REPORT: FSB digs up fake files to break the Kyiv-Warsaw alliance

Introduction: An operation timed to the day

July 5, a date carefully chosen by Moscow

According to Ukrainska Pravda on July 5, 2026, Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) entered the active phase of a special operation aimed at undermining the strategic partnership between Ukraine and Poland, by spreading fake "archival documents" about the Volhynia tragedy. The timing is no accident: it comes right before July 11, the day Poland officially commemorates the victims of that 1943 tragedy.

Andriy Kovalenko, head of Ukraine's National Security and Defense Council Center for Countering Disinformation, was the first to raise the alarm. According to him, FSB director Alexander Bortnikov personally oversees this information campaign aimed at driving a wedge between Warsaw and Kyiv. "The FSB plans to publish falsified documents related to World War II events, namely the Volhynia tragedy, in an attempt to undermine Ukrainian-Polish relations," he said.

A scenario Kyiv had anticipated before it even aired

What sets this operation apart from previous Russian disinformation campaigns is that Ukrainian services had foreseen and publicly announced it before it was even carried out. On the night of July 4 to 5, Russia Today did in fact publish an article citing supposedly "declassified" FSB files, accusing Dmytro Klyachkivsky, one of the commanders of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), of orchestrating the deaths of 11 Catholic priests and nearly 2,000 Polish civilians in the town of Volodymyr-Volynskyi in early summer 1943.

Poland's public broadcaster TVP summed up the reaction with a cutting line: "what was supposed to be a bombshell turned out to be a dud," noting that the documents, even if genuine, contained "nothing new."

There is something almost comic about this sequence: the FSB secretly prepares a historical manipulation operation, Ukraine exposes it publicly before it even airs, and when the bombshell finally drops, even Polish state television mocks its ineffectiveness. The Kremlin did not just miss its target. It lost its element of surprise entirely.

Volhynia 1943: a wound that never healed

What history remembers, and what still divides

To understand why this historical manipulation still works as a lever of division, we need to go back to the facts themselves. During the Volhynia events, Ukrainian nationalists killed roughly 100,000 ethnic Polish civilians, mostly women and children, often with great brutality. Poland officially recognizes these mass atrocities as an international crime of the utmost gravity — a classification the Polish Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) stands behind without hesitation, naming Klyachkivsky as the tragedy's "chief perpetrator."

Ukraine, for its part, treats this episode as part of a broader bilateral conflict, without denying the facts but rejecting the exact label Poland applies to them. This divergence in historical interpretation, real and legitimate in a normal democratic debate, is precisely what the Kremlin has exploited for years to turn a historiographical disagreement into a geopolitical fracture.

An already tense backdrop before the FSB even stepped in

Russia's operation did not land in a calm climate. In late May, President Volodymyr Zelensky had awarded Ukraine's Special Forces Independent Special Operations Center the honorary title of "Hero of the UPA," a decision that immediately drew sharp criticism from senior Polish officials. Tensions worsened further when Polish President Karol Nawrocki announced that Zelensky would be stripped of the Order of the White Eagle — Poland's highest honor. The Ukrainian president mailed the decoration back to Warsaw the very next day.

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk urged Kyiv to make "the first move" to ease bilateral tensions, calling the decision to name the military unit after the "Heroes of the UPA" "unfortunate." It was in this exact window of real diplomatic fragility that the FSB chose to strike.

That is the real sophistication of Russian information warfare: it does not create tension out of nothing. It waits for a genuine friction to already exist — here, a real diplomatic disagreement over a decoration and a military naming — then pours gasoline on an ember that was already smoldering. The Kremlin does not invent division. It maximizes it.

The falsified documents: anatomy of a manipulation

Recycling old files already discredited

Polish history-focused websites revealed a damning detail for the FSB's credibility: part of the material in its report had already been circulated two years earlier by Russia, and had at the time been judged unreliable by experts. The FSB was not presenting "new evidence," then, but recycling already discredited material, banking on the novelty effect with an audience that would not have followed the previous 2022 attempt.

Damian Markowski, a historian at the Pilecki Institute — a Polish public research body — was blunt with the Polish press: the files contain "no bombshell." Ukrainian historian Volodymyr Viatrovych went further, saying this material amounts to a fabrication by Soviet-era chekists, unconfirmed by any other source — Polish, Ukrainian, or German.

