Ukraine Soldiers Praised For Telling Russian Warship to “Go F*** Yourself” Actually Surrendered

This morning the Ukrainian navy announced that the Snake Island border guards said to have been killed after telling a Russian warship to "go f*** yourself" are in fact alive and being held prisoner by the Russians.

2 min read

It was one of the defining moments of the start of Russia’s incursion into Ukraine. Thirteen Ukrainian border guards on Snake Island were told by a Russian warship to surrender and they responded by telling the Russians to “go f*** yourself” before they were all brutally killed. The recording was confirmed as authentic by Ukraine’s Interior Ministry and reported around the world. Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky awarded each border guard the posthumous title of ‘Hero of Ukraine’, saying: “On our Zmiinyi Island, defending it to the last, all the border guards died heroically.”

Here’s the original clip on YouTube – it’s clocked up over 3.7 million views since Thursday.

There’s just one problem. It isn’t true. In fact, as the Russians said at the time, all the border guards surrendered. This morning the Ukrainian navy announced the border guards were in fact alive and being held prisoner by the Russians.

It’s good that the Ukrainian navy has admitted the truth on this, and it’s also good to hear the soldiers are alive, albeit in enemy hands. It’s a reminder, though, that in a war, even more so than in normal times, you can’t always trust what you watch and read. That’s not to say that Putin isn’t an unhinged psychopath, or that Russia’s invasion is actually going to plan. But it’s worth having your antenna primed for propaganda and fakes and not assuming everything you read or see is 100% accurate.

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211 Comments
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Oscarone
Oscarone
4 years ago

Will Jones too? “That’s not to say that Putin isn’t an unhinged psychopath”. A bit extreme as a comment. I always had Will Jones down as a more sober type.

MrTea
MrTea
4 years ago

What a shocker, ‘our side’ told us a lie, well that never happened before.

JXB
JXB
4 years ago

‘That’s not to say that Putin isn’t an unhinged psychopath…’

That’s a crowded field. Out of curiosity, in the unhinged psychopath stakes would Trudeau come before or after Putin, and whither Jacinda-the-Hun or Manny Macronavirus?

FrankFisher
FrankFisher
4 years ago

The media knows that most of their Ukraine stories are lies. They do not care, because they’re all telling the same lies and there is no penalty for lying, in fact they’re rewarded by their puppetmasters.

Maxine
Maxine
4 years ago

Agree, can someone point this out to ~Toby given his piece immediately above Will’s where he asks why some skeptics are asking questions?! For many of us it isn’t that we don’t believe that Russia has invaded but given the high number of false video’s and claims already proven to be false, coupled with ‘live’ views showing normal life; most of us have no idea as to what to believe!

Sectasch
Sectasch
4 years ago

It reminded me of ridiculous stories west media created when NATO bombing was happening in Serbia, so I had a very strong suspicion. All the stories were later debunked but nobody was really interested in that.

attilathemum
attilathemum
4 years ago

So this article follows one saying we should ease up on the scepticism about what we hear in the media. 🤦‍♀️

sprinter
sprinter
4 years ago

I can quite believe that they said “Go f$%k yourself” and THEN surrendered. Seems perfectly sensible in the circumstances.

Luis RCoelho
Luis RCoelho
4 years ago

Oh my, my, my… please don’t be so gullible.

This was the first major propaganda narrative following Russia’s advance onto Ukrainian territory. Allegedly leaked audio showed Ukrainian border guards on tiny Snake Island in the black sea communicating with a Russian warship. Upon being told to surrender, the guards say “Russian warship go fuck yourself”.

The Western press reported that all 13 pf the men were killed, and the Ukrainian government released a statement saying they would all be awarded posthumous honours.
However, while the supposedly fallen heroes were being canonised all over the western world, Russia was reporting that they had not been killed at all, but taken alive and unharmed back to the mainland.

A story both the press and the Ukrainian government have since reluctantly admitted is likely true.

Star
Star
4 years ago

The US airforce is running a drill on what they will do if the US starts getting nuked.

https://twitter.com/haveVglass/status/1498428478491959296

Meanwhile there is chatter about Poland allowing the MIG fighter planes it is selling to Ukraine to be used by Ukraine from airbases in Poland. Let’s hope this isn’t true.

