Shelters, missiles and drones–a photojournalist speaks (part 3)

American photojournalist Patrick Patterson first appeared on the radar of this editor when he volunteered to come to the aid of Ukrainian refugees flooding into Poland at the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Later came his travels to various parts of the war zone and stark, stunning photos, often in crisp black and white. The Corners caught up with Patterson shortly after his most recent stint in Kyiv and far beyond—and the tales he had to tell were as stark and honest as his photography. Below is the third part of a three-part series in which the displaced Texan came clean on what he saw, but equally important, what he has felt while both experience the profundity of war… and the Ukrainian people.

[Please note–further photos in the Patreon version of this story on the Patreon link on the site.]

TC: We spoke briefly about the news coverage on the war, but what is your take on the news that we are hearing that 1) Ukraine is running out of troops and also 2) how are Ukrainians getting their news and what do they think about it? 

Patterson: It’s hard. Telegram provides a lot of information to Ukrainian citizens. Telegram is a very good in some aspects—at least in my circle it was like a pretty reliable news source. As far as reports coming out that Ukraine is running out of troops. I think that’s hard for anyone—including any press—to have an idea of just what that looks like.

I spoke to a close friend of mine from Kharkiv who now lives in Kyiv. Before the war he was in wholesale flowers. War happened and he instantly became a volunteer. He was bringing food and supplies to the Saltivskyi District. He was having missiles hitting next to him right from the start.

He is now building drones. He has mock drones that have a mechanism that will prevent them from being jammed. So my point is that this is what he is doing now. He is on the front lines—back and forth from Kyiv, speaking with soldiers trying to figure out how many drones a battalion needs. Bringing back wounded. But when I speak to him he is very concerned about the casualties now.

TC: The casualty figures are indeed worrying. We hear various numbers, but the figure that there are already 77,000 Ukrainian amputees is frightening.

Regardless of the outcome, when Ukraine pulls through this there is going to need to be a transformation of infrastructure that supports returning soldiers.

I’ll share a story with you—I was sitting in a fancy hotel in Kyiv where all the Western journos stay. This is where you pay 10 times more for an Americano than anywhere else. Of course, I’m a nobody. I’m just a guy from the US that wants to use a camera to amplify stories, to tell stories. But sometimes I stop working and start listening. Every time one of these press guys needed a place to sit a waiter would bring a chair over so they could put their coats on it, and then a hanger.

And in the meantime they were talking so much smack about internal politics of a major news network in the US. How they had to get permission to go to certain part of the country and the internal politics of getting permission. And here I am—it’s my first trip as a journalist, first trip to Europe. And I’m able to get information from social media, travel to Poland and get off a train,  arrive at a train station in Kyiv and be met by a group of people, and these people immediately said: “Welcome, what can we show you? I lived in a USD 450 apartment and had the same view of missiles and drones that a US network had by renting a whole floor of a hotel. They were paying USD 300 a night per person per room.

My point is that when you look at the resources that news networks have—what they truly can do with it--they could do anything they want to in that country. Anything. I’m only comparing that to what I was able to do.

I remember when Lyman was liberated. I showed up in Kramatorsk. I got on the same media van to get there, but to hear the convos on the bus… they were so disheartening. In some capacity journalists were not really even taking in what they were seeing. We were going into a community that had been in occupation for seven months. It was if they were walking into the San Antonio zoo and saying “wow, look at that animal. Wow.

TC: This is a common take when people see groups of journalists—when they show up in groups like that…

I’ll tell you about one of the most disheartening thing I have seen: three villagers were walking toward the World Central Kitchen in Lyman. It pulls into the center of town and sets up and people were starting to come get humanitarian supplies, and these journos from different countries, photographers, writers, anchors, they see these three people down the road. One person gets off and starts walking towards them. Then another gets out and the first one starts walking faster. Then another gets out and then they are all running—all of them running toward the people coming to get food.

Those people turned around and started walking the other direction.

TC: That’s not impressive.

Look at the Western media—what is reported and how it operates and then how it is actually reported.

I have a close friend, a photographer. She has always told me you are parachuting in. You are being dropped into a community. You are going to absorb all of these stories. Some of these are going to be stored inside your soul forever, and you need to release some of those. But treat people with humanity.

In the end I decided I didn’t want to work with others. It’s a competition, but it’s a social club too at the same time.

You have to remember that it was still cold out. These people were under constant shelling. People had been raped and murdered. There were people who had their kneecaps drilled, then treated and then having other kneecap drilled. This is what the Russians were doing, but then journalists approached these people (in brutal fashion).

When I travelled to Izyum, I didn’t even take out my camera. Instead I built rapport with a man, but then came back a month later. I was able to bring humanitarian supplies, but was also able to get his story. To get it in a respectful way.

But then I go back to that hotel and listen to those convos as each person came down. One person was sent back to the US because he didn’t get permission. But Ukrainians were dying every day. Me—I had no understanding of the language, but I was able to figure things out. If I can do that with my lack of experience, what could these networks do? When you see a network pull in they are traveling with tremendous resources. [MISSING THIS PART].

There is plenty of good reporting out there. I think what is really amazing is the quality of work that Ukrainian journalists are producing. It’s there country. They know it. They are going to have access that a lot of people don’t.

TC: Yes, the Ukrainians are doing a great job. Much better than the western press in my opinion.

This is true. Today I went to Fox news—scrolled through and not a blurb about Ukraine. Sky news, CNN, Al Jazeera— and there was a huge section on Ukraine.

