File talk:Fake Berkut.jpg

Terminology
On the caption dispute: Petri restored and said "If you disagree on the issue, take it to the comments." Current caption: "Berkut policemen with assault rifles claimed by Yanukovitch supporters to be Right Sector militants in disguise." That's certainly a claim you want to be careful with. You could make a circumstantial case. I don't know how good the one is. But I liked the previous caption best: "Men with assault rifles claimed by Yanukovitch supporters to be Right Sector militants in disguise and by most others to be Berkut policemen." Modification: "some Yanukovitch supporters." Saying they are police is leading, in a direction I suspect (from ignorance + common sense) is more likely correct, but maybe not, and we're question-askers. The previous caption to the one I like with "masked men" is leading. Faces are obscured, and that's a fact to note, and allows fakery, but the helmet is not suspicious. So in a short caption, best left out. --Caustic Logic (talk) 03:02, 23 February 2014 (UTC)


 * I am 100% sure these are real Berkut, see the F***ing video.
 * On this wiki we follow Wikipedia protocol on discussions. The photo and the comment was on the talk page and part of my comment. Protocol says you do not mess with other peoples comments. If it was in article space, then you would be free to edit it. -- Petri Krohn (talk) 04:12, 23 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Fair point. I will see the video, but as I said (below), no 100% for me. Maybe 99%. I do prefer the version I prefer for the reasons given, but it's your comment. I guess a picture and caption makes it seem like something else. If it were, and ACLOS was saying this our take, then all this would matter. Otherwise, we should leave reverted to what you meant to say. --Caustic Logic (talk) 05:11, 23 February 2014 (UTC)
 * If you make a comment, sign it. The caption is not signed and contains your opinion. My version was neutral after I deleted the "masked". Sign the caption or restore the neutral version, please. --CE (talk) 08:30, 23 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Fair point. But maybe just it being within the comment covers the issue? Signed or not, we know by now that's his comment and reading. Going to watch "the F***ing video" now. Soon, we agree on something, lighten up, group hug? --Caustic Logic (talk) 09:36, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

The Fakery Case
They sure have been stealing police uniforms and gear, if often torn and damaged. Apparent police in full gear cannot be proof of anything. This will should be a zone free of 100% certainties. A good spot for details and consideration might be the spot below. I may sit it out entirely, I don't mean to get too into this stuff. --Caustic Logic (talk) 03:02, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

The original source (Truth About Situation in Ukraine, Facebook) claims fakery with this explanation:
 * The militants of the Right Sector, militarised extremist wing of the opposition's national party, are trying to impose as law reinforcement officers. The black SWAT uniforms are not used by Berkut division of police. The AK model has been removed from the law reinforcement forces awhile ago. Light boots are not worn by Berkut as well as the ski goggles. Another attempt of opposition to discredit the police force and justify their crimes committed for the benefit of US and EU masters.

(Interestingly, this doesn't even pop up in a Google search - instead you can find this re-posting at White People World Wide and another white power Facebook page. The one is shared with no comment added. Apparently they find the whole claim, bad English and all, rather amusing.)

If there's a good case for this, it would ideally include referenced visual supports, or at least more thorough explanation, circumstantial clues in what they do/how they act, etc. If such exists, I won't be looking for it, but if someone else does, bring it here. Would be interesting if true. --Caustic Logic (talk) 05:27, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

As for the video - I'm not sure which. The Ukraine page links apparently to this video from radio Svoboda? It's not the exact scene at all, but same concept. Yellow armbands, uniforms, making the government "look bad" by shooting. They look fine. I don't know what they're shooting, in this flash mob coup. All clues in how they act suggest real police doing their job. The photo looked the same, the video added makes me think this fakery case is not going to pan out well. --Caustic Logic (talk) 09:42, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

Also, after seeing more, I can say the image we started with, and all the many ones at the same scene, were at the October Palace, up until 12:22 or so. The 41-minute video shows the strange attack on them, about 4-6:00 in, fireworks surely to mask gunfire. They all march away briskly to the south at this time. After that, this place was insurgent held and used as another field clinic, except the part that's on fire. The palace has sniper bullets stuck in its columns. Some of their wounded or dead were dragged away, leaving trails of blood. Citations, schmitations. In due time. Shortly after, the real Berkut were chased from another front line even further south. --Caustic Logic (talk) 11:05, 10 March 2014 (UTC)

Actual Fake Berkut?
Was that above story sown to confuse a real allegation someone half-expected? The Ukrainian videos I've seen here show men who look shady to me, but I can't tell what they're saying. The same type can be seen in this BBC video, about 3:00 in. That's ostensibly someone filming actual Berkut, with mismatching uniforms and helmets, random backpacks, and all different kinds of oddball "sniper rifles." I don't really see what they're doing except letting it seem like the snipers are running around everywhere, not just pinned down and fleeing as the totally real ones usually were. --Caustic Logic (talk) 11:05, 10 March 2014 (UTC)

