A RUSSIAN state media outlet has claimed the UK is planning on building a new aircraft carrier named HMS Prince Andrew.
The state media outlet RT, formerly Russia Today, fell for an April Fools’ piece in the UK Defence Journal, publishing a story about the UK building a new Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carrier .
Titled "UK to order third aircraft carrier due to Russia threat", the original article made numerous absurd claims, including the new supercarrier would carry “infinity-hundred” aircraft and cost the taxpayer around £987.6 billion.
It added that the HMS Prince Andrew would be armed with Cold War-era Harriers or “naval Typhoons” launched via six catapults.
RT’s story used parts of the satirical story but presented them as genuine fact and analysis.
In the original article, a fake expert at the "Daily Mail Comment Section" think tank, said: “Waste of funds & Human Life! One correctly placed Smart-Bomb will see Today’s heap of steel turn into Tomorrow’s heap of Scrap!"
RT reported: “Brian Robertson, a senior analyst at the DMCS think tank, called the decision to expand the fleet ‘a waste of money and lives.’
“He stressed that one strike would turn the carrier into ‘a pile of scrap metal.’”
Banned from broadcasting in the UK, RT has long been accused of spreading disinformation in a bid to undermine confidence in Western institutions and is often criticised for promoting Kremlin-aligned narratives.
George Allison, the original author of the article, told the Defence Journal that the biggest “clue” that the story was not real was it even said it was an April Fools’ Day joke.
He said: “We wrote the piece to have a bit of fun on April 1st — not to end up as ‘evidence’ in a Russian state media broadcast.
“The clues were all there: an absurd cost, fictional think tanks, imaginary aircraft, and the name HMS Prince Andrew, which alone should have set alarm bells ringing.
“Plus — and this is a big clue — it literally said at the end that it was an April Fools’ Day joke.
“That RT reported it as real is either hilarious or deeply concerning, depending on how seriously you take their editorial oversight.
“Either they didn’t bother to read the article properly, or they read it and published it anyway. I’m honestly not sure which is worse. But it does highlight how easily disinformation can take hold when satire is stripped of its context and repackaged as fact.”
