Bellingcat is indeed pure propaganda. A lot of their Russia claims during the recent conflict have been pure propaganda. They were also baselessly perpetuating the lie that the Ukrainian negotiators and Abramovich were poisoned ahead of their talks in Turkey, which turned out to be complete BS, but they didn't back down after it was proving BS either[1].
He also made ridiculously outrageous claims about Russian resources for the war which he at least walked back a little bit from[2]. Which have been echoed in such a way that people in the west seriously believed that Russia is a third world army that can't handle basic logistics, so that we could funnel more weapons to Ukraine in the hopes of crippling Russia for the future. Everyone that questioned this completely absurd narrative was insulted, attacked and called a Putin shill.
People would like to believe that Bellingcat is not propaganda, because they have been the primary source for certain bigger events that gave a lot of legitimacy to the 'Putin is Hitler' narrative and if it was propaganda, we would have to reevaluate those narratives.
Another one of these propaganda shills is Anders Östlund who was calling for the dismantling of Germany and France along the way. “The Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA)’s mission is to ensure a strong and enduring transatlantic alliance rooted in democratic values and principles with strategic vision, foresight, and policy impact”[3]
It's not really surprising that these groups are funded by the national endowment for democracy, BAE, lockhead martin, etc.. But surprising to me is a bit that there are Microsoft and Google in some of these groups donor lists.
[0] https://www.bellingcat.com/app/uploads/2021/05/Bellingcat-An...
[1] https://twitter.com/christogrozev/status/1509156285190651909
[2] https://twitter.com/michaeldweiss/status/1499849754897010694
[3] https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FS2k2giaAAEXRxC?format=jpg&name=...
> Paul Mason Says Bellingcat Launders Information For Western Intelligence
> "Just as Bellingcat get a steady stream of intel from Western agencies, I suspect the attacks on you and others are fed by Russian and Chinese intel," Mason is seen telling Khan, who has been the subject of a previous Grayzone exposé.
They're not the only OSINT group doing it, but they're the most obvious.
[1] https://caitlinjohnstone.substack.com/p/paul-mason-says-bell...