mdd1, I think your overall skeptical approach to media is healthy and would work well in many historical situations. for example, debunking Nazi propaganda about Poland allegedly starting a war against them, or NYT describing great life of Ukrainian peasants in 1930s.
I wonder who would you believe with your approach when Nazis claimed to uncover “crimes” of Soviets allegedly killing tens of thousands of Polish officers in Katyn forest? Would you believe the side you happen to sympathize a priori, or would you stay open to both options?
So, if taking this situation to the extreme level of skepticism – should we use prior guilt and history into account? In this case, it is RUS that sent army to UKR. There are also numerous recent cases of RUS saying absolute lies, such as that there were no RUS forces in Crimea in 2014 – and later openly giving them medals. They now seem to be saying that UKR themselves shot their own rail station with precision weaponry and similar nonsense.