A week after Russia fired a missile capable of carrying atomic charges on Dnipro in Ukraine, the nuclear blackmail brandished by the Kremlin has never seemed so strong. Traveling to Kazakhstan, Vladimir Putin threatened this Thursday, November 28 to strike kyiv with this new missile. In this context, some are broadcasting on the networks the story of an imminent nuclear war between Russia and NATO. This narrative is pushed with fake news, to terrorize Westerners.
This little alarmist music of an imminent nuclear war between Russia and NATO is omnipresent on social networks. The latest example is a video purporting to show “ a new Russian nuclear bomb under construction “. We see an enormous black machine, as high as a ten-story building, cylindrical in shape, transported on a rolling platform several dozen meters long. Workers in construction clothing film the scene. On the sound side, the atmosphere is deliberately rather disturbing. The Internet user at the origin of this publication speaks of “ alarming reports suggesting Russia is stepping up its nuclear preparations and arsenal ».
Once verified, these images do not show a nuclear bomb, nor any Russian weapon. Thanks to a reverse image search, we find several photos of this same machine in an article published on the Mammoet company website.
This Dutch company specializes in lifting and transporting heavy objects. We learn that it is in reality a gigantic regeneration column which is used to treat products resulting from refining. The device weighs more than 3,000 tonnes and was transported to the Dangote oil refinery, Nigeria, in 2021. To date, it is the heaviest item ever transported on a public road in Africa .
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A false message from the French government
Still to fuel fears, other videos taken out of context even simulate the start of a nuclear war. This is the case of a TikTok publication viewed hundreds of thousands of times in recent hours. We see the yellow and black nuclear symbol, affixed to images of Paris.
These visuals are accompanied by a supposed nuclear alert message from the French government.
False nuclear warning message
This distressing message seems real. The graphic charter, the blue-white-red logo, the intonation of the voice, everything seems to correspond with the official alerts broadcast on other subjects by the French Republic. Except that in reality, this message was made and broadcast on YouTube by a videographer, in April 2023. He clearly specifies that it is a “ fictional content “. Despite this, his video is now being reused for disinformation purposes.
Weakening support for Ukraine
Analysis of the spread of these alarmist fake news shows that they are, in part, disseminated and amplified by accounts used to relaying Russian propaganda daily on social networks. Their goal is to install this background noise of an imminent nuclear war between Russia and NATO, to create a feeling of panic among Westerners. This fear could lead to a desire to no longer support the Ukrainian war effort. This information strategy has been put in place by the Kremlin since the launch of its invasion of Ukraine.
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