A skillful blend of truth and fiction

The Polish Resilience Council, in a statement on July 9, offered the sharpest analysis of this operation: "In an effort to maximize the propaganda effect, the Russian propaganda apparatus has, for the most part, combined incidents that took place in different locations and at different times," according to Poland's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The Council insisted: "This is not an attempt to reveal previously unknown historical facts, but an effort to transfer the emotions associated with past events into current Polish-Ukrainian relations in order to weaken, and ultimately damage, them."

This technique — blending a seemingly genuine document with manipulated substance — is particularly insidious. It aims, according to the Council, to discredit Ukraine's own disinformation-fighting institutions, by sowing doubt: if a document "looks" genuine but contains false information, that could suggest previous Ukrainian warnings were exaggerated or biased.

This has been the hallmark of Russian intelligence services for decades: not lying crudely, but rearranging fragments of truth in an order that serves their interests. It used to be called state disinformation in the Soviet era. The channel has changed — Telegram instead of Radio Moscow — but the method remains almost academically consistent.

Bortnikov, the man orchestrating the discord

A Soviet-intelligence veteran at the helm

Alexander Bortnikov, director of the FSB, has held that post for years and embodies the continuity between Soviet-era security services and Vladimir Putin's current apparatus. The fact that Kovalenko explicitly names Bortnikov as the personal supervisor of this operation is no minor detail: it means Moscow treats the Ukrainian-Polish relationship as a priority target, worthy of engaging the very top of the Russian intelligence hierarchy rather than a second-tier propaganda office.

Russian state media were instructed to amplify this story widely, according to information gathered by Ukraine's Center for Countering Disinformation. The Russian Foreign Ministry itself was involved in the dissemination, a strategic choice meant to lend official diplomatic weight to what remains, at bottom, a historical manipulation operation.

A manipulation extending beyond the falsified documents

Ukraine's Center for Countering Disinformation had already warned, before this specific operation, that Russian intelligence services had stepped up troll farm activity in the Polish-language segment of social media, and were preparing provocations in Ukraine using Polish symbols, according to the Center. A joint report prepared by the European External Action Service and Ukraine's Center for Countering Disinformation details how Moscow manipulates genuine statements by European politicians to convince Ukrainians that Poland's commemoration of Volhynia's victims is not a matter of historical policy but proof of hostile Polish designs against Ukraine.

This multi-layered strategy — falsified documents, social media bots, manipulation of authentic quotes — illustrates the scale of resources the Kremlin is willing to deploy against a single target: the relationship between two countries that together form one of the sturdiest pillars of European support for Ukraine since 2022.

When the FSB director himself oversees a disinformation campaign about a tragedy that happened more than eighty years ago, that is an admission, not a show of strength. It means Moscow no longer finds room to weaken Ukraine on the battlefield, and falls back on historical scars three generations old. That is pathetic. It is also, for that very reason, dangerous.

Poland's response: firmness mixed with calculated caution

Warsaw refuses to bite — officially

The most significant response came directly from Poland's Resilience Council, a government body tasked with assessing hybrid threats. Its statement on July 9 called on the public "not to react to information about the Volhynian crime coming from Russian or otherwise unverified sources until it has been reviewed by Polish historians," according to the official text released by Warsaw.

The Polish text struck a delicate balance: while reaffirming the importance of Polish historical memory and voicing a "critical assessment" of Ukraine's decision to name a military unit after the "Heroes of the UPA," the Council also called for "restraint" in reactions toward Ukrainian society. It is a balancing act: not minimizing Poland's historical pain, while refusing to let that pain be weaponized by Moscow.

An unflinching strategic reminder

The most telling line in the Polish statement sums up the geopolitical stakes in a single sentence: "We must remember that misunderstandings between Poles and Ukrainians ultimately serve Russia's interests." The Council also calls on competent institutions and Polish political actors to respond appropriately, in particular by exposing and refuting Russian manipulation and its underlying objectives.

This measured response contrasts with the Kremlin's clear hope for an immediate rhetorical escalation between Warsaw and Kyiv. By choosing institutional caution over media outrage, Poland has — for now — defused the effect sought by the FSB's operation, without denying the real bilateral tensions that already existed before this manipulation.

