LONDON (Reuters) – Days after Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine, Andrei Shestakov opened a set of files in a WhatsApp group chat for history teachers like himself in his town in east Russia.

The files, which Reuters examined and include dozens of pages worth of presentations and documents as well as links to video clips, are instruction on teaching teenage students about the conflict. It’s unclear who shared the files to the group chat, but many of the documents carry the crest of the education ministry in Moscow.

Leitfails are included in the material that state that Russian soldiers in Ukraine are heroes and that Ukraine’s rulers have made common cause to those who collaborated in World War Two Nazis. They also say that West wanted to inflict discord on Russian society and that Russians should stick together.

Shestakov claimed that he looked through files while preparing for one of his lessons. According to Shestakov, a 38 year-old slimmer than his brother, he worked 16 years in police force before he became a teacher. He said that he was beginning to doubt whether Russia’s ruling class is living up the democratic values they have professed, partly due to Alexei Navalny, prominent Kremlin critic.

The modules were not taught to him at the Gymnasium No. He worked at the Gymnasium No. 2 in Neryungri (a town of coal miners in Eastern Siberia), some 6,700km (4160 miles) northeast of Moscow.

Shestakov, however, told his pupils the contents of the textbook and explained why the history was incorrect. He said that he had explained to his students how the materials claimed Ukraine was an invention from Bolshevik communist Russia, but history textbooks covered Ukrainian history stretching back many centuries.

He did more. He told students in a civics class that he wouldn’t recommend them serving in the Russian military. According to a signed declaration taken by police, which was reviewed by Reuters, he also said that Russia’s leaders displayed elements of fascism while claiming they were fighting fascism against Ukraine.

According to the signed March 5 statement regarding his comments in class, Shestakov was summoned by the Federal Security Service (also known as the FSB) and local police. According to Shestakov, he said that he had not been arrested in connection with those comments. The FSB and local police didn’t respond to requests for comment.

On March 18, he was fined 35,000 roubles ($about $420), for discrediting Russian armed forces. He posted videos on YouTube of interviews conducted with Russian soldiers who were captured in Ukraine. According to Reuters’s court decision,

He told Reuters that he left his job in order to protest the war and that he knew he would lose his job. The local education authority and the education ministry didn’t respond to requests for comment on Shestakov and the teaching guide. When Reuters reached the school by phone, a woman who identified herself as acting head teacher said she declined to comment on Shestakov’s case and ended the call.

According to teachers across Russia, they have been given the exact same teaching guide, or something similar, by two union representatives, two teachers, and two social media posts from schools that reported having taught the modules.

Olga Miryasova is an official of a trade union known as Teacher. She said that regional education officials distributed the Shestakov teaching guide to several schools across the country. Reuters could not determine the number of schools that received these modules. Although the content was similar, one of the teachers claimed that they were given a different teaching package than Shestakov’s.

This initiative shows that the Russian state, which is increasing its control over the media, now extends its propaganda campaign about the Ukraine war to schools in order to boost support. Numerous Russian schools shared images of students forming a formation to write the letter Z and sending support messages to the troops in Ukraine since the start of the conflict.

Teachers disapproving of war joining opposition activists, campaigners for non-governmental organisations and independent journalists. They feel the Russian state’s pressure with penalties, prosecutions and the possibility of losing their jobs. President Vladimir Putin in early March signed into law legislation that makes the spread of “fake” information about the Russian armed forces, an offence punishable with fines or jail terms of up to 15 years.

The Kremlin was already tightening its screws against its enemies even before the invasion. This included arrests, internetcensorship, and blacklists.

The Kremlin didn’t respond to requests for comment about its handling of opposition to the war, the teaching guide and Shestakov’s case.

Russia’s Education Minister Sergei Kravtsov told a parliamentary committee in March that his ministry had launched a nationwide drive to discuss Russian-Ukrainian relations with pupils, amid questions from children about the situation in Ukraine and sanctions.

According to the Kremlin, it enforces laws that prevent extremism from threatening stability and other threats. It says it is conducting what it calls a “special operation” to destroy its southern neighbour’s military capabilities and “denazify” Ukraine and prevent genocide against Russian speakers, especially in the east of the country. It claims that this is an unfounded pretext for war and Kyiv, along with its Western allies, has accused Russian forces of civilian casualties.

