THE DONBASS GIRL OR THE AMERICAN IMPOSSOR

VOICE OF RUSSIA

She spoke with a slight Russian accent. She professed her admiration for Vladimir Putin to the hundreds of thousands of subscribers to her various social media accounts. But Donbass Devushka - literally the girl of Donbass in Russian - actually had no connection with Russia and spoke perfect English.

In reality, she is a 100% “made in the USA” 30-year-old who lives in the Washington region, in the United States, confirmed to be called Sarah Bils, in an interview granted to the Wall Street Journal, Sunday April 16. The famous daily presents her as a key element in the dissemination of “Pentagon leaks” - the famous classified documents of the American intelligence services - on Russian social networks.

Interviews with top pro-Russian bloggers

In the interview with The Wall Street Journal, Sarah Bils confessed to being behind the "Donbass Devushka" character, as well as fundraising and hosting podcasts under that name. She added, however, that the eponymous account was managed by fourteen other people based "all over the world", without indicating their identity. According to her, another moderator of her Telegram channel would have disseminated the classified information, she being aware of the "seriousness" of such documents.

Because “the daughter of Donbass” is not alone in playing pro-Russian propaganda on her social networks. Since 2021, this former soldier has built a "small empire of pro-Russian disinformation", which would occupy about fifteen people from its North American suburbs, says Nafo, a group of pro-Ukrainian activists, who were the first to discover the true identity of Donbass Devushka.

On her YouTube channel, she regularly posts long interviews with all the top pro-Russian bloggers and self-proclaimed independent journalists in the English-speaking world. Personalities like Jackson Hinkle or Eva Bartlett, who are among the top 10 non-Russian "influencers" to support Moscow, according to the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, discuss the "inevitable decline of the West" or even the how the United States is using Ukraine to attack Russia.

On Telegram, Sarah Bils does not hesitate to share more violent content with her community, which is 65,000 strong.

Sarah Bils seems to have become the propaganda mistress of Moscow. His career, however, gave no indication of such a professional specialty. Despite her assertions, the one who pretended to be Donbass Devushka never set foot in Russia and even less in the Donbass.

Before her blogging job, Sarah Bils had been promoted at the end of 2020 to a senior non-commissioned officer rank in aeronautical electronics, recalls the Wall Street Journal, in support of the promotion files published on the Navy website. In November last year, however, the 30-year-old left the army with a lower rank, a significant demotion that cannot be explained at this time. Contacted, neither the navy nor the American Department of Justice wished to answer the questions of the American newspaper.

In the meantime, she had set up a small business selling… fish food. She even participated in podcasts on this theme, which is nevertheless very far from Russophile considerations.

“The antithesis of an America they no longer support”

It was only with the start of the big offensive in February 2022 that Sarah Bils turned into a staunch supporter of the Russian cause. “She built one of the fastest growing English-speaking pro-Putin communities,” said Pekka Kallioniemi, a researcher at the University of Tampere in Finland and a member of the Nafo collective.

Difficult to explain this professional retraining. But she is far from the only one to have chosen to become an influencer in the service of Moscow. “The vast majority of this English-speaking support for Russia comes from the United States or Europe,” says Jeff Hawn, Russia specialist and outside consultant for the New Lines Institute, an American center for geopolitical research.

This is not, however, a sign of Vladimir Putin's growing popularity in the Western world, says this specialist. "In the United States, most of these supporters of Moscow are promoting Russia because it embodies the antithesis of an America they no longer support," says Jeff Hawn.

With these relays in the English-speaking world, Moscow can boast of having popular support. What could be more distant, a priori, from the corridors of the Kremlin than a former soldier reconverted in the sale of fish products in a small American town.