U.S. Embassy Shares Anti-Russia Twitter Meme As Digital War Over Ukraine Intensifies

Nearly a thousand years ago, the newly converted Christian population in what is now Ukraine decided to build something grand, a church to rival the Hagia Sophia, then the gravitational center of their Eastern Orthodox faith. So sometime in the 11th Century, an army of builders—likely recruited directly from the Byzantine Empire, the home of the Hagia Sophia—constructed a blue, many-domed cathedral in Kyiv, filling it with over 800 square feet of mosaics and frescoes.

In this century, Kyiv’s St. Sophia Cathedral has continued to enjoy pride of place in Ukrainian consciousness. In 2019, over 100,000 people lined up outside on cobblestone streets to see an official declaration: The Ukranian Orthodox church would seperate from the one in Russia. Around the same time, Ukranian Orthodox officials gathered there to vote and elect a new leader.

And most recently, U.S. officials used St. Sophia in a Twitter meme on Tuesday morning.

The tweet, sent by the State Department’s official account for the U.S. embassy in Kyiv, is meant to underscore Ukraine’s longtsanding history seperate from Russia, a key argument by both Western and Ukraine governments to dispell Russian claims over territory within Ukraine. The casual, conversational nature of the embassy’s message—delivered in a format usually meant for light-hearted jokes—contrasts starkly with the increasingly dire situation in Ukraine with America and other allies rushing to forestall a full-scale Russian invasion.

The tweet reflects a broader truth about the confrontration between Ukraine and Russia: Like so many modern conflicts, the contest will not only unfolding between forces on the ground but also between adversaries online.

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