It’s the U.S. Navy’s 247th birthday, and to celebrate, news outlets, politicians and even a federal agency shared their birthday wishes for the U.S. Navy while actually sharing images of warships from other countries, including Russia.
POLITICO defense editor Dave Brown caught several of these errors in a Twitter thread on Thursday. In one tweet, he caught three local news stations using the same stock image of a trio of Russian warships at sea.
“These are Russian warships. It even says so when you do a stock image search,” Brown tweeted.
“More Russian warships,” Brown tweeted, this time showing the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) making the same mistake. One of the federal agency’s official accounts shared an image of three more Russian warships, while tweeting, “Happy 247th Birthday U.S. Navy! @CBP thanks you and all of the men and women who have served and are serving for continuing to uphold the timeless core values of Honor, Courage, and Commitment. #USNavy #NavyBday.”
Brown continued to call out a host of other tweeters who clearly don’t share his discerning eye for different warships.
“Japan’s Maritime Self-Defense Force enters the chat,” Brown tweeted after the Michigan Supreme Court shared a photo of incoming Japanese ships overlaid with a billowing American flag.
In what Brown called a “multi-domain violation,” a CBP official posted a collage of what appear to be three Russian fighter jets, a Russian battlecruiser and the Statue of Liberty.
Politicians got in on the fun, too.
Rep. Doug LaMalfa (R-CA) posted three Indian Navy ships, and Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita posted a photo of Russian ships similar to the one used by Gray Television news agencies.
Brown identified another Russian warship posted by Illinois Republican congressional candidate Esther Joy King.
