Tucker Carlson and RT misled on Ukraine with same clips, claims on the same day
Tucker Carlson presented multiple clips and claims that were the same as those that RT put out the same day. Carlson also falsely accused the US of a coup.
Tucker Carlson’s March 9, 2022 show included claims, clips, and presentation that was remarkably similar to what RT published on the same day. The claims made were false or misleading and favored the Kremlin’s false presentation of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, in which Russia is indiscriminately killing civilians, including children. Carlson’s previous false claims about Ukraine have aired on Russian state-controlled media channels like RT and Fondsk.ru.
Comparing the claims of Tucker and RT
In the segment, Carlson says:
In 2014, Victoria Nuland engineered a coup in Ukraine in the name of democracy, of course. So, she is a highly informed source about Ukraine. So, she was having this colloquy with Senator Marco Rubio of Florida during her testimony, and at one point, Rubio took a tack that we were not expecting at all. He asked Nuland if Ukraine had biological weapons.
Here, Carlson repeats a false claim about the US orchestrating a coup in 2014 that is not the segment's focus. The detail is given without qualification and is a lie also cited by the Kremlin as justification for its “security concerns.” A recent Sputnik article decried an alleged US-backed coup and cited the Ron Paul Institute, which repeated the false coup claim.
Carlson then presented partial evidence, leaving out critical details that make the situation appear suspicious. He explained the false bioweapons claims using the same talking points and footage as Russian state media earlier that day.
Carlson tees up Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) as asking something unimaginable and the answer as “shocking.” The answer is not shocking as it has been part of the public discussion in the science community.
CARLSON: We never imagined Ukraine would have biological weapons. Why would Ukraine have bioweapons? So, it seemed like a pretty strange question, but it wasn't half as shocking as the answer he got.
Using the same framing as RT, Carlson implies that research facilities’ existence is somehow shocking and scandalous, but their existence is public record, as is their purpose.
After the misleading coup statements and statements implying a public program was scandalous, Carlson aired the Russian Defense Minister spokesperson whose claims Tucker had supported with clips and selective details.
For context, the Defense Minister is shown here claiming the US will use migratory birds to spread pathogens from Ukraine to Russia, evoking the birds-aren’t-real conspiracy.
Carlson also featured Chinese Foreign Minister Zhao Lijian, who spoke of the laboratories as revelatory.
ZHAO LIJIAN: Over the past two decades, the United States has been blocking the establishment of a verification regime to the Biological Weapons Convention and refused to accept the inspection of biological facilities within and outside its borders. The move has further aggravated the concern of the international community. We, once again, urge the U.S. to provide full clarification of its bio militarization activities within and outside its borders and accept multilateral verification.
The US has already clarified this, but the claim seems like the US has hidden this information. Russia and China are both blasting the narrative through their state-controlled propaganda machines.
The only bioweapons are the ones the Soviets made.
The facilities referenced by RT and Tucker Carlson do not create bioweapons but were established to secure illegally created Soviet bioweapons.
Ukraine’s inclusion in the list of countries partaking in this threat reduction program is public, as is the nuclear threat reduction program established around the same time. The aims and the countries in the program are public record and have public-facing websites that explain what they do.
The US biological weapons program was terminated by executive order under US President Nixon on November 25, 1969. The US, Russia, and other countries then signed a treaty in 1972 where countries agreed not to pursue these weapons of mass destruction. The biological weapons and research that now reside in Ukraine were illegal weapons produced by the Soviet Union.
The US had been trying to curb and eliminate biological weapons when the Soviet fell, and that presented the opportunity. Russian President Boris Yeltsin admitted to having, and he allegedly —many have doubted the program ended, although Yeltsin committed to it— downsized the Soviet biological weapons program in 1992.
The US-funded program is a successful, now-30-year endeavor to secure Soviet bioweapons in Ukraine that also helped Soviet scientists to transition into peaceful work. In the first two decades, the program helped around 70,000 weapons scientists.
Where did the story originate?
Cyber Berkut, a group identified by UK intelligence as a front for the GRU, published the false Ukrainian bioweapon story in 2017. A similar story involving Georgia, a country Russia invaded in 2008, dates back to 2011.
Milton Leitenberg, a long-time researcher at the Center for International and Security Studies and the author of “Assessing the Biological Weapons and Bioterrorism Threat,” has written about the progression of biological weapons disinformation stories. Leitenberg described the 2011 piece as written by “a Georgian journalist, Joni Simonishvili, in Geonews, a Russian proxy disinformation” who “turned to the Lugar Center in earnest.”
In 2013, the Georgian story had taken shape; by 2017, the story had shifted toward Ukraine. The story appeared days after the Cyber Berkut article in TASS, a Russian state-controlled news outlet, and then later in early 2018 on the FSB-controlled outlet South Front by Dilyana Gaytandzhieva.
Gaytandzhieva was the credited author of an investigative-style version of the GRU story from 2017. She also promoted the same false claims in 2022, connecting the 2022 narrative to the claims made in 2017 and 2018.
Gaytandzhieva identified the story as one and the same as her 2018 article, which she linked in a tweet in early 2022.
The story has stayed remarkably unchanged. Stories generally evolve.
Gaytandzhieva appeared on Chinese state media related to her false biological weapons claims. China promoted the false claims alongside the Russian state in early March 2022.
Leitenberg said of the Ukrainian “biolabs” narrative, “This is ALL KGB/FSB work.”
How do we know these outlets are state-controlled?
The outlets mentioned in this report and linked sources are as follows: