Bloomberg Had Fake Headline “Russia Invades Ukraine” On Homepage For 30 Minutes

At a moment the White House has curiously been pushing hard a ‘Russian false flag’ narrative, Bloomberg has apologized for prematurely placing a headline at the top of its homepage Friday afternoon which said: “Live: Russia Invades Ukraine.”

Bloomberg admitted that it had the headline ready to go, despite an “invasion” not at all being the reality. The hugely influential global financial news company said late in the day Friday: “We prepare headlines for many scenarios and the headline ‘Russia Invades Ukraine’ was inadvertently published around 4 p.m. ET today on our website. We deeply regret the error. The headline has been removed and we are investigating the cause.” 

So Bloomberg has the headline “Russia Invades Ukraine” ready, just in case. pic.twitter.com/h3zPNhhLwp

— Nassim Nicholas Taleb (@nntaleb) February 5, 2022

Given that speculations over false flags and charges that a Russian invasion is “imminent” (the latter wordage walked back by the White House this week) have become a key talking point in US mainstream media this month, the false start Bloomberg headline certainly raises some questions. 

Kremlin researcher and podcaster Olga Lautman posted a screenshot of the Bloomberg homepage while the false headline was live. She told the New York Post:

“I went on the site and saw the breaking news but knew it wasn’t real because I deal with Ukraine and will be one of the first to know. It is bizarre and a pretty big mistake to make considering this is a potential large scale invasion and everyone is on edge.”

She said it stayed up “for about 30 minutes”, according to the NY Post. Here’s how the “inadvertently published” fake headline appeared for up to half an hour on the homepage: 

Moscow has consistently and vehemently denied that it plans to invade Ukraine, accusations sparked by its stationing additional troops in southern Russia, in regions near the border but firmly within its own sovereign territory. 

Lately, even Ukraine’s leadership and President Zelensky himself have warned the West must calm its rhetoric, saying this alone could unnecessarily spark a shooting war which can be averted through diplomacy. 

When neocons have too much caffeine and energy drinks… https://t.co/XMVoq2PjE6

— Ron Paul Institute (@RonPaulInstitut) February 5, 2022

This latest strange Bloomberg incident is an example of the kind of ‘wag the dog’ type false media reporting that’s particularly dangerous when superpowers are on a war footing.

The Kremlin reacted to the ‘mistake’ as follows:

The Bloomberg news agency’s publishing error about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine makes it clear how dangerous West-triggered tensions are, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told TASS on Saturday.

“It hardly was a provocation, there is no need to exaggerate it,” he said, adding that the agency had apologized for the error.

“However, this situation makes it clear how dangerous such tensions are, which have been triggered by daily aggressive statements that we keep hearing from Washington, European capitals and London, because it is these statements, the deployment of troops near our borders and daily activities to pump Ukraine with weapons that lead to these tensions, and any spark is dangerous amid tensions,” Peskov pointed out.

“I guess, instead of ‘fake news’, we can now say ‘Bloomberg news’, which makes sense [given the circumstances],” Peskov added.

The ironies keep piling up…

Moscow has considered staging a graphic propaganda video that would purport to show an attack by Ukraine on Russia as a pretense for an invasion, according to a U.S. intelligence assessment https://t.co/w1Ci5rCjyk

— Bloomberg (@business) February 3, 2022

And speculation abounds…

i’m skeptical that one click could result in the mistaken publication of a story like this and the cynical part of me wonders if this was a deliberate attempt to gauge public reaction to a russian invasion because bloomberg were asked to find out by some fuckers at the pentagon https://t.co/lBSvp9Hm0f

— a dream of hovering roadside skulls ⏳ (@CheneyForPrison) February 5, 2022