Forensic Research Archive of Manipulation and Exploitation
Illustration: a contemporary investigator's evidence wall of printed social-media posts, network diagrams and a pinned world map, in the same dossier style as the rest of the archive.

Then and now

Then and now:accusing the target of the attack you are about to launch (Mainila 1939, Ukraine 2022)

Illustration, not an archive object

In one line: in 1939 the Soviet Union said Finland had shelled its troops and invaded four days later; in 2022 Russia said Ukraine was committing genocide and preparing an offensive, then invaded. In both cases the evidence later showed the accusation had been prepared by the accuser.

The shared technique: Accusation in a mirror. The archive's definition: "Accuse the target of the method or crime you are preparing or running, so their warning sounds like a confession." The 2022 case also uses Semantic hijacking: the word "denazification" was applied to an elected government led by a Jewish president.

Then Now
The item Soviet announcement that Finnish artillery had shelled Soviet troops at the border village of Mainila Putin's address of 24 February 2022, and separatist "evacuation" videos released on 18 February
When 26 November 1939 18–24 February 2022
Who The Soviet government The Russian government and the leaders of the Russian-backed "people's republics" in Donetsk and Luhansk
Leader at the time Joseph Stalin Vladimir Putin
What followed The Soviet invasion of Finland on 30 November 1939 (the Winter War) Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022

Then: the shelling of Mainila (Soviet Union, 1939)

Group of men in overcoats at Mainila in falling snow, 29 November 1939

Six men, two of them in Finnish military overcoats, one pointing across a snowy field, at Mainila on 29 November 1939, three days after the Soviet announcement. Catalogued in the Finnish Defence Forces' wartime photograph archive (SA-Kuva) as "Press at Mainila". Photographer unknown. CC BY 4.0.

On 26 November 1939 the Soviet Union announced that Finnish artillery had fired on Soviet troops near Mainila, on the Karelian border, killing soldiers. It demanded that Finland pull its troops back. Finland denied firing and proposed a neutral investigation; the Soviet Union refused, tore up the two countries' non-aggression pact, and invaded four days later.

What was going on. Under the 1939 Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, Finland had been placed in the Soviet sphere. Moscow had demanded territory near Leningrad, and talks had failed in early November.

How the technique shows. Finnish artillery war diaries show that Mainila was out of range of their guns, which had been withdrawn from the border to avoid incidents. Historians working in Soviet archives, including the papers of Politburo member Andrei Zhdanov, concluded that the shelling was staged by the Soviet side. The aggressor accused its target of the aggression it was preparing.

Now: "genocide" and the evacuation videos (Russia, 2022)

Vladimir Putin's address of 24 February 2022

Address announcing a 'special military operation'. Kremlin photograph, 24 February 2022. CC BY 4.0 (kremlin.ru).

On 18 February 2022 the leaders of the Russian-backed Donetsk and Luhansk "people's republics" released videos announcing an emergency evacuation of civilians to Russia because of an imminent Ukrainian offensive. On 24 February Putin announced a "special military operation" whose purpose, he said, was "to protect people who, for eight years now, have been facing humiliation and genocide perpetrated by the Kiev regime. To this end, we will seek to demilitarise and denazify Ukraine."

What was going on. Russia had massed more than 150,000 troops on Ukraine's borders. Fighting between Ukraine and Russian-backed forces in the Donbas had continued at a lower level since 2014.

How the technique shows.

  • The videos. Open-source investigators at RFE/RL and Bellingcat found that the file metadata showed the "emergency" videos had been recorded on 16 February, two days before release, although the Donetsk leader says "today, February 18" in his. (Meduza, RFE/RL)
  • The genocide claim. On 16 March 2022 the International Court of Justice said that "at the present stage of the proceedings, it is not in possession of evidence substantiating the allegation of the Russian Federation that genocide has been committed on Ukrainian territory," and ordered Russia to suspend its military operations. This was a provisional order, not a final ruling on the merits.

Where they are alike

  • A larger state accuses a smaller neighbour of the attack it is about to launch.
  • The accusation arrives days before the invasion and is presented as the reason for it.
  • An offer to verify is refused or ignored: Finland's call for a neutral inquiry in 1939.

Where they differ

  • One event or a campaign. Mainila was a single staged border incident. The 2022 case was a months-long narrative plus several staged or pre-recorded items.
  • What is established. For Mainila, the verdict comes from historians and archives decades later. For 2022, the evidence came within days (video metadata) and weeks (the ICJ's provisional finding), but the full judicial record is still open.
  • Information environment. In 1939 the Soviet account went largely unchallenged inside the USSR. In 2022 the claims were contested in real time by open-source investigators, foreign governments and international courts, while Russian domestic media repeated them.

Positions on the record

  • The Soviet government maintained for decades that Finland had fired the shots. Russian officials and state media have continued to repeat versions of that account.
  • The Russian government maintains that it acted to protect the people of the Donbas, and it rejected the ICJ's jurisdiction in the case.
  • Ukraine brought the case to the ICJ arguing that Russia had falsely invoked genocide to justify its invasion.

Same-method test

Any government that stages or pre-records an attack on itself, or accuses a neighbour of a crime it has no evidence for, as the opening move of its own war, would be scored the same way here. Nazi Germany's staged attack on the Gleiwitz radio station on 31 August 1939, the night before it invaded Poland, is the best-known example from the other side of the same year. In his Reichstag speech the next morning, Hitler cited Polish attacks on German territory as the reason for the invasion; the Gleiwitz attack had been staged by the SS.

Content note: Photograph of Adolf Hitler addressing the Nazi-era Reichstag, with swastika emblems visible. This object is shown as it was published. Why Adolf Hitler speaking at the Reichstag session of 1 September 1939

Adolf Hitler speaking at the Reichstag session held in the Kroll Opera House, Berlin, 1 September 1939, the day of the invasion of Poland. Photograph credited "Fot. Wag", Bundesarchiv Bild 183-E10402. CC BY-SA 3.0 DE (Bundesarchiv).

How to spot it
  • Ask whether the accusation was independently verified before military action followed it.
  • Check timestamps and metadata on "emergency" videos and images.
  • Notice when the charge closely mirrors what the accuser is about to do.

Sources

Images

Image Source Licence
Putin's address, 24 February 2022 FRAME gallery, from kremlin.ru CC BY 4.0
Men at Mainila, 29 November 1939 Wikimedia Commons, from SA-Kuva / Finna CC BY 4.0
Hitler at the Reichstag, 1 September 1939 Wikimedia Commons, Bundesarchiv CC BY-SA 3.0 DE

Image gaps

  • The 1939 Soviet announcement and the Mainila site. No openly licensed image of the announcement itself was found; the Mainila photograph above is from three days later. A 1941 Finnish wartime photograph on Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 4.0) shows shells chalked "to Mainila", but it is from a later war and would be misleading here.
  • Stills from the 18 February 2022 evacuation videos. Copyrighted. Linked instead.