How the Mainstream Media Hid the Use of Human Shields by Ukrainian Military

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Executive Summary

The US Pentagon highly controls the establishment media.
For this reason, the use of human shields by the Ukrainian military is hidden from the public.

Introduction

This article shows how the establishment media gaslights the public for using human shields.

DW or German News Video, Provides US/NATO Controlled Inaccurate Information on the War

This video, by DW, tries to hide the fact that Ukrainians are being used as human shields. A good question would be why are civilians in a chemical plant, and why have they not fled the area. The establishment media continually talks of “trapped civilians” but can’t explain why Ukrainian civilians are constantly trapped when they should have vacated war zones already.

Ukraine and Human Shield Use

The Pentagon-controlled establishment media does not want the public to know that Ukraine has, since the beginning of the war, used Ukrainian civilians as human shields. The only reason civilians are kept along with the military is for use as human shields.

Al Jazeera Claiming Putin is Making False Claims on Human Shield Use by Ukrainians

Al Jazeera (amusingly funded out of Qatar, which has no freedom of speech and pretends to be “enlightened” but supports anyone being beheaded if you insult the Prophet, questions Putin’s claim. Al Jazeera has no independence from the Qatar government and is a tool of Qatar’s government — a complaint brought up by Saudi Arabia, which led to conflict between these two countries, naturally published an article claiming that Putin’s accusations of the use of human shields must be false. Here are some quotes.

Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.

Discussing the capital, Kyiv, he added that “the leadership of Ukraine and the authorities of the city, having announced a curfew, are persuading the residents of the capital to stay in their homes”. This, he concluded, “once again proves that the Kyiv regime uses the residents of the city as a ‘human shield’ for the nationalists who have deployed artillery units and military equipment in residential areas of the capital”.

Russia has repeated similar claims in diplomatic arenas such as the United Nations Security Council. On social media too, Russian diplomats have attempted to shape perceptions of the battlefield, portraying the Ukrainian resistance as guilty of war crimes by insisting that they have used “human shields”.

Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills.

On March 8, the Russian Defence Ministry accused the Ukrainian “militants” of holding “more than 4.5 million civilians hostage as a human shield”. Basically, Moscow applied its legal argument to 10 percent of the Ukrainian population, transforming millions of civilians into a potentially legitimate target. – Al Jazeera

Notice that there is no evidence presented or attempts to crack the argument presented by Putin regarding Ukraine’s use of human shields. The article asserts that Putin’s claims must be rejected because they lead to civilian casualties. However, do you know what increases civilian casualties? When militaries use human shields. Al Jazeera’s arguments are strangely circular. I will do what Al Jazeera could not do: provide evidence that Putin is correct in his accusation.

Infomration Confirming The Use of Human Shields Independent of Putin’s Claim

Putin is automatically assumed to be lying, as are all Russian sources. However, outside of bias, I don’t know why, as I see no evidence that Putin or other Russian sources lie more than the US or the Ukrainian government.

However, I don’t need Putin’s claim — it’s obvious the Ukrainian military is using human shields from the accounts of what is happening to civilians during the war. One can even use the accounts provided by the establishment media, but one has to look past the Orwellian terminology they use.

Another example of Orwellian terminology used by the establishment media is “evacuation,” when the accurate term is surrender. Ukrainian military members have been “evacuated” to Russian POW camps. However, previous to this war, this activity was called surrendering. To hide defeats, the establishment media has substituted the phrase “the Ukrainian operations in XYZ city or region have ended” instead of using the phrase “the Ukrainian military has lost the battle of XYZ city or region.”

The Ukrainian military never surrenders. And it is merely evacuated and never loses a battle for a city, and it just ends its operations. Under this logic, the Japanese did not surrender to the US to end the war of the Pacific, but they just ended their operations. One can have great fun going through military history and using the phrasing applied by the establishment media to historical events.

Ukrainian Civilians Repateldy”Trapped”

The establishment media loves to state that Ukrainian civilians are trapped in this location or that. However, if you have civilians who are repeatedly “trapped” (the term used by MSM) in a war zone, that means they are being used as shields by the military that is local or the defending military. Russia has made a lot of effort to keep civilian casualties low — which is why there are around 4k dead and 4k injured as of a week ago when I checked the UN’s figures. There has been a persistent drumbeat in the establishment media and amount of NATO leadership to cast this war as one in which Russia is deliberately targeting civilians. However, if that were true, why are civilian casualties so low?

Why Are Apartment Complexes Being Hit With Russian Artillery?

