Do these photos show Ukrainian children being trained to fight the Russian army?

Question

From a widely-shared Reddit post:

Ukrainian children trained to use rifles against Russian soldiers

The other photos in the post are shown below.

Neither the post nor the comments provide a source. Reverse image search turns up similar photos and headlines at The Sun and The Times, but neither includes a source.

Are these photos of Ukrainian children being trained to fight Russian soldiers authentic? Or is something else going on here?

that specific photo is certainly not of childREN, there's only a single child in it (and that one might be an exceptionally small adult). — jwenting, Feb 02 '22 at 12:33
Not even "exceptionally small." Standing further back (which she is) and lower, would make her look smaller and shorter. The photo looks to be framed specifically around her. If you look at the line of 3 hats from top left, hers is only slightly lower. — Weather Vane, Feb 02 '22 at 13:29
The "against russian soldiers" part is completely pointless. there's people learning to handle a rifle, "against" nobody. But if Russia decides to invade, then they will (probably) use that training, but the training is not specifically "against russian soldiers" — Federico, Feb 02 '22 at 16:32
@Federico This is Skeptics where we get lots of fakes. This could be a repurposed photo of actual Ukrainians, but training to be movie extras, or they're a pro-Russian group. "Against russian soldiers" seems like a decent way of ruling out fakery. — Owen Reynolds, Feb 02 '22 at 17:06
@OwenReynolds I think it could be done equally as well without — Federico, Feb 02 '22 at 17:51
Given that we are in the middle of quite obvious propaganda (on all sides), there are really multiple questions here - are the photos showing what they claim to show? Are they current? Are these isolated incidents or a wide-spread activity? Is it a government-backed thing or the Ukraine version of preppers? Is this actual military training or a photo-shoot (either purely for propaganda or for a non-military purpose such as a movie or school project)? Some of these questions may be impossible to answer without inside sources. — Tom, Feb 03 '22 at 10:00
It is **very** unlikely to be real military training. In a real training they would at least tell them how they are supposed to hold it properly. — Vladimir F Героям слава, Feb 04 '22 at 13:24
@VladimirF with a couple of exceptions, they do appear to be holding them correctly — Carl Kevinson, Feb 04 '22 at 14:19

score 40 · Answer 1 · edited Mar 10 '22 at 04:07

This answer talks about two Ukrainian photojournalists, both called Sergei: Sergei Supinsky and Sergei Dolzhenko.

Both of them photographed the training event in Ukraine.

Supinsky's photos are available from Getty images where they are described as:

TOPSHOT - A military instructor teaches civilians holding wooden replicas of Kalashnikov rifles, as they take part in a training session at an abandoned factory in the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv on January 30, 2022. - As fears grow of a potential invasion by Russian troops massed on Ukraine's border, within the framework of the training there were classes on tactics, paramedics, training on the obstacle course. The training is conducted by instructors with combat experience, members of the public initiative "Total Resistance".

Dolzhenko's photos are available from the European Pressphoto Agency, where they are described as:

Open military exercise for civilians in Kiev

Ukrainians attend an open military training for civilians on a training range in Kiev, Ukraine, 30 January 2022. [...]

Neither explicitly mentions schoolchildren, although some of the subjects are clearly school-aged.

As tensions between Russia and Ukraine are high, we might expect to see propaganda from each side. It would be well to consider the propaganda and military recruiting value of such a training day, compared to how much more effective it made the participants in any combat situations.

(Hat tip to pinegulf's answer, which introduced me to Supinsky. I was going to make a minor edit, to add a link to Dolzhenko's photos, got confused by the surname mismatch, and decided it should be a separate answer.)

Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been [moved to chat](https://chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/133795/discussion-on-answer-by-oddthinking-do-these-photos-show-ukranian-children-being). — Oddthinking, Feb 03 '22 at 09:26
Answer missing a "Yes" or "No" (or even "maybe") so I don't understand it. — Shadow The GPT Wizard, Feb 14 '22 at 09:51
I don't think it's particularly problematic to provide a nuanced answer to a question which is less so. Quite the opposite, actually. The facts are what they are and the subjective aspects of the question are best left to the reader to mull over. — tripleee, Feb 14 '22 at 09:56

pinegulf · Answer 2 · 2022-02-03T14:51:13.447

14

Yes.

As far as I can tell. More similar images hosted by Yahoo news.

My local news hosted one of these pictures. Second article. Both credit the figure to SERGEI SUPINSKY / AFP. Search on him seem to indicate journalistic action. Ref: Kyivpost and correspondent.afp.com.