These guys could be real, just some oddball unit put together. One more for fakery mislabeling, one more against. Christipher Miller tweeted this photo of the same sniper group described "Proof of police snipers. @KyivPost photographers Pavlo Podufalov just took this photo near Maidan. #euromaidan" (12:26 Kiev time ?) identified that (12:33 PM (?) Kiev time, 20 Feb) as taken by Poland's ambassador, in Kiev at the time. "@mathieuvonrohr that's the same as the pic Sikorski took of EU delegation's armed escort pic.twitter.com/CA9ClmxgKm @KyivPost" The linked image is the same, but doesn't specify that's their security. Radosław Sikorski (11:48 AM?): "Black smoke,detonations and gunfire around presidential palace. Meeting moved to another location. Officials panicky." One comment below says "#Ukraine police snipers ready for action. These guns ain't firing rubber bullets. Pic via @sikorskiradek pic.twitter.com/Vxna4DK2s7” Could be, then. Either way, it's not clear how the ambassador would have gotten Podufalov's photo to re-tweet, while the opposite would be quite clear. "Just took" the photo, in a sense. --Caustic Logic (talk) 05:11, 31 March 2014 (UTC) and --Caustic Logic (talk) 05:29, 31 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Side-note: Can't find anywhere but re-tweeted Miller where Podufalov actually says he took the photo. But here's an interesting photo of his, Feb. 21: "#euromaidan They found some police training targets. (преса = press) Photo by Pavlo Podufalov pic.twitter.com/ePG9L4auJH." They were targeting: press, medics, Ukrainian patriots, the Euro. According to this (art installation? Actual alleged evidence?) --Caustic Logic (talk) 05:29, 31 March 2014 (UTC)

Not Actual Government Forces
This liveblog thing from "the Interpreter" includes this famous photo, with the explanation:
 * Pro-government armed groups, which certainly seem to resemble professional paramilitary units, are conspicuous by their yellow armbands for deterring actual government forces from firing at them --Caustic Logic (talk) 09:54, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

SBU Alfa Team
No, it doesn't do what it says in the headline. They say they have a bunch of photographs and video (and actually show five photographs) from the backyard of the SBU building three blocks away from Maidan, from the morning of the 20th between 9-10 and 11:40-12:00 and from the 21st (they say metadata fits, filmed by "ordinary Ukrainians"). They show what they say was identified by several people who should know as men of the SBU "Alfa Team" (Russian-trained, of course) which has 200 people total. I would say they look a whole lot like our "Fake Berkut" including the yellow identification marks. They come and go, and when they go, they mask, they say, but don't show. On the 21st while the President was fleeing there is some hectic "cover-up" activity, not clear if by the same people or not. A super-long rambling EXCLUSIVE article with no conclusive evidence of who the snipers were. But now we know who the "Fake Berkut" were (I would say). --CE (talk) 16:09, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Exclusive: Photographs Expose Russian-Trained Killers in Kiev, The Daily Beast, March 30, 2014
 * I just read through this too. Some useful detail, a lot of twisted illogic. These guys must be the killer snipers because ... well we already know some had sniper rifles, but here you see them putting them in trucks. Russia can be implicated, by training. Handy! The main thing this adds is their faces - lynch mobs will want this info. "No afternoon pictures of the courtyard were taken by the sources, who are ordinary Ukrainians and not connected with any government authority," or at least not shared. They stopped filming right before the major assault on them began. This keeps us from seeing the dispirited and blood-smeared survivors returning and crying in the lot. (the worst ones would be in hospital). This image would complicate the message. They know how to keep it simple. --Caustic Logic (talk) 22:15, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
 * You're right, it's rather strange that no later material is there. Maybe they went shopping or whatever ordinary Ukrainians do with killers in their backyard. I just realized that there is a huge timeline flaw anyway: The president did not flee "on the next day", but two days later. The next day saw the agreement with the Europeans and the three opposition leaders, which was broken in the morning of the 22nd. So their activities "on the next day" can't have anything to do with a reaction to the end of the "regime" they were supporting.
 * The next day there is again a lot of activity in the courtyard but it is of a totally different nature and the tasks being performed are not preparations for battle or rotation of fighters but the measures accompanying a hasty retreat. Yanukovych was in flight by then and the regime crumbling fast. The SBU appears to be covering tracks, getting rid of evidence, tying up loose ends. The day begins with smoke rising from one of the chimneys, possibly a burning of documents, reminiscent of similar scenes during the anti-communist revolutions in East Germany or Romania in 1989.
 * btw, from the style this article is quite skilled propaganda worth a Chulov. Not the first time I noticed that on The Daily Beast. --CE (talk) 23:47, 30 March 2014 (UTC)