Many of these casualties are because the Ukrainian military fires from an apartment complex, making the complex a target. The MSM shows the destroyed apartment complex and says, “how terrible,” but Russia has no interest in hitting civilian targets.

The BBC talks about the devastation of Russian artillery but manipulates viewers into thinking that these targets were hit for no reason. This context is left out so that the Russian military can assume the worst.

Why was this steel plant destroyed? Because the Ukrainian military fought from this location. This is a valuable steel mill that Russia will likely own in the future. They would want to preserve this infrastructure. Russia may have to rebuild those complexes as they are going to keep some of the territory — why would they want to damage them?

What Is Ukraine’s Responsibility For These Civilian Targets Being Hit?

But the Ukraine gov and MSM/US/Pentagon seek to make it look like Russia is just firing on apartment complexes for fun and because they are evil. There is no reason to do so. The establishment media leaves out the Russian military is being fired upon from those structures. The Ukrainian military kept Ukrainians as hostages in the basement of a chemical plant so that they could complain that Russia was attacking chemical plants irresponsibly after they got hit.

The Official Military Strategy of the Ukrainian Military is to Bring the Fight to Crowded Areas and Civilian Locations

This article explains this strategy. It is published on RT (Russian Television) but uses Ukrainian sources.

Taking up positions in cities is the Ukrainian military’s calculated tactic to minimize their own losses and maximize those of Russian forces, a top adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has revealed.

In an interview with the New York Times published on Tuesday, Mikhail Podolyak argued that the “Russians fight poorly in the cities.” The Ukrainian official went on to explain that “in the cities, it is possible to maneuver, and find cover, and you minimize losses; you can resist a longer time and inflict significant casualties on the Russians.” – RT

Do they really “fight poorly” in cities, or do the cities impose more potential civilian casualties, causing the Russians to hold back? The establishment media has been strangely contradictory on this topic. On several occasions, they critiqued the Russian military for not advancing quickly enough — but then they state the Russian military is targeting civilians. If the Russian military were targeting civilians, they would have advanced much more rapidly.

The quote continues.

Podolyak added that combat in an urban environment is where the infantry stands a chance. And since Russian forces have far more artillery, Ukrainian troops have to resort to this strategy, according to the presidential adviser. As an example, he referenced the city of Severodonetsk in the Lugansk region, where heavy street fighting has been taking place for several days now. – RT

Yes, they have a better chance because the Russians are holding back when in cities of concern of civilian casualties. This explanation by the Podolyak is very helpful, but he is sugar-coating the reason the Ukrainian military is fighting in cities. The Ukrainian government cannot both choose to engage with the Russian military in cities, use the civilian population as shields by keeping them from leaving, and then complain of either civilian casualties or the destruction of their cities.

The official noted that the Ukrainian military did not have very many alternate options due to a dearth of heavy weapons. Zelensky’s aide said that the apparent reluctance of Western leaders to provide Kiev with an adequate number of big guns was partly to blame.– RT

As Podolyak admits, Russia has a significant artillery advantage. So one could argue that Ukrainians have to persistently use human shields and pull the Russians into confrontations in cities, or they would be obliterated. Notice the RT article explaining the “cover story” of moving fighting to cities. That is a cover for the fact that the Ukrainian military needs to move fighting where there is the maximum number of Ukrainian civilians.

But this brings up a question. Ukraine allowed itself to be used by NATO with the placement of US bioweapons facilities, US missile systems, and other weapons.

The US and Ukraine have played a word game calling bioweapons labs, bio research facilities.

Putin warned the US and Ukraine to stop doing this for at least ten years. John Mearsheimer predicted in 2015 that Russia would attack Ukraine if these things continued.

This video does an excellent job of explaining what is happening in Ukraine. However, only a tiny fraction of the population is willing to invest 1 hour and 15 minutes watching it. They prefer to get information about the war in snippets from the establishment media.

Given all this was known, including Ukraine’s inability to defeat Russia, why did Ukraine continue to make overtures to join NATO, and why did they allow large numbers of weapons to move into their country.

Conclusion

Ukraine’s military is using human shields because they cannot keep them from being destroyed without them. Ukraine has stated that without being sent heavy weapons, they will continue with this strategy, which slows the Russian’s advance, but leads to massive city and infrastructure destruction. Instead of blaming themselves for being used as puppets by the US and US defense contractors, the Ukrainian government blames the fact that the US has not sent them all of the trappings of military equipment that will allow them to repel one of the largest militaries in the world. The establishment media is doing everything it can to keep hidden from the public that using human shields and bringing Russians into Ukrainian cities to fight has been a primary strategy of the Ukrainian military.