Whether these are schoolchildren or not might be in question. Sources state (freely translated) 'Ukrainian civilians being instructed...' The young looking persons with wooden guns and instructed by people with persons in military apparel can be observed.

edited Feb 03 '22 at 14:51

answered Feb 02 '22 at 07:36

pinegulf

6,374
5
32
55

Given that by definition it is only possible to train civilians to be soldiers, the question is whether they are are children, which you brush off. None of the linked articles seem to show pictures of "children" although one figure in some of them could be taken to be a child. – Weather Vane Feb 02 '22 at 08:58
9

@WeatherVane Most Q's on Skeptics involve complete frauds -- like those photos are stolen from a 20-year-old French movie. This answer is good since it verifies "yes, they are recent, are from Ukraine, and are actually military training". To verify the children part would require access to a sign-in sheet or something. – Owen Reynolds Feb 02 '22 at 16:57
4

@OwenReynolds I don't see any "military training" but some people posing for photos. OP has added some more photos to the question, which were shown up in answers. This answer only seems to repeat what the question states. – Weather Vane Feb 02 '22 at 17:28
2

@WeatherVane I would think that the important question is whether these civilians are being trained specifically to fight the Russian army. – terdon Feb 03 '22 at 14:33
1

@terdon it is? In my mind, since Russia invaded Crimea (part of Ukraine) in 2014, there is an ongoing conflict with Russia, and a build-up of its military forces near the border, there is no doubt that it won't be Belarus, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania or Moldova. – Weather Vane Feb 03 '22 at 15:27
@WeatherVane eh, it seems as questionable a claim as whether those are children (i.e. not very), but for instance it could be images taken in Sweden 20 years ago for all I know. – terdon Feb 03 '22 at 16:23
2

@terdon not to me: I find nothing skeptical at all about Ukraine preparing for a conflict with Russia, not so for its other neighbours. Rather the opposite, I would find a report like "Ukraine oblivious to moves by Russia" to be unbelievable. – Weather Vane Feb 03 '22 at 16:55
@WeatherVane I don't find anything here to be particularly skeptical about, myself. All I'm saying is that of the three claims made (children being trained; in Ukraine; to fight Russia) the least unlikely is that those are indeed children which is [what you had suggested](https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/52992/52993?noredirect=1#comment253970_52993). If there's anything to prove here, it is that this is happening in Ukraine and is specifically against Russian aggression. – terdon Feb 03 '22 at 17:17
1

@OwenReynolds Which movie? I could try to find it out. – pinegulf Feb 04 '22 at 08:32
1

@WeatherVane The claim is not whether Ukraine is training civilians to participate in military combat, but if they are training _children_ to participate in military combat. The latter is clearly in violation of international law. – gerrit Feb 04 '22 at 10:53
@gerrit that is exactly my original point, which this answer does not address. The photos of children were added to OP later. The first picture includes a person who is made to look small by the perspective view. 'Further away' = 'Smaller'. – Weather Vane Feb 04 '22 at 12:03
@Weather Vane LMAO anything to try and serve the narrative: These are CLEARLY children so don't be pseudo intellectual about it LOL – csstudent1418 Feb 05 '22 at 11:04
@csstudent1418 the only picture shown at the first posting is the one at the top. The person in the red coat is clearly shrunk by the perspective - if you draw a line from top left through their hats, she isn't much smaller than anyone else. Notice how the photo lacks "depth of field". She is the only one in focus, and must be further back, so the picture is framed around her to *make* her look small. And it isn't possible to tell from the face whether she is a child. So from the OP, the answer is NO, it isn't a "photo of children being trained". It is a pose contrived by the photographer... – Weather Vane Feb 05 '22 at 11:22
...and that observation is neither intellectual nor pseudo-intellectual. It is a logical deduction. So apart from name-calling and laughter, do you have anything credible to offer? – Weather Vane Feb 05 '22 at 11:30
1

@Weather Vane Okay and the boy in blue in the second picture ? – csstudent1418 Feb 05 '22 at 11:55
@csstudent1418 they were added after I made the first comments. In the other two pictures I see a child posing for a photo, not "children being trained". If there was an actual training program for children, do you suppose that the authorities would allow it to be photographed, knowing full well that it is in violation of international law? – Weather Vane Feb 05 '22 at 12:12
@Weather Vane lemme check ... nope, you haven't posted your own answer. Why not if your so convinced that you got it debunked? – csstudent1418 Feb 05 '22 at 14:49
@csstudent1418 you are trolling. I stated that this answer does not address the matter of children being trained, and no-one, not even you, seems to understand that. – Weather Vane Feb 05 '22 at 14:52
@Weather Vane I do understand that but imo this answer does try to address that and concludes that there is no way to tell with the information we have. – csstudent1418 Feb 06 '22 at 09:37
Better answer than the first, much more clear. – Shadow The GPT Wizard Feb 14 '22 at 09:52

Do these photos show Ukrainian children being trained to fight the Russian army?

2 Answers2