I wrote a short piece the other day commenting on a Guardian story by a journalist Liz Cookman, about “abducted Ukrainian children”. This is the propaganda story about Russia abducting children from Ukraine. The two main points I made are: when people talk about Russia abducting children from Ukraine they are waging an implicit war. Russia has annexed Donbas and sees the territory as being part of the Russian Federation. From the Russian point of view, moving children from an orphanage into Russia proper, is not a cross-border transfer. It may be done for safety reasons or for other administrative reasons. When the narrative is spun up about “Russia abducting children from Ukraine” people are trying to reinforce the idea that Donbas is an illegally occupied territory. They pretend to be concerned about children, but in fact are fighting a war with Russia over control of territory. Recall that Russia’s reason for taking Donbas is, from their point of view, to rescue the Russian minority population in this region from an anti-Russian nationalist regime in Kiev. (This site frequently produces solid evidence to show that this narrative is plausible). Underneath the “humanitarian” concern about “Russia abducting children” is simply a continuation of the original Kiev nationalist narrative; there is no genuine “pro-Russian” movement in Donbas; anyone who does not support the nationalist take-over in Kiev is a Moscow sponsored terrorist. This is a narrative which rejects the Minsk peace agreements. They are weaponizing children to this end. The second point I made was more at the granular level of the propaganda; the narrative depends on avoiding specificity and concreteness. When you break it down, there are different strands to the story. There is a story about parents voluntarily sending their children to camps in Russia. There is the case of children in state care in the Donbas region being taken over by Russia and treated as if Russian. And, early in the war, there were cases of children finding themselves on the wrong side of shifting front lines. Russia cooperates with returning children where there is reliable evidence of living relatives in Ukraine. (I would not claim that the process is easy; apparently, they require relatives to travel into Russia to claim their child).
In the first piece I reported on how Liz Cookman was retelling the propaganda narrative and filling it out by using wholly partisan sources. She also, as I showed, mislead the Guardian’s readers by misrepresenting a poster about “not using foreign languages around the soldiers” (along with a set of other injunctions, like avoid sudden movements), as evidence that “Ukrainian is banned in these camps”.
Liz Cookman has done a follow-up piece in the Guardian. “Russia has network of 200 camps for ‘brainwashing’ Ukrainian children – report”. The main source appears to be a report from a team at Harvard who she had already quoted in the first piece. I looked at the website of this group at Harvard. I don’t think I have ever seen such virulent anti-Russia hatred. I pointed out in my piece that one of their claims; that Russia has refused to provide a list of children taken from Ukraine is refuted by the Russian Foreign Ministry. In the original piece Cookman talked about a brother and sister who had gone to a patriotic camp in Russia, from Ukraine. The girl hated it. The boy liked it, (which is presented as “fell for the indoctrination” – this is all part of Russia phobia. In the fog of Russia phobia it is simply not possible to admit that anyone voluntarily aligned with the Russian position; they have to have been “indoctrinated”. This is because Russia is not allowed to actually have a position). But, the key point is we are implicitly told how they got to the camp: “Her foster mother agreed that she needed a break.” “After her stint in the military camp, Sonya, now 18, returned to her foster family in an occupied part of Kherson.” and, about the brother: “Her younger brother was also sent to an Avangard camp, where she says he fell victim to the indoctrination.”. Notice the use of the passive to avoid saying who by, a standard tactic of propaganda writing. It is seems clear, though, from the article that these children were sent by their parents. There is a quote from a NATO think tank “Children are forced into these programmes or their parents risk losing custody. It’s explicitly coercive” – to kind of try to massage that story up a bit. So, the parents send them, but they are coerced into sending them. It is conceivable in some instances; but I doubt it is routine. Places at these camps cost quite a lot, and I would imagine there are plenty of young people who want to go, without being coerced. By the time of her second article Liz Cookman is writing, “The findings follow a Guardian report last week in which children from occupied regions of Ukraine described being forcibly taken to such military-style camps and groomed to be ready to fight for Russia,” referring back to her own first article, which she is now quoting as a source. I had to read this three times. The first article does not in any way say, let alone present any evidence, of these specific children being “forcibly taken” to a “military camp”. And, of the two children in the first article, one, not two, talked about “grooming”; so not “children”. What can one say? It is sheer fiction, I am sorry to say. Why might she do this? Either she is hoping to win another award and this is what, at the editorial level, will win her a prize. Or she is in the pay of someone. Those seem to be the most likely explanations. Where is the journalistic spirit to investigate and get at the truth? Not here. Here we just have making up a story to fit a given propaganda narrative. We even see contradictory evidence embedded in the story itself. (The same pattern can often be seen in “scientific studies”, for example those which promote ADHD drugging. In those cases studies are written up to please the funders or promote a pre-established point of view, regardless, often, of what the results show. But I digress).
The present article appears to be based on a report by the Russia phobic Harvard group about a “network of camps in Russia and the occupied territories where Ukrainian children are indoctrinated and prepared for the military”. I don’t have time to read the report. (That is probably a good thing. The extent of the Russia phobia would probably make my blood boil). But one comment; nowhere in Liz Cookman’s second article does she adduce any evidence at all that the “network of camps” is “expressly built and expanded since 2014, to turn Ukrainian children into Russians,” as the Harvard group claims. There is mention of satellite imagery and Russian sources being used to show evidence of military style camps for children, but, surprisingly, no evidence, at all, that these camps are expressly for “Ukrainian” children, (I put “Ukrainian” in quote marks. not because I dispute Ukrainian national identify, but because whether or not children from Donbas are Ukrainian is disputed, sadly. In some cases they will already have Russian passports). Such evidence may be presented in the Harvard report, but it hasn’t made it into this media report.
The partisanship is so self-evident. In the first piece we learn of just two actual young people sent to these camps for a “break”, apparently by their foster parents. The girl hated it. The boy liked it. That, so far, is 50/50. You wouldn’t believe that from the narratives though, even though that is a core reported fact in the text.
The other point here. Yes. There is a “network”, (if you like), of military style camps for young people in Russia. Out of interest I searched for such a camp on Yandex and quickly found lots of adverts for “military patriotic” camps for young people in Russia. You don’t need satellite imagery to find them, though it may make you feel like a brave humanitarian researcher to use it. Some seem more sports focussed. Some clearly have a strong military programme. No secret. And, by the way, back in 2014 I recall reading lots of reports in the Guardian about summer camps run by nationalists in Ukraine – where children learned how to fire weapons and could be said to have been being “groomed” for the military. Final note; at my posh British Public School in the 1980s I had to do a “stint” in a military style organisation, wear a uniform, and learn how to fire a gun – at the age of 14. One could equally say we were being “groomed”. It seems that nationalists the world over like to “groom” young people to align with their military postures and possibly prepare them for the army. The issue seems to be that when Russia does it, it is evidence of their singular evil and barbarity. I would say the real evil is the propaganda. (It would be a logical mistake to conclude from that that I am a fan of military camps for children; I am focussed on the partisanship and false reporting).
I think Cookman is a freelance contributor to the Guardian. Where is the editorial process? Even on its own internal evidence the story fails. It fails on a theoretical level; no critical discussion that Donbas is contested territory. It fails to demonstrate any attempt to check the story stands up, by researching the other side. And it mispresented the little evidence it adduces. One assumes that, at this point, however, it is enough that the story is good war propaganda for it to pass. And Liz Cookman will still get paid a “journalistic fee”, (one imagines), even though she is writing straight war propaganda with the most passing connection even to her own facts.