I went on two press tours. One to Izyum, right after liberation and one to Lyman, right after liberation. I went back to Izum in April there was a US-based journalist working on a long-term project that was a documentary. He is based out of Kharkiv. Really, aside from that when I showed up to my hotel that got hit by a missile he was the only journalist I saw. There was a slew of journalists there.

I really didn’t see any journalists the rest of the time unless I was in Kyiv.

TC: Are you serious? You would think that there would be journalists all over.

“There are two photographers that are doing some of the most amazing work in Ukraine. Eddie van Weasel and Jan Grarup –they have both in Bakhmut for long, extended periods of time before Bakhmut got blocked off to journalists. But they have been coming in and out of the Netherlands the whole war. They are two of the people doing the best war photography in Ukraine. They are committed.

When I was in Kramatorsk there were journalists there.

My hotel in Dnipro there were journalists and UN workers, but when I would go into places I didn’t cross a lot of paths with journalists. When I was in the Cherniv region , I did not see a single journalist.  My entire time in Kharkiv, with the exception of the press tour I didn’t see any.

In Izyum there was the press tour. And I saw one journalist after that. In Bereslav I did not see any.

In the very beginning of the war Ukraine was inundated with journalists. But as it went on networks started pulling out. NPR reduced its presence—I think they have one person there now. I just know that those numbers dropped exponentially there.

There are a lot of people reporting from Kyiv that are not going out to the front line. They are getting intelligence, getting wire service reports, and they are writing from that.

If a missile hits in Kyiv or Dnipro or Kramatorsk the networks will line up and write or cover this in the same way.

This makes me wonder about how we are telling this narrative. The narrative is the business of war, but not the impact of war or how is it affecting the people-.

Why not embed yourself in Ukrainian families. Every family in Ukraine would take you in.

TC: What is the most shocking coverage you have seen?

Tucker Carlson interviewing a guy saying Russians have been gentle with Ukrainian soldiers. I saw this. Let me tell you a story. Once I’m in a nursing home where Ukrainians who were wounded were staying. When the Russians came, the soldiers came and there was one wounded Ukrainians who said just go. Don’t try to take me with you because I’ll hold you back.

“So he stayed in this room in a retirement home and he held a mine in his hand the entire time and the woman taking care of him and ran the home would feed him, bathe him, take care of him. She tried to convince him to change out of uniform and put on civilian clothes, but he said no, I’m a Ukrainian soldiers.  But he knew the Russians would come and the entire time he held that mine.

He held onto this mine while this center was under constant shelling and not able to provide proper care. As the Ukrainains died there the director would go out under shelling and dig graves one by one. And there she was putting patients into holes she dug under shelling.

So he’s in this room and somehow within the village word gets out that there is an injured Ukrainian soldier at this center. So Russian soldiers find this woman and say take me to this soldier. At gunpoint she opens the door where the soldier is standing and he sees her first and he lays the mine down. He was holding the mine so that when he saw them he would detonate it.

They shot him in both kneecaps. Then they took him to Kherson. They looked at this woman and said burn the center down—you housed a Ukrainian soldier. She begged and pleaded to spare the center, and then one of the commanders said, “Ok, we won’t burn the center. We’ll burn her home. So they did.”

Four months later this prisoner was part of a prisoner swap—he got back to Ukraine. But when I see Tucker say something like they have always been gentle with Ukrainians. Well, no wonder he is not on the air.

It breaks my heart that before the elections in the United States these types of statements influence people. People hear this. This is propaganda.

When I hear things like this is justifies everything I’m doing. This nobody photographer that went to Ukraine. I’m not represented by anybody, but I’ve been there. I’ve seen it. And all of that right-leaning Western news is absolutely 100 percent wrong from what I saw. This isn’t coming from me. This is coming from people under occupations--from people who experienced rape, shelling, cold, hunger, bartering possession for Russian rations.

TC: Tell me about what you said about the man with the kneecap drilled.

I spoke to many people in oblasts who had their kneecaps drilled. Then it heals and then the Russians did it again. At the Zaporizhzhia power plant a lot of them had kneecaps drilled. Then let the holes heal to drill them again. The broadcasters and lead anchors could take the info from people on the ground in Ukraine and report on that.

TC: But you have seen coverage that you believe is truthful?

Everything that I’ve seen that CNN reports—I have been there and it’s coming across pretty accurate and unbiased. What they choose to air and show, well, they could have biases there, but what they are actually reporting. I would say that is pretty fair for most networks across the board.

I’ll give you another example. I have an audio recording from Gostomel. A woman named Ann Hudna lived there with two sons—and her mom lived in different apartment in community.

Chechen paratroopers came into Gostomel—and Ann got a phone call early in the morning that Russia invaded. Ann Hudna fills her car and missiles are hitting the buildings behind them as they drive. Her mom stays. They couldn’t get her to leave.

A missile hit and the shock wave ultimately killed her. She was buried in her apartment yard by the people that were underground seeking shelter. She lived in that apartment with no windows/no heat. She would call her daughter say there are men moving through taking things. What her daughter didn’t realize was that she was saving those convos. Ukrainian soldiers discovered the phone and gave it back.

It turns out she had archived her phone conversations and recordings. She sat in her apartment with a fur coat keeping warm, and at the same time Russian snipers would line up people and dry fire at them—and repeat this every day.

So when I hear Tucker Carlson talk about Russians treating Ukrainians gently. Well, that ‘s not my experience. Nothing like that.

Photo courtesy of Patrick Patterson