WEST’S ‘HYBRID WARFARE’

Shestakov’s teaching guide states that it was written for students between 14 and 18. This teaching guide contains detailed lesson plans and links to video of President Putin speaking. It also includes short videos to help illustrate the lessons.

According to the teaching materials, the West is waging information warfare to try to turn public opinion against Russia’s rulers, and that all Russian people need to stand firm against that.

One lesson plan explained that Russia was engaged in a culture war with the West, which had decimated “the institution of the traditional family”, and was trying to force its values onto Russia.

According to the document, Ukraine has been pursuing an anti-Russian strategy since the fall of the Soviet Union. According to this document, “There were attacks against the Russian language”, our common history was falsified and war criminals were made into heroes.

Another lesson is that the West deploys hybrid warfare — which is a combination of economic sanctions, propaganda and military pressure — in an attempt to subdue Russia. “That is precisely why they urge us to attend unsanctioned demonstrations, they incite us to break the law, and try to scare us,” it reads.

According to the document, “We should not give in to provocation.”

Modules include an interactive game that gives pupils 15 seconds to determine whether a statement true or false. A statement says: “The organisation and provocation of authorities and large-scale gatherings is an effective method of solving a hybrid dispute.” According to the lesson plan, “false” is the correct answer.

Reuters was able to find social media posts of a Samara school on the Volga and Minusinsk schools in southern Siberia showing slides taken from the same presentations.

Danil Plotnikov, a math teacher in Chelyabinsk, the Ural mountains, told Reuters he had been asked by his bosses to teach similar content but from a different teaching pack than the one Shestakov received; Plotnikov didn’t identify who the bosses were. Tatyana Chernenko (a Moscow math teacher) said that colleagues told her they were asked to teach modules similar to those she was teaching in Moscow.

Reuters interviewed five teachers who said they felt that certain schools and regions made the lesson more difficult than others. Five teachers did not say that they have heard of teachers being ordered to teach modules. The request was typically made by schools or regional education officials.

Daniil Ken (chair of the independent teacher’s trade union Teachers’ Alliance) said that some had refused to say no and were not punished. Ken said that others did not give the lessons, but they told their bosses. Ken said that refusing to take the lesson was dangerous, since teachers did not know whether their teachers might pressure them into quitting.

Ken said his union has heard from about half a dozen teachers a week who say they are quitting because they didn’t want to promote the Kremlin’s line – something Reuters wasn’t able to independently verify.

POLITICAL EMERGENCE

Shestakov has his hair cut short and practices sambo (a Soviet-era martial art). His police career also included a 1-year stint with the interior ministry special force, which is an arm law enforcement officers who are currently fighting in Ukraine. The interior ministry didn’t respond to a request for comment.

According to Shestakov, his political awakening began in 2018, while he was working as a juvenile officer. He claimed he first started to watch videos by Navalny, an opposition figure now held in Russia, and claiming corruption by Kremlin leadership.

Shestakov declared, “I have become a real opponent person.”

He stated that he became disturbed by images of victims when the conflict in Ukraine began and spent hours looking at videos on social media.

The videos were posted by him under a pseudonym. He also posted comments from interviews with Russian soldiers taken in Ukraine. According to Shestakov, and the March 18 court order seen by Reuters, the local media outlet has approximately 5,200 subscribers.

According to court, his actions are a violation of law prohibiting discrediting Russian armed forces.

Shestakov claimed that he believes the FSB may have been listening in on his conversations via phone calls over recent weeks, but he didn’t have any evidence. He claimed that he’s seen individuals he knows to be undercover FSB agents three times over the last few days. The FSB didn’t respond to requests for comment on whether it is monitoring him.

Shestakov now plans to flee Russia, citing fears of further punishments from the authorities. Shestakov would be joining the tens to thousands of Kremlin opposition members who fled Russia since Putin’s crackdown on any opposition was in 2018.

He stated that he would go to Turkey if the authorities don’t allow him to leave the country.

Shestakov declared that staying and dropping public opposition was not an option. He said, “It is difficult for me to keep it shut.”