Did a U.S. Air Force A-10 drop a "500-Pound BDU-50 bomb," destroying a 40-mile Russian tank convoy? No, that's not true: This is a clickbait headline with an eye-catching image, but this did not happen. The article paired with the false headline does not even repeat what the headline claims. The article is copied from a June 10, 2022, article from airforcetimes.com about multinational training exercises that took place in 10 different countries.
The text of the article, which was reproduced with minor changes, appeared originally in airforcetimes.com on June 10, 2022. It was titled, "This A-10C Warthog unit wants to bring more 'brrrrrt' to Europe" A false clickbait headline, "Terrible Attack: USAF A-10 Drop 500-Pound BDU-50 Bomb Destroying 40-Mile Russian Tank Convoy" was placed with the article (archived here), which was published by projoktibangla.com on July 12, 2022. It opened:
Terrible Attack: USAF A-10 Drop 500-Pound BDU-50 Bomb Destroying 40-Mile Russian Tank ConvoyAs Buzz Patterson, a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel, put it on Twitter: 'A 40-mile Russian convoy = an American A-10 pilot's dream.'
This is how the article appeared at the time of writing:
(Image source: projoktibangla.com screenshot taken on Thu Jul 14 14:06:31 2022 UTC)
The next projoktibangla.com paragraph begins:
- A Maryland Air National Guard unit recently sent a fleet of 10 A-10C Thunderbolt II attack planes to participate in multinational combat exercises in eastern Europe, one of its largest training delegations there in the past decade.
The article was copied word for word from airforcetimes.com. That article begins:
A Maryland Air National Guard unit recently sent a fleet of 10 A-10C Thunderbolt II attack planes to participate in multinational combat exercises in eastern Europe, one of its largest training delegations there in the past decade.
The image used for this article has watermarks from the YouTube channel The Military TV, which features dramatic digitally edited clickbait-style thumbnails. The war photos with smoke and explosions for thumbnail images for their content do not reflect the video they are paired with. The channel titles their videos similarly to this projoktibangla.com headline -- examples start with, "Horrible Attack!!!" "Brutal Attack!!!" and "Terrible Attack!!!" The thumbnail (pictured below center) for the June 7, 2022 video titled, "Warning!!! Ukrainian forces will use MQ-1C attack drones destroy hundred Russia tank in battle Kyiv" makes up most of the image used by projoktibangla.com. The image of Russian President Vladimir Putin included in the article's image dates back to July 27, 2018 when Putin spoke at a press conference after the BRICS summit in South Africa.
(Image source: The Military TV YouTube Channel screenshot taken on Thu Jul 14 15:11:02 2022 UTC)
