Thread by @Nrg8000

THREAD. Some comments on @rajfortyseven's satellite analysis of the Balakot strike.
Available here theprint.in/defence/first-…

I have opinions on most of the imagery posted so bear with me for a bit here. 1/

Firstly just some details on the imagery. It's not the best post-strike imagery available, so don't consider this the final word. It is Pleiades imagery, taken at 70cm resolution on March 4th. There's data from Feb 27th at 50cm available. But this is FAR better than my imagery 2/

So let's dig in. Firstly, the most crucial evidence that it shows is the small four-holes in the roof of the main building. This looks potentially interesting. I dont want to dig deeper than the resolution allows but what makes them look legit is the pattern of dust coming out 3/

Its hard to see (and my laptop is fucking me right now so I can't highlight it more clearly rn), but the top-right mark appears to have dust settled around it, so does the left-most one. This makes it look MORE like a 'strike' than without that, but it's far from conclusive 4/

The issue is, these roofs are holey. This, pre-strike imagery from, i believe, last november shows similar looking holes in the roof, and the adjacent building, which i would consider attributing to an airstrike if i was looking for one. 5/

I have no clue why the roof looked/s like this. It also appears that the roof may have been replaced in the time since the last imagery I have, so it's hard to make a direct comparison. 6/

It's more than believable that these marks represent holes caused by airstrikes (though certainly not the SPICE-2000), but it's also very possible these marks are just a continuation of some weird quirk of this roof that makes it look a bit holey. 7/

I dont want to dismiss Raj's clams because theyre very possible and evidenced. Occams Razor maybe says that it's more likely theyre a continuation of what was visible before than new airstrikes but with a smaller warhead than leaked by the IAF. But Occams Razor's overly simple 8/

Hopefully the 50cm imagery will help clear it up, if not then hopefully 30cm imagery that I'm sure will come soon will help.
Next, the claim about a fuel explosion or airburst is silly. You can see something made some dirt wet. Nothing more. You see those marks ALL the time 9/

Next image. I don't have any imagery that shows tents in that area (except PERHAPS one in 2012), so I can't comment on that. Raj may have have access to additional imagery that I haven seen that shows tents there. 10/

I would argue that the image does indeed show a crater in the forest. Where I detected the crater was a bit to the left of the imagery, half cut off by the crop. I would argue the post-imagery does actually show an area (or half of one) where there are no trees. 11/

To highlight it more clearly:

12/

Indeed, I think it might show an extra crater that I missed with the lower-resolution. That area pointed to in Yellow previously was just grass. 13/

The next image also shows the other two, in the lower resolution I missed their impact point by 6/7 metres (or two pixels haha) The yellow lines point to where I believe the impact point is. 14/

Also I believe that the burn marks significantly predate the strike. It's harder to tell in the low-res, but compare it to this image from Dec 28th, specifically that bottom circled area with the two parallel burn scars that hook to the right. 15/

That being said, I don't take any issue with the published analysis. Both his and my analysis has probably been pretty heavily affected by confirmation bias; there is enough ambiguous about these images that that will have an effect. 50cm imagery should help lol. 16/

In a way, though, the fact that it is so ambiguous itself refutes India's claims. Some of the strikes (if they were smaller warheads than reported) MAY have hit their target - though this is far from confirmed. But we can guarantee no large-scale destruction or 3-400 deaths. 17/

Anyway, based on what I've seen, I still stand by my analysis, and i know it seems like a cop out of just kicking the can down the road to higher resolution. In this case that's what I have to do. 18/

Final assessment is that I still believe (based on all the imagery I've seen) that the strikes completely missed the ridgetop target. There was categorically no destruction like was initially described by the IAF, Not impossible 1 building was hit with small munitions. 19/19