Boris Johnson flies to Poland and Estonia tomorrow.

huxleypiggles
huxleypiggles
4 years ago
Reply to  Star

Oh I do hope a detachment of Russian Special Forces could nip in to Poland to deliver an invite to Bozo for discussions with Vladimir. One of those “oh, but we insist. Mr Putin is very keen to have a word.”

Grumman
Grumman
4 years ago
Reply to  Star

I do hope he had to show his vac pass. Pity him & Biden weren’t forced to isolate for few weeks.

Dodgy Geezer
Dodgy Geezer
4 years ago

Surrendering is exactly the correct thing to do.

Your options are to get killed rapidly by overwhelming firepower, or to destroy all vital equipment, leave a few booby traps, surrender so as to tie down several Russian soldiers guarding you, and look for opportunities to escape, while causing as much trouble as possible.

The latter action supports the Ukrainian war effort better….

Fireweasel
Fireweasel
4 years ago

In this YouTube video Matt Hancock puts on a clear display of an unintelligent psychopath attempting to feign tearful emotions. This video is disgusting to watch if this was just an ordinary person, but Hancock was the Health Secretary at the time he did this.
 
I said “unintelligent psychopath” because Hancock doesn’t just make a mess of his attempt to appear tearful, he actually can’t stop himself sneeringly smirking whilst trying to appear to be crying. Perhaps, he was trying to impress Good Morning Britain’s Piers Morgan – and they had a sneer and laugh about it later in the canteen?   
 
Psychopaths are well known to be able to perfectly fake emotions, but seemingly the UK Health Secretary can’t stretch this far.
 
But yet, here he is on Twitter faking emotions about the situation in Ukraine. At least on Twitter this clearly sociopathic MP can’t be seen to be clearly sneeringly smirking as he pretends he cares.
 
With politicians like this on Ukraine’s side, God help them.

Rogerborg
Rogerborg
4 years ago

Oh dear, I see Will misread the room a little with his kneejerk nudge-unit rhetoric.

I’ll start taking his geopolitical analyses seriously when he stops conflating England with the UK, something that’s he’s done on multiple occasions here.

David Beaton
David Beaton
4 years ago

BBC Institutional Lies reach new depths with their hysterical Goebbels level anti-Russian propaganda – it seems that GBNews is following suit and has just trashed its own boastful claims of “No spin,No bias” – are you listening Wootton?

Most of GBNews now just one big noisy / blousy “Loose Women” turn off!

Oh well! Back to RT……Oh wait! Johnson has found Ofcom to blame when he so ‘reluctantly’ bans it for covering the Russian point of view!

Samurai Jack
Samurai Jack
4 years ago

I like to watch YouTube channels that cover past battles, channels like Kings and Generals give you the political build up to the battle.

Listening to this shows me how long in the tooth misinformation, political gain and personal claim to a throne or kingdom really is.. The posturing, maneuvering, desire to rule over?

I mean, it’s been going on for centuries, why should it be different now?

One major difference between now and then is the power of media, instant communication platforms, real time footage, it’s not like your waiting for the messenger on a horse to arrive anymore?

JASA
JASA
4 years ago

Have Russia actually invaded i.e. ground forces have moved into the country? The only footage is old footage of troops and not what is happening now. Nothing verified as genuine. We are being lied to on a huge scale.

crisisgarden
crisisgarden
4 years ago
Reply to  JASA

I’ve been quite suspicious of much of the images and footage I’ve seen. Apartment blocks with very little damage; Very little footage of actual conflict and hardly any of the kind of columns of vehicles you’d see in an invasion. Comparing this to footage I’ve seen from Syria, for instance, and I wonder…

JASA
JASA
4 years ago
Reply to  crisisgarden

Indeed. I caught a glimpse of Good Morning Britain and it was perfectly clear that in the background, citizens were going about things pretty normally.

kate
kate
4 years ago
Reply to  crisisgarden

There was a man yesterday filming himself from Kiev. Everything looked normal, buildings standing, electricity and water on, cars moving around the city……this is because the Russians are not doing a deliberately destructive advance. they are targeting carefully what to attack. Many areas are living normally.

