Facebook post uses edited images of Ukrainian farmers towing Russian weaponry

 

The first picture, showing a farmer hauling away a massive warship, was posted by a satirical Twitter account named "Sputnik_Not," referencing Russia’s state-owned news agency, Sputnik News. 

A reverse image search revealed that the user photoshopped the tractor against the backdrop of the Admiral Kuznetsov — a Russian aircraft carrier. The photo was published on the actual Sputnik News website on Oct. 30, 2018.

The second image, showing the farming vehicle towing a Russian tank, and the third image, depicting a rocket attached to a tractor, also appeared on the satirical Twitter account. 

We couldn’t verify the authenticity of the photo showing the tank being towed, though it appears to be a screengrab from footage surfacing on tabloid sites and social media. A reverse image search on TinEye dated the image back to March 5.

PolitiFact found an earlier version of the third photo in Getty Images archives. That image depicted the Russian rocket in transit. According to the Getty caption, it was taken by photographer Bill Ingalls for NASA on Oct. 9, 2018, in Kazakhstan — without a green tractor attached and thousands of miles away from Ukraine.

The fourth picture in the Facebook post shows a tractor resting slightly above the water, supposedly pulling a Russian nuclear submarine. It was photographed in France on Sept. 21, 2004, and was digitally altered to include the tractor.

The central image in the collage depicted an aircraft hitched to a tractor.  It was taken during a celebration of Croatia’s military in 2011 and ran with a story published by 24sata.hr, a Croatian news outlet. 

Only one of the images included in the compilation could not be verified. Still, none of them accurately reflect the enduring conflict in Ukraine or point to farmers in the country "slowly starting to build their own army." We rate this claim False.