Fact check: Russia-Ukraine conflict predates actor Sean Penn’s forthcoming documentary

March 11, 2022 russia, ukraine

The claim: Sean Penn’s pre-war Ukraine visit is evidence of propaganda

As war rages on between Russia and Ukraine, conspiracy theories about the conflict have bubbled to the surface online. Some on social media suggest the timing of actor Sean Penn’s travels to Ukraine indicate he’s part of a bigger, more nefarious plan.

“Can’t help but wonder how a hyperpolitical actor like Sean Penn knew in November to visit Ukraine in February with a film crew to document a war that hadn’t started yet. #propaganda,” reads a March 1 Instagram post.

The post, liked more than 700 times in 10 days, is captioned with additional hashtags like #FakeNews, #PoliticalPropaganda and #MediaLies.

But Penn’s documentary proves nothing of the sort. He was traveling to document a conflict between Russia and Ukraine that dates back to at least 2014, when Russian troops took control of Ukraine’s Crimean region. Without this context, the post may be misleading.

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USA TODAY reached out to the Instagram user who shared the claim for comment.

Russia-Ukraine conflict predates documentary announcement

Penn traveled to Ukraine in November 2021, where he was photographed in combat gear. Insider reported on his trip at the time, writing that he was “reportedly filming a documentary about how the Donbas region of Ukraine has been affected by the conflict with Russia.”

The office of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed in a Feb. 24 Facebook post that Penn traveled to Ukraine in November for his documentary and that the actor returned to Kyiv “to record all the events that are currently happening in Ukraine and to tell the world the truth about Russia’s invasion into our country” in February, according to a Google translation of the post. The post also said the 61-year-old actor attended Ukrainian news briefings.

Penn also provided his own updates on the status of the war in Ukraine and his safety. He told USA TODAY in a statement that the ongoing invasion was “a brutal mistake of lives taken and hearts broken” and shared in a Feb. 28 tweet that he fled to the Polish border with two colleagues.

The news sparked conspiracy theories that Penn had some foresight of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. But in reality, the conflict had existed for years prior.

In March 2014, Russian troops seized Ukraine’s Crimean region, according to the Council on Foreign Relations. Russia formally annexed the peninsula after Crimeans voted to join the Russian Federation in a “disputed local referendum,” the council says. Shortly after, pro-Russian separatists in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions of Ukraine declared independence from it.

More than 10,000 people have been killed and nearly 24,000 injured since April 2014 due to the conflicts between Ukraine and Russian-backed separatists, according to the council.

By November, when Penn visited Ukraine, there were already concerns that Russia might try to invade other parts of Ukraine.

After Russia renewed its troop presence along its border with Ukraine that month, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said “we’re not sure exactly what (Russian President Vladimir) Putin is up to, but these movements certainly have our attention,” NPR reported. Biden warned Putin in a December call that there would be “real costs” to invading Ukraine, according to NPR.

Two months later, Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in the early hours of Feb. 24, initiating the ongoing conflict.

Our rating: Missing context

Based on our research, we rate MISSING CONTEXT the claim that Sean Penn’s pre-war Ukraine visit is evidence of propaganda, because without additional context it can be misleading. Penn’s November visit to Ukraine for his documentary offers no proof of political propaganda. The current conflict between Russia and Ukraine dates back to at least 2014, when Russian troops took control of Ukraine’s Crimean region.