This is why a lot of the BBC footage is faked.(and looks it)

David Beaton
David Beaton
4 years ago
Reply to  kate

One shot of Russian planes “flying over Kiev” was apparently of a Moscow Red Square practice flight for a parade

huxleypiggles
huxleypiggles
4 years ago
Reply to  kate

Is it Saker? A Russian guy who I was directed to last night is blogging on this. He says the Russians have Kiev surrounded but do not want to commit major infrastructure destruction.

Fireweasel
Fireweasel
4 years ago
Reply to  crisisgarden

A lot of the footage is fake, and very badly created fakes. One fake video clearly showed a dummy being blown up. The entire dummy blew about a hundred feet in the air and came down intact, human bodies don’t do this, they generally blow apart and bits go everywhere.

But the BBC, YouTube and Twitter morons will lap these cheap fakes up.

RW
RW
4 years ago
Reply to  JASA

They have. But you’re not going to believe that, anyway.

JASA
JASA
4 years ago
Reply to  RW

How do you know? Where’s the verified evidence? That’s all I asked. I don’t trust anything the Media say now. Daily Sceptic says Question Everything, yet they don’t appear to be over this.

kate
kate
4 years ago
Reply to  JASA

The Russians have invaded. They are moving carefully to take out military targets only. They are trying to protect essential infrastructure such as sewage, water, roads, food supply, electricity and gas, and civilian lives. They do not want a chaotic state on their borders, or one with justified and recent grievances against them. They have knocked out several bioweapons labs that the US put in Ukraine, (and which are associated with several suspicious leaks of deadly viral illnesses)
I think the Russians want to get their hands on Ukrainian government documents too, as they are looking for evidence of the genocides that have taken place there.
So it is not the typical US “shock and awe” but a steady advance. They do not want to destroy everything in their path.

The Saker is a good source of info.

Day 4 of the Russian offensive in the Ukraine

https://thesaker.is/day-4-of-the-russian-offensive-in-the-ukraine/

huxleypiggles
huxleypiggles
4 years ago
Reply to  kate

Agree Kate. Seems to be a decent, legitimate blog.

David Beaton
David Beaton
4 years ago
Reply to  JASA

We need a PCR test to tell us whether the troops are Russian or not!

I suspect a 100% “False Positive” result on the way!

Paul B
Paul B
4 years ago

They keep slipping these stories out while we are all looking at Russia.

The NHS job ads have been doing the rounds for a few weeks on social media.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/02/27/almost-1000-people-seek-compensation-severe-disability-covid/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhr

Judging by the insurance company numbers I’d expect this to be 10x higher once people start to become aware of the damage payments system, still at least Pfizer won’t have to pay anything hey….

A good comment below “I wonder if the NHS will require the applicants to be vaccinated?”.

chris-ds
chris-ds
4 years ago

We come to the dailysceptic for the details behind the headlines.

if your going to parrot the msm you need to add details to your ascertains because the readership is sceptical, it’s in the tital of your website!!!!

we need detail and data.

if Putin us a psycho tell us why, provide the data.

otherwise maybe just stick to Covid or just close?

Joe 90
Joe 90
4 years ago

Since covid (in fact since the Blair wars but its gotten much worse since then) I’ve not trusted a thing being reported in the msm. I mean, is there anything being reported that is even remotely close to being actual truth anymore?

I despair – I really do.

Here are some more fake news stories coming out of Ukraine and being used as facts by some of the western msm.

“THE GHOST OF KIEV”
It was reported that a single Ukrainian plane, a MiG-29, was patrolling the skies above Kiev. The English-speaking press called the unnamed pilot “The Ghost of Kiev”, and claimed he had downed 6 Russian jets in air-to-air combat in less than 2 days, making him an official Fighter Ace, and probably one of the fastest to ever earn that title.The trouble is there is almost no evidence this happened at all.

“RUSSIAN PLANES FLYING OVER KIEV”
A lot of people have been sharing a short video of Russian planes allegedly flying low over the city of Kiev. The Times used a still from it in their story “Will sanctions stop a Russian shell?”. The problem with that is it’s not Kiev, it’s Moscow. And it’s not today, it’s… Read more »

ElSabio
ElSabio
4 years ago

Oops!

