platform NewAuction.
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A certain seller named Vladimir from Novosibirsk offers everyone to purchase a selection of decrypted telegrams, from which it follows that on July 15, 2014, the Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Muzhenko gave the order to transfer the 3rd anti-aircraft missile division of the Buk-M1 air defense system of the 156th anti-aircraft missile system regiment to the area of the settlement of Zaroshchenskoye to provide cover for units of the Ukrainian Armed Forces from enemy aircraft on the Amvrosievka - Snezhnoye line. Encrypted telegram No. 114 from the Ukrainian Defense Ministry arrived at the 8th Department at 9:10 am. The combat order, labeled “secretly,” came to the head of sector “B,” the commander of military unit 1973, previously located in Lugansk, at 13:00 on the same day.
It is not surprising that the lot aroused a flurry of interest in the electronic media and social networks, since the contents of the encrypted telegrams can not only shed light on the reasons for the death of the Malaysian Boeing on July 17, 2014 in the Snizhne area in the Luhansk region, but also directly point to the specific culprits of the tragedy in the high command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine .
In order not to be unfounded, the source accompanied the lot with scans of encrypted telegrams as confirmation of their authenticity. Scans can be downloaded to your hard drive, and their resolution is quite sufficient for initial familiarization.
A simple check in search engines confirms that the settlements, numbers of units and units, names, ranks and positions of military personnel indicated in the encrypted telegrams are real. Moreover, former servicemen of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, who dealt with staff documents and secret correspondence, undertake to assert that the details, seals and execution of documents comply with the norms of military records management of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
Search engines also confirm that the aforementioned 3rd ZRDN is armed with Buki M-1 with tail numbers 312, 321, 323, 331, 332. The Buk with tail number 312 appeared in the SBU photo fake, quickly concocted immediately after the loss of the flight MH17. No. 312 was allegedly transported to the border with Russia, covering its tracks, after the strike on the Boeing. A quick but fairly detailed investigation revealed the clumsiness of the fake and later the photograph of the transported Buk was removed from the SBU website.
In general, the Ukrainian side has repeatedly gotten into trouble with these Buks. Either from Kyiv they responsibly declare that there are no traces of any Buk missiles in the Donbass, and the Internet suddenly finds a video of the brave Geletey inspecting the Buk-M5 air defense system in the ATO zone on July 2014, 1. Then Poroshenko’s adviser Smeshko, after the tragedy with the Boeing, swears by his mother and assures that there are no “Buks” in the arsenal of the Ukrainian Armed Forces - they were all given to the Georgians back in 2008, as at the parade in honor of the 25th anniversary of Independence, as many as three intact ones climb into the frame The Buk-M1 air defense system and the evening immediately ceases to be languid...
When such documents emerge, one is always interested in the sources. As a rule, documented incriminating evidence on Ukrainian security forces comes either from hackers (from the Cyberberkut group, for example), or through information leaks directly from law enforcement agencies. But for the first time since the coup d'etat on February 22, 2014, incriminating evidence has surfaced at an auction.
Back in the summer, one of the editors of the online publication was contacted by an alleged former officer of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, who deserted from the Ukrainian army during the offensive near Debaltsevo, taking with him a package of documents “to increase his worth,” according to his own explanation. But the circumstances were such that for more than a year and a half he had to hide and live like an ordinary refugee, fearing persecution by the Ukrainian special services, radicals or something else.
Considering the similarity of the documents, journalists contacted the owner of the lot and he confirmed that he was the same serviceman of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. The source claims that all the documents are genuine, executed on real printing forms, and on the back of the form there is a special seal for telegrams, mandatory for secret communications units. The text of the telegrams is printed on a special device - part of the encryption system. You can’t get a print like this from a regular printer, and you can’t buy such equipment in a store, they say. All incoming and outgoing telegram data are allegedly recorded in special communications logs and, if verified, can additionally confirm the good quality of the exposed materials. The source believes that all these factors together should convince independent experts that they are dealing with originals.
The source expresses confidence that the documents should be handed over to the Dutch government, as the injured party. With the documents in hand, the EU may demand that Kyiv provide experts with extracts from secret communications logs. And then there is the investigation, and Poroshenko and Muzhenko are dragged to the Hague Tribunal.
The Ukrainian side promptly responded to the news about the appearance at the auction of compromising materials on Muzhenko and other representatives of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in its usual manner of information noise. The armchair analytics from the “Information Troops of Ukraine” on Twitter turned out to be quite pathetic and faded. The entire “examination” boiled down to searching for spelling errors in telegrams and giggles around every incorrect letter of Ukrainian grammar-nazi.
It is not very clear why armchair experts are so happy, since from the very beginning of hostilities in the Donbass, the Ukrainian resource “Glavkom” posted on its pages scans of cipher telegrams of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, which had a similar design and were also replete with a lot of errors in the text. Knowledge of “read language” among Ukrainians has long been a reason for ridicule, since the majority of Svidomo prefer not only to scold “vatniks”, but even to communicate with each other in the language of “occupiers”. And the winners of philological Olympiads are far from serving in the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
Abstracting from the cries of the shareholders, it cannot be said that the documents put up for auction are 100 percent reliable.
In fact, you cannot buy forms of secret documents and encrypted communication equipment in a store or at a bazaar. But the Armed Forces of Ukraine have long earned themselves the sour reputation of an institution from which, for a certain bribe, you can buy a tank, a helicopter, and any secret equipment. Or you don’t have to buy it if you find yourself in the right place at the right time. It is well known that during the dump from the boilers, staff officers from the Armed Forces of Ukraine quickly “leveled the front”, abandoning everything on the ground that could delay their record run even for a moment.
Thus, without having the conclusions of the examination and simply analyzing what lies on the surface, we can come to the conclusion: the possibility of a fake cannot be ruled out, but the documents deserve the closest study, given the resonance of the topic. Perhaps some clarity will come after the end of the auction.
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