During a global pandemic, the United States of America is also nearing the end of its presidential election.
As one of the front-runners for re-election, current US President Donald Trump, has been trying to tap onto the patriotic side of Americans ahead of it.
But while the sentiment may be in the right place, the imagery didn't appear to be. A digital advertisement released by one of the fundraising units of the Trump campaign, Trump Make America Great Again Committee. The ad ran on September 11, which called on people to “support our troops” used a stock photo of Russian-made fighter jets and Russian models dressed as soldiers.
The ad featured silhouettes of three soldiers walking towards the viewer, as three fighter jets flew over them.
According the Google Transparency Report, the advertisement ran from September 8 to September 11.
The photo is originally a stock photo from ShutterStock and is captioned "Military silhouettes of soldiers and airforce against the backdrop of sunset sky."
The owner of the photo suggests they are based in Andorra.
Pierre Sprey, who helped design US Air Force planes, told Politico the jet featured in the ad is “definitely a MiG-29”, as did the director of the Centre for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies in Moscow, Ruslan Pukhov.
Pukhov also pointed out that at least one of the soldiers in the image was also carrying Russian-made AK-74 assault rifle.
After the Politico article was published, the original creator of the photo, Arthur Zakiro who is a 34-year-old oil company analyst and hobbyist photographer based in the Russian city of Perm, reached out to them to confirm the photo was indeed taken in Russia.
He also added that the models of the 'soldiers' in the photo, were in fact, Russians as well.
Data from the Google Transparency Report indicated that the image was viewed about 10,000 times and cost the Trump Make America Great Again Committee less than $100,000.
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