They were thirteen. Thirteen Ukrainian soldiers, engaged as coastguards on the tiny Serpents’ Island, in the Black Sea, near the Romanian coast. The attack launched by Vladimir Putin on Thursday left no survivors in their ranks. Ordinarily, the story would have been classed among the tragedies of war. People are dying. Soldiers, especially. But the latter will return a little more in history for a final act of resistance. A refusal to surrender in the face of the power deployed by the Russians, materialized in a simple sentence, out of the guts: “Fuck you”.
The sequence, which was initially the subject of a certain skepticism concerning the words used – on the form, worthy of a Hollywood drama – before being authenticated, was shared tens of thousands of times on the social networks. The Ukrainian president also announced the death of these soldiers. Volodymyr Zelensky took the opportunity to salute their “heroism”, and indicated that he was awarding them the posthumous honor of “Heroes of Ukraine”.
These thirteen soldiers alone sum up Ukraine’s new posture. That of the resistant, facing the cruel invader. A reality, it must be said, given the disproportionate balance of power between the two countries. A necessity, too, in order to hold on and give hope to a people in a conflict that could last for years. These thirteen anonymous soldiers are not the only ones to forge this legend, a sort of “counter-propaganda” to that made by Russia thanks to massive disinformation. Finally, it comes at a time when Ukraine is calling on all its nationals to take up arms.
Vitaly Shakun, Vitali Klitschko, “ghost of Kiev”…
So, among the dozens of deaths to be counted in this war, other faces emerge. The Ukrainian soldier Vitaly Shakun would have distinguished himself by losing his life in the explosion of a bridge, a strategic operation to slow down Russian convoys, near Kherson. The face of the (young) martyr was exposed everywhere on social media this Friday.
This need for heroes is fueled directly by certain political figures in the country. The mayor of Kiev, former world heavyweight boxing champion Vitali Klitschko, has promised to put on the uniform in the next few hours. “I have no other choice, I will fight. I have to do this. It is already a bloody war. I am ready to fight for my country,” he proudly declared. His brother Wladimir would also have joined the reserve army.
President Zelensky himself relays many messages calling for resistance and bravery. He claims to be in Kiev this Friday evening in a video published on Twitter. “We are here (…) We are defending Ukraine.” The day before, he had confided to the European leaders that he could soon die there of his own. Like the soldiers from Serpents’ Island, or Vitaly Shakun.
Obviously, this quest for new heroes has its excesses. In the widely shared photo above, the former boxing champion was actually taking part in a home defense briefing and combat training in Ukraine, which took place almost a year ago. Some will see there only the illustration of a promise of Klitschko. But in recent hours, with the battle of Kiev, another funny hero has also appeared on the radar, once again urging caution.
Nicknamed the “ghost of Kyiv”, this Ukrainian MiG-29 fighter plane alone would have brought down six enemy planes. The Ukrainian top gun would manfully patrol over the capital, eliminating any surrounding threat. What if… it was all wrong? A video is at the origin of this runaway, where we can quite clearly distinguish an impressive dogfight, with appropriate sound effects, accompanied by the following caption: “He was nicknamed the ghost of Kiev and is the first pilot since the Second World War to achieve ace status!”.
Without verification, this “heroic” sequence was nevertheless broadcast by the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense on its Twitter account this Friday. And yet, this one comes from a video game, “Digital Combat Simulator”. The Department of Defense account didn’t bother to delete it. Why ? Two hypotheses to this. From the start of the fighting, Western military sources acknowledged that the Russian army had “complete air superiority”. The “ghost of Kyiv” somewhat restores Ukraine’s honor in this area, and implies a rebalancing in this area. More likely, this mythical pilot simply gives hope to the inhabitants of a capital on the verge of being besieged. Several netizens said they hoped the “ghost of Kyiv” was real. One summed up the current situation even better: “True or not, this is EXACTLY the kind of inspirational story the resistance needs right now.”