The article in the Seattle Tribune had all the attractive elements: the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, Adolf Hitler and a classic car worth $15 million. Not surprisingly, the text quickly spread to Russian state media and media that support the Kremlin.
However, the topic is unusual for a website dealing with a single American city – such outlets usually only cover local stories.
In reality, the article with the headline "Hitler's parade car was bought by Zelensky from Ukraine" was another fake text spread by Russian propaganda, it says Voice of America (VOA).
There is no media called the Seattle Tribune, just a website posing as a real publication. And the text is a compilation of Russian disinformation and "greatest hits" about Ukraine - "Nazism", "unlimited corruption" and "wasting American aid".
What is "writing" in the Seattle Tribune
According to the fake article, Zelensky was spotted in Kiev getting out of Hitler's parade car "Mercedes-Benz 770K Grosser Offener Tourenwagen". This reportedly happened just days after he returned from Washington, where the US government awarded his country an eight billion dollar aid package.
The text contained a screenshot of a post by a Ukrainian Telegram channel called "Realna Viyna" (Ukrainian: real war), showing a photo of a vehicle parked in front of the Ukrainian presidential administration building in Kyiv.
Aside from the Seattle Tribune page, which doesn't actually exist, the article had several other glaring problems.
First, the "Realna Viyna" channel did not publish the post seen in the screenshot. Second, the image of "Hitler's car" was stolen from a photo widely available on the Internet. The vehicle is digitally embedded in a photo of the Ukrainian presidential administration building.
VOA found that the angle of the screenshot photo, the black patch on the asphalt under the car and the reflection on the front windshield completely match the image of the Mercedes-Benz 770K found online.
Third, the Seattle Tribune website was registered on October 3, 2024, just six days before the fake article was published. And the registration was only for one year.
Who is behind the disinformation?
The Seattle Tribune appears to belong to a network of disinformation websites controlled by John Mark Dugan, an American living in Russia, says Shayan Sardarizad, a fact-checking and disinformation reporter at the BBC.
He noted on the X social network that creating fake local American news is Dugan's standard approach. That conclusion coincides with VOA's observations about Dugan's network.
Dugan, a former deputy sheriff in Florida, has been charged with extortion and wiretapping in the US. In 2016, he fled to Russia and was later granted political asylum there.
He now operates at least 167 disinformation sites that often publish stories that serve Russian interests, according to a May 2024 Newsguard investigation.
Its websites previously attracted a lot of attention for spreading a false story claiming that Ukraine's first lady, Olena Zelenska, bought a $4,8 million Bugatti supercar during a D-Day visit to France.
The story seemed intended for a Western audience. The fake story about the "Hitler car", however, is spreading the most in the Russian news space. In a Telegram message, Djugan told Voice of America that he did not know about the Seattle Tribune.
"I've never heard of it." But I looked it up [and] heard there's a lot of great information out there. A real pillar of journalistic integrity, on par with the NYT, CNN and MSNBC," he wrote, referring to the New York Times and two major US TV channels.
Who is the real owner of the car
As is often the case with higher-quality fake information, the false story about Hitler's parade car combines a fictional story about Zelensky with real facts about the sale of a former Nazi parade car in the US.
The facts come from an article in a real American newspaper, the Seattle Times, which reported in February 2018 that the Mercedes-Benz 770K made a brief appearance in the Seattle area after being auctioned in Scottsdale, Arizona, a month earlier.
Although the vehicle was not sold at auction, it soon found a buyer. Afterwards, the "Hitler car" was briefly unloaded from a truck in Medina, an affluent suburb of Seattle, where it attracted the attention of a local resident, who spoke to The Seattle Times about it. Later, the car was probably loaded onto a truck and driven away.
Worldwide Auctioneers CEO Rod Egan (whose name was also mentioned in the fake Seattle Tribune story) declined to tell The Seattle Times the name of the car's buyer, citing a non-disclosure agreement.
Still, Eagan said the car's final destination is "very, very far" outside the US.
The Seattle Times article also cited a German media report that six such cars were purchased by a Russian billionaire in 2009. Among them is the vehicle mentioned in the fake article.
The fake story about Zelensky and the "Hitler car" also brought to mind a scene from the 2001 American comedy "Rat Race", in which actor Jon Lovitz steals Hitler's parade car from the fictional museum of Nazi SS officer Klaus Barbie and then rams it into the audience at a gathering of American war veterans from World War II.
Asked if he was familiar with the film and the scene, Dugan replied, "It's comedy gold."
Source: VOA
