A four-month-old YouTube video recently uploaded on Facebook (FB) claims that 10,000 Chinese soldiers were killed and 150 fighter jets were destroyed in Taiwan. This is not true.
The publishers made a clickbait headline and introduction to mislead netizens.
The deceitful videos posted by YouTube channel Terong Explained and FB page Breaking News24h on Jan. 12 and May 8, respectively, carried a title that read:
“KINAWAWA ANG CHINA! 10,000 Sundalong Tsino At 150 Na Fighter Jets SINAWING PALAD SA TAIWAN (China tormented! 10,000 Chinese soldiers and 150 fighter jets were unfortunate in Taiwan)!”
A narrator repeated the same false claim in the first few seconds of the video:
“Breaking news, mainit ito kaibigan! Sampung libong sundalo ng China nasawi at higit sa 100 fighter jets ang bumagsak sa sagupaang U.S. at China sa Taiwan
(Breaking news, this is hot, friend! 10,000 Chinese soldiers killed and over 100 fighter jets fell in U.S. and China clash in Taiwan)!”
This twists the findings of a report by the United States (U.S.)-based think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).
Published Jan. 9, the CSIS report ran 24 wargame scenarios to show potential casualties, deaths, and loss of warships and aircraft should China invade Taiwan.
According to the study, in scenarios where Chinese forces were unable to conquer Taiwan, China typically suffered the loss of over 100 warships and tens of thousands of soldiers killed, wounded or captured.
The misleading videos mentioned that this was an estimate only about 50 seconds into the report, after making it appear as fact in the introduction.
The misleading videos, which collectively got over 681,800 interactions, were called out by netizens in the comment section for falsely insinuating that war broke out between China and Taiwan.
YouTube channel Terong Explained was created on Oct. 16, 2015, while FB page Breaking News24h was made on March 23, originally named as AJMAN Gaming.
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(Editor’s Note: VERA Files has partnered with Facebook to fight the spread of disinformation. Find out more about this partnership and our methodology.)
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