It takes political courage to say, in essence: "yes, our historical pain is legitimate, but no, we will not let ourselves be manipulated by those exploiting it." That is exactly what Poland's Resilience Council did, and it is a lesson in democratic maturity that many Western countries, facing their own Russian disinformation operations, would do well to follow.

The strategic stakes: why Kyiv-Warsaw scares Moscow so much

A partnership that carries real weight in the war

To understand why the Kremlin pours so many resources into weakening this specific bilateral relationship, you have to measure the scale of Polish support for Ukraine since February 2022. Poland has taken in millions of Ukrainian refugees, served as a major logistics hub for Western military aid, and positioned itself as one of the most consistent voices for the Ukrainian cause within European institutions and NATO.

Weakening this partnership would not only serve Russian interests around historical narrative — it would concretely weaken Ukraine's logistical and diplomatic capacity in its resistance against the Russian invasion. It is a cold calculation: every ton of military equipment that crosses Polish territory a little less smoothly, every Polish statement of support that grows a little more timid, represents a strategic gain for Moscow on the ground, far from the trenches of Donbas.

A war also fought in history textbooks

This disinformation operation illustrates a broader truth about the nature of the current conflict: Russia's war against Ukraine is not limited to drone strikes and front lines. It also plays out in how European nations remember their own past, and in the ability of democratic societies to distinguish legitimate historical reflection from calculated manipulation by a foreign intelligence service.

The fact that this specific operation was anticipated, documented, and largely neutralized by Ukrainian and Polish institutions does not mean the threat has vanished. The FSB already tried this same narrative in 2022. It will try again, in a different form, as long as the Kyiv-Warsaw relationship remains a strategic target for the Kremlin.

What should alarm the West is not just this specific operation — already largely exposed and mocked — but the methodical persistence with which Moscow targets the emotional foundations of European alliances. The next target could be any other historical wound on the continent. Vigilance cannot be a one-off reflex. It has to become a permanent habit.

What the relative silence of major Western capitals reveals

Brussels, Washington, and Berlin stay quiet

One element of this story deserves highlighting in this report: as of this writing, neither the European Commission, nor the US State Department, nor the German government has publicly commented on this specific Russian disinformation operation targeting the Ukrainian-Polish relationship. That silence contrasts with the speed of the reaction from Ukrainian and Polish institutions themselves, who documented and responded to the operation within days.

This is not necessarily a sign of Western indifference — major capitals often prefer to let directly involved countries manage a bilateral crisis before intervening publicly, to avoid appearing to arbitrate a dispute that does not directly concern them. But this silence also leaves a vacuum that Russian propaganda can exploit, framing the absence of Western reaction as indifference, or even a lack of interest, toward historical tensions between Ukraine's European allies.

A missed opportunity for visible solidarity

I believe European institutions would be well served by reacting faster and more publicly when such disinformation operations directly target the cohesion of the Western coalition backing Ukraine. A joint statement of support for Poland and Ukraine, reaffirming that their partnership remains a cornerstone of European resistance against Russia, would have sent Moscow a clear signal: this kind of historical manipulation will not divide the coalition, no matter how sophisticated the operation.

Western silence, even temporary, always leaves the Kremlin a window to test the real strength of the alliances it seeks to fracture.

Every time such a Russian operation gets exposed, I am struck by how long it takes major Western capitals to react publicly. The speed of the Ukrainian and Polish response in documenting this manipulation should serve as a model, not remain a regional exception that Brussels and Washington watch from afar without comment.

Historical precedents of a permanent memory war

2022, the first attempt at the same maneuver

This is not the first time the FSB has tried to exploit the Volhynia tragedy to fracture the Ukrainian-Polish relationship. A similar attempt was launched in 2022, shortly after the start of the full-scale invasion, at a time when Poland had just become the main entry point for Western military aid to Ukraine. That first attempt failed to produce the intended divisive effect, as Polish-Ukrainian solidarity was then at its highest point since the conflict began.

The fact that Moscow is now recycling, four years later, a maneuver already attempted and already failed suggests either a lack of strategic imagination on the part of Russian intelligence, or — more likely — a calculation that war fatigue accumulated over four years has made both societies more vulnerable to this kind of manipulation than they were in 2022.

