: On the evening of February 21 and into the early hours of February 22, Russia officially recognized the independence of the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) and Luhansk People's Republic (LPR) . Immediately following this, Putin ordered Russian "peacekeeping" troops into these territories.
: Some videos purportedly showed Ukrainian saboteurs or shelling in Russian-held territory to provide a pretext for the invasion. video_2022-02-22_00-06-10.mp4
: Notably, on February 22, 2022, the Luhanska power station in eastern Ukraine was attacked, marking one of the early strategic strikes on infrastructure before the broad invasion [1.4.1). Disinformation and Staged Footage : On the evening of February 21 and