Fabricated Story Viral as Real Telegraph Article on India-Pakistan Conflict

The story is fabricated. The Telegraph has not published such an article.

A fake story has gone viral with the false claim that it shows an article by The Telegraph's Memphis Barker, who wrote about Chinese involvement in the recent India-Pakistan conflict.

(Source: X/Altered by The Quint)

Social media users are sharing a long text message, claiming that it carries the content of an article published by British daily The Telegraph's Memphis Barker.

What does the message say?: Claiming to discuss the details of the article, claiming that due to the Chinese ambassador to Pakistan's intervention, "a long prepared contigency went live (sic)," due to which the Indian Air Force 'hesitated' from sending more Rafale fighter jets into Pakistani airspace.

• It further claims that despite the IAF having strong presence along the Indo-Pak border, they "never crossed the threshold" as they knew "China’s entire air warfare doctrine" waited for them on the other side.

• The purported article goes on to say that India's Rafale jets were grounded 300 kilometers from the border because its Spectra EW defence systems were easily overwhelmed by Chinese-made air defence systems and missiles.

• The claim makes more claims about India's "failed" air dominance at the hands of Pakistani jets firing Chinese missiles, Chinese-made defence systems covertly taking down Rafales before the French fighter jets could even detect any attacks or lock in on targets, and so on.

An archived version of this post can be seen here.

(Source: X/Altered by The Quint)

(Archives of more posts sharing this claim can be seen here and here.)

But...?: The Telegraph did not publish any such article. The story shared in the claim appears to have originated from a Reddit post which says it was "inspired" by a real article by Barker.

How did we find out the truth?: The claim mentioned that the article had the headline 'How China helped Pakistan shoot down Indian fighter jets'.

• When we looked for this article, we saw that did not carry any of the statements that the viral claim makes.

Barker's report did not carry any of the statements from the viral claim.

(Source: The Telegraph/Screenshot)

• It, however, carried several official inputs and statements by the Chinese and Pakistani government, which were suspiciously missing from the original claim.

• Barker's report discusses, in objective detail, the PL-15 missile, Pakistan's military buying patterns in recent history, the capabilities of both, the Indian and Pakistani armed forces.

• It also highlights how Pakistan's defense buying from the USA has decreased, while India has ramped up its defense spending in acquiring arms from "Western allies and reduced its reliance on Russia."

So, who wrote this?: Carefully filtering by date, we tried to find the source of this lengthy piece of text.

• This search led us to a Reddit post, which carried the full text of the claim, calling it a "story," "creative strategy," and clearly stating that it was inspired by Barker's reportage.

This Reddit post appears to be the source of the viral claim.

(Source: Reddit/Altered by The Quint)

• When we looked for Barker's social media accounts, we saw that he had reshared an X post which called out the misinformation in this now-viral story.

Barker reposted another X post calling out this misinformation.

(Source: X/Altered by The Quint)

Conclusion: A fabricated story has gone viral with the false claim that it shows an authentic report by The Telegraph.

(Not convinced of a post or information you came across online and want it verified? Send us the details on WhatsApp at 9540511818 , or e-mail it to us at [e-mail] and we'll fact-check it for you. You can also read all our fact-checked stories here.)