A memory battle that goes beyond the Ukrainian-Polish case alone

This manipulation strategy around historical memory is not unique to the Ukrainian-Polish relationship. Moscow has deployed similar tactics elsewhere in Eastern Europe, exploiting various historical wounds — often tied to World War II or Soviet occupation — to weaken the cohesion of Central and Eastern European societies against Russia. Volhynia, in that sense, is just one specific case of a much broader method that the Kremlin systematically applies wherever a latent historical fracture can be reactivated for contemporary strategic ends.

Understanding this recurrence is essential to anticipate future attempts, which will almost certainly target other historical wounds not yet exploited in other European countries allied with Ukraine.

Watching Moscow recycle in 2026 a maneuver already botched in 2022 reminds me of a simple truth about Russian state propaganda: it does not need to be original, it only needs to be repeated often enough that a fraction of the public, each time a little more war-weary, ends up believing it a little more than the last attempt.

Conclusion: A manipulation exposed, a vigilance that must last

A tactical failure for the Kremlin, a methodological win for transparency

In the end, this specific FSB operation turned out to be, in the words of Polish public television itself, a "dud." The falsified documents convinced neither Polish nor Ukrainian historians, and the prior coordination between Ukrainian security services and Polish authorities helped defuse the element of surprise Moscow was counting on.

But this tactical success for transparency should not obscure the bigger picture: the relationship between Ukraine and Poland remains weakened by very real disagreements over historical memory, which the Kremlin will keep exploiting as long as they exist. The real antidote is not just exposing fake Russian documents — it is resolving, between democratic partners, the genuine tensions that make this kind of manipulation possible.

What this affair teaches the rest of Europe

This July 2026 sequence should serve as a textbook case for other European democracies facing their own historical fractures that hostile powers could exploit. Russia's method — recycling discredited material, dressing it up as new, targeting a symbolic date, mobilizing state media — is reproducible elsewhere, on other national wounds.

The best defense remains the one demonstrated here: intelligence services that anticipate and document the threat before it airs, historians who examine facts with rigor rather than emotion, and government institutions that call for restraint without denying the legitimacy of historical pain. This is a model of democratic resilience against information warfare — imperfect, but effective.

I close this report with one simple certainty: Moscow will always lose this kind of battle as long as independent historians, rigorous journalists, and democratic institutions keep doing their job. The problem is not that Russian disinformation is too sophisticated. It is that our societies, at times, are too tired to expose it every single time it resurfaces.

By Maxime Marquette, columnist

Columnist's transparency note

Editorial positioning

This report takes a clear editorial line: support for Ukraine and opposition to Kremlin influence operations, in whatever form they take. This positioning does not preclude acknowledging the legitimacy of Polish historical pain over the Volhynia events, nor the real complexity of Ukrainian-Polish relations on these memory questions. The columnist clearly distinguishes genuine tensions between two democratic nations — which deserve calm debate — from deliberate manipulation by a foreign intelligence service seeking to exploit those tensions.

Methodology and sources

All facts, quotes, and statements come from verified sources: Ukrainska Pravda, ZMINA, Notes from Poland, RBC-Ukraine, and the official statement of the Resilience Council published by Poland's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. No fact has been invented or extrapolated. Statements by Andriy Kovalenko, Poland's Resilience Council, and the historians cited are drawn from their public communications or official reports.

Nature of the analysis and factual limits

This text is an analytical report, built from publicly available Ukrainian, Polish, and international sources. The columnist did not have access to the FSB documents themselves, nor to first-hand historiographic expertise on the 1943 events — the analysis relies on assessments from Polish and Ukrainian historians cited by journalistic sources. The situation remains fluid, and new information could refine our understanding of this operation.

Sources

Primary sources

Ukrainska Pravda — report on the FSB's special operation targeting Volhynia, July 5, 2026

Ukraine warns of Kremlin operation using Volhynia tragedy to damage ties with Poland — ZMINA, July 5, 2026

Statement of the Resilience Council on Russian Disinformation Concerning the Volhynian Crime — Poland's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, July 9, 2026

Secondary sources

FSB's Volhynia documents seek to undermine Ukrainian-Polish relations — TVP World, July 5, 2026

Poland's Tusk urges Kyiv to make first move over recent controversy — RBC-Ukraine, July 4, 2026

The CPD stated that the active phase of the Russian Federation's special operation to split Ukraine and Poland has begun — UNN, July 6, 2026