Russian forces are distributing “gas masks” among their troops in eastern Ukraine, according to a senior Ukrainian official who suggested that Russian forces might orchestrate a chemical attack under false pretenses.
Ambassador Oksana Markarova told reporters at the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington that “occupation forces are also handing out, actively, gas masks to local militants and the Russian military in Donetsk Oblast,” citing Ukrainian intelligence reports.
“So we are making this information public to warn that there might be a possibility of provocation. There are different versions of what would they do, [perhaps] after blowing up some industrial tanks with chemicals,” she continued.
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Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba wrote earlier on Twitter that “Russian propaganda has gone off the rails and speculates Ukraine might be preparing to drop a ‘dirty bomb’ on the Russian territory.” While Kuleba’s statement attempted to dispel that idea, Markarova’s claim, which she attributed to Ukrainian security services, raised the specter of a Russian chemical attack in one of the key theaters of the invasion.
“Unlike Russian occupiers, Ukraine does not resort to such methods,” she said.
Russian propaganda has gone off the rails and speculates Ukraine might be preparing to drop a ‘dirty bomb’ on the Russian territory. This is a sick fake. Ukraine doesn’t have nuclear weapons, doesn’t conduct any work to create/acquire them. We are a responsible member of the NPT.
— Dmytro Kuleba (@DmytroKuleba) February 26, 2022
Markarova’s claim is the latest reference to chemical weapons in an information environment characterized by dueling narratives. U.S. officials spent the weeks prior to the invasion releasing reports that they characterized as preemptive revelations of Russian propaganda schemes. Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned before the invasion that Russian forces might stage a chemical incident as a pretext for the assault.
And, as the attack has unfolded, U.S. officials have said that Russia will continue to conduct disinformation operations designed to discourage Ukrainian forces until surrendering, raising questions among observers about whether this gas mask report forecasts a real military threat or a new twist in the propaganda war.
“Or both — at least the second one,” Atlantic Council visiting fellow Petr Tuma, a career Czech diplomat, told the Washington Examiner. “And we will see whether it’s even the first one.”
Russia launched a three-pronged assault earlier this week. One line of attack targeted a quick-strike overthrow of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s government in Kyiv, while the other two focused on the seizure of additional territory in eastern Ukraine, where most of the Ukrainian military has been deployed over the last eight years of lower-profile conflict with disguised Russian forces and proxy separatists.
Ukrainian security forces and residents of Kyiv, rallied by Zelensky, have displayed unexpected resilience in their defense of the capital, but Markarova’s warning calls attention to the challenge presented by Russian forces farther east.
“Russian forces remain much larger and more capable than Ukraine’s conventional military,” however, and Russian advances in southern Ukraine may threaten to unhinge the defense of Kyiv and northeastern Ukraine if they continue unchecked, U.S.-based Institute for the Study of War analysts Mason Clark, George Barros, and Kateryna Stepanenko wrote in a Saturday assessment.
The allegations about chemical threats in Ukraine evoke the competing narratives around Syrian dictator Bashar Assad’s use of chemical weapons against opposition forces. Russian diplomats, defending Assad from Western allegations and international investigations that blamed Assad’s Air Force, have claimed that the Syrian fighters conducted chemical weapons attacks against their own communities — an allegation that Markarova sought to preempt.
“Our Armed Forces operated in the most responsible manner, and they are defending our country, while also trying to be very, very responsible about the Ukrainian citizens, because of the very simple fact — they are there to defend Ukraine, together with the Ukrainian citizens,” she said.
The troops fighting the Russian attempt to break out of the proxy-controlled areas of Donbas could soon be in danger of an attack from Russian troops who moved out of the Crimean Peninsula, located further to the south.
“These advances risk cutting off the large concentrations of Ukrainian forces still defending the former line of contact between unoccupied Ukraine and occupied Donbas,” the ISW analysts warned. “Ukrainian leaders may soon face the painful decision of ordering the withdrawal of those forces and the ceding of more of eastern Ukraine or allowing much of Ukraine’s uncommitted conventional combat power to be encircled and destroyed. There are no indications as yet of whether the Ukrainian government is considering this decision point.”
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The Russian offensive has provoked a surge of military aid from the United States and Ukraine’s neighbors in Europe.
“It’s a full-fledged war in Ukraine. Ukrainians are fighting with everything for our homes, and the support that we need is [needed] yesterday,” Markarova said. “We are grateful. … We need everything now. Because this is the moment when we have to mobilize all the resources and all the support in order to not only stop Putin, but also save every life that we can save.”
Ukraine’s health minister said that 198 civilians had been killed in the Russian invasion, including three children. Another 1,115 civilians have been wounded, including 33 children.
