Mystery Explosions Rock Russian Base — and Send the Propaganda War Into Overdrive
On Tuesday, videos began to spread of massive explosions at a Russian air base in the occupied territory of Crimea in southern Ukraine. The videos, taken from multiple angles by beachgoers using smartphones, showed the immediate aftermath of two large mushroom clouds, followed shortly by a third.
It took only minutes for online cybersleuths and amateur open-source intelligence analysts to definitively identify the location of the explosions as Saki Air Base near Novofedorivka, about 30 miles to the north of Sevastopol on the western coast of the Crimean peninsula.
The fact that the air base was deep inside territory that Russia has controlled since 2014 lent the dramatic spectacle ominous import, and pro-Ukrainian commentators were quick to herald the blasts as a signal achievement for Ukraine’s military…