Toppling Russia’s President Vladimir Putin is the goal of the new wave of international sanctions introduced in response to Moscow’s offensive in Ukraine, a spokesman for Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson told reporters on Monday. Downing Street later clarified that the spokesperson had “misspoken”.

“The measures we are introducing, that large parts of the world are introducing, are to bring down the Putin regime,” the unnamed official said.

https://www.rt.com/russia/550879-uk-sanctions-regime-change/

David Beaton
David Beaton
4 years ago
Reply to  ElSabio

Who guessed?

kate
kate
4 years ago
Reply to  David Beaton

Putin should be safe, he has the support of 70% of Russians. Our leaders have nothing like this degree of support for their policies.

It will be Europe that will suffer from the sanctions, Russia has been preparing for this for years, they wanted closer cooperation with the west but were repeatedly rebuffed.

They now realise the US/UK/EU will never accept them, have allies in China and India who will continue trading contracts and banking agreements, are self sufficient in food and energy and have been accumulating gold reserves.

Russia should be fine, it is the europeans whose economies will collapse.

(I wonder if Schwab wants this)

lordsnooty
lordsnooty
4 years ago

The main opposition in Russia to Putin is the Communist Party, out government is easing it’s path to power, despite Britain spending most of the last century trying to stop the communist USSR.

chris-ds
chris-ds
4 years ago

Has Toby read this yet?

I saw a bbc headline that they where alive and wondered why they had bothered letting us know, I assume they had previous told us they where murdered by the Russians.

no denying the whole situation is wrong, sadly we can’t believe what our media tell us especially after they’ve lied to us these last 2 years of Covid.

they tell us what they want us to believe rather than letting us make our own minds up.

B.F.Finlayson
B.F.Finlayson
4 years ago
Reply to  chris-ds

It was announced last Friday 26th that the Snake Island military had surrendered and were safe. Quite how the news has taken this long to filter through is a testimony to both the MSM and Western government blanket restrictions – but truth will out, eventually.

bresbo
bresbo
4 years ago
kate
kate
4 years ago
Reply to  bresbo

thanks for this Johnathan Cook has a great reputation.

kate
kate
4 years ago

Mark Crispin Miller who is Professor of Media, Culture and Communication at New York University talks about US government propaganda, the corporate media, the CIA and the Russian “Putin” threat. He also looks at the role of the CIA and the US government in their organized effort to demonize Putin and Russia and create a US population hysteria similar to the 1950s. This interview was done during the Project Censored 40th anniversary at Sonoma State University on October 22, 2016 by Pacifica KPFA WorkWeek host Steve Zeltzer.
https://off-guardian.org/2016/11/02/video-war-us-government-corporate-propaganda-the-cia-and-the-russian-putin-threat/

James Kreis
James Kreis
4 years ago

“An unhinged psychopath”. Oh dear Will, I couldn’t disagree more. I fear a great falling out amongst your readers over this conflict.

ElSabio
ElSabio
4 years ago

I’m going to be sick…

President Zelensky is becoming a respected war hero — and a cultural icon

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/president-zelensky-is-becoming-a-respected-war-hero-and-a-cultural-icon-11646079007?mod=mw_latestnews

ElSabio
ElSabio
4 years ago

China gets it:

So, she concludes: “Why doesn’t President Biden and NATO leaders actually just say that and guarantee it? Why don’t they prevent this war from happening? Because if Ukraine became a member of NATO, that would put US and NATO troops directly on the doorstep of Russia, which as Putin has laid out, would undermine their national security interest. Why doesn’t President Biden and NATO leaders actually just say that and guarantee it?

They actually want Russia to invade Ukraine, because number one it gives the Biden administration a clear excuse to go and levy draconian sanctions which are modern-day siege against Russia and the Russian people.

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/they-actually-want-russia-invade-ccp-spox-slams-biden-provoking-putin

tom171uk
tom171uk
4 years ago

“Unhinged” is emotive but essentially meaningless. A good many other world leaders are likely psychopathic. How else do you get to be a world leader?

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/the-pros-to-being-a-psychopath-96723962/

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