Trent Telenko Profile picture
Mar 3, 2022 13 tweets 5 min read Read on X
This thread is going to discuss what the loss by capture of Russian Army Pantsyr S1/S2 / SA-22 (pictured below), 2S6 Tunguska / SA-19, Osa AKM / SA-8B, Tor M2 / SA-15, Strela 10 / SA-13 means for the Russian invasion of Ukraine going forward. Its bad🧵
1/
...for the Russians and particularly the Russian Air Force.

BTW, that list of captured Russian Army short range air defense (SHORAD) gear comes from this link to all the documented equipment losses in the war to date.
2/
oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack…
This is a Russian Army TOR M2 surface-to-air missile complex that was captured intact by Ukrainian farmers.

You can be certain that the Ukrainian SF have showed up with technical experts to rape it's technical information for the UAF.

3/
I am part of a group weblog called Chicagoboyz where I've posted updates on the Latest Russian
Invasion of Ukraine twice.

One of the people in the second post commented on the huge implications for Russian communications security (COMSEC) & Identification Friend or Foe (IFF)
4/ ImageImageImage
Modern IFF is part coded digital radio, part radar and part air traffic control beacon.

Each piece of IFF gear has a list of codes that are used at predetermined & programed intervals.

In wartime these are changed one or more times a day.
5/ ImageImage
The compromise of Russian IFF answers the question everyone have been asking -- "Where is the Russian Air Force."

See:
"The United States estimates that Russia is using just over 75 aircraft in its Ukraine invasion, the senior U.S. official said."

6/
msn.com/en-gb/news/wor…
The failure to destroy these missile complexes & their abandonment in operational condition means the Ukrainians have both those IFF codes & remote ports into the Russian air defense computer networks.

Short form: Ukraine can hack Russian integrated air defense systems(IADS).7/ Image
This is a Chicagoboyz comment specifically detailing how badly hurt the Russians were by the abandonment of an intact Pantsir air defense vehicle by "Kirk," who is ex-US military & hangs out in the comment sections there:

8/
chicagoboyz.net/archives/67311…
The Russian sorties after the 3rd day of the war have switched into set piece assaults on to Ukrainian civilian infrastructure after trying to hit Ukrainian mobile forces, particularly in the south.


9/
This would be consistent with a compromised air defense network where the Russians have to do a ponderous "deconfliction" process to make sure Russian ground-to-air missiles don't target their own strike aircraft.

10/
Image
Additionally, the UAF possession of Russian IFF code settings for the operation means their radars can trigger Russian IFF at extreme distances outside skin-paint radar range for tracking.

In essence, the Ukrainians can engage in aerial "doxing" of Russian aircraft.
11/
The Ukrainian Air Force does not have A-50 AWACS radar tracking planes like the RuAF, but being able to Dox Russian aircraft IFF is almost as good.

12/End Image
@threadreaderapp unroll please

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Trent Telenko

Trent Telenko Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @TrentTelenko

Dec 21
The following is evaluation is based on a number of professional discussions:

This CRPA found in a shot down jet Shaheed is reported to be Russian built. This is highly doubtful as the design and construction style looks far too professional for Russian industry.

1/
Bluntly - Russians tend towards cheapskate up-front capital manufacturing solutions.

The upshot is injection molded and die cast components are not a common feature in Russian designs as tooling for manufacturing designs is expensive up front,

2/
...even if the mass production unit costs are lower.

In addition, Western style SMA RF connectors are not a feature of the Soviet technology base.

Nor is the RF coax with a transparent jacket.

3/
Read 5 tweets
Dec 19
Let us be clear what has happened here.

Ukraine has a drone armed merchant raider lose in the Mediterranean hunting Russian shadow tankers.

Upshot: There will be more elsewhere on the world's oceans in the near future effecting maritime trade.

2025 Merchant Armed Raider 🧵
1/
@grok answered the following questions for me:

" Please summarize the pre-World War 1 to 1942 career of merchant armed raiders and compare that data to Ukraine's recent drone attack in the Mediterranean with a drone armed commercial vessel."

2/ Image
Image
Image
This is @grok's final summary:

"In essence, Ukraine's approach modernizes the raider concept—swapping guns for drones and merchant disguises for stealthy launches— but lacks the historical volume due to the conflict's constraints.

3/
Read 11 tweets
Dec 11
US Ground force flag ranks deny this 2025 reality 🤡⬇️

"The Ukraine war has exposed a large and increasing gap between Western reconnaissance doctrine and modern conventional battlefield reality.
1/3
In Donetsk, reconnaissance operators face constant drone surveillance, electromagnetic degradation, and hyper-local combat conditions that invalidate long-held assumptions about stealth and standoff intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR).

2/3
This article contends that NATO must, with urgency, reform its reconnaissance doctrine, training, and force structure to survive and efficiently operate in a drone-saturated battlefield."

Upton Sinclair reports:
3/3 Image
Read 4 tweets
Dec 9
I said this about the US Navy in 2023 (⬇️)

....and the institutional failures on display in the USS Truman CVBG Red Sea deployment proved me correct in 2025.

1/2
Every competent USN surface officer knows in their gut an anti-aircraft cruiser should not be operating with downed identification friend or foe (IFF) and Link-16 data link with no E-2 Hawkeye AEW support.

2/
news.usni.org/2025/12/04/inv…
Those officers know in their guts that radar skin paints alone from their ship's SPY-1 will be borderline for high tempo engagements...

...but this is not the first time this kind of problem occurred:

3/
twz.com/air/how-uss-ge…
Read 6 tweets
Nov 16
Just...listen...to this video clip with your eyes closed.

The predominant sound isn't artillery.
It isn't assault rifles.

It is the scream of drone rotors coming close, punctuated with the explosion of the drone upon impact.

1/3
That sound drama isn't World War One or any "medium intensity" conflict since 1918.

It is the sound of how 21st century Peer-to-Peer conflict is fought.

A conflict Western ground militaries are obsolescent in equipment to face.

2/3
That Russo-Ukraine War video is a soundscape US Army National Training Centers are too obsolete/incapable of replicating, because US Army flag ranks are allergic to training with high densities of small/cheap/many FPV drones.

3/3 Image
Read 4 tweets
Nov 10
WW2 is calling again with Ukraine developing Drone version of SHORAN.

_SH_ort
_RA_nge
_N_avigation

1/
SHORAN was a WW2 blind bombing system using two radio stations and an electromechanical computer.

In 1938 an RCA engineer named Stuart William Seeley, while attempting to remove "ghost" signals from an experimental television system, discovered he could measure distances
2/ Image
...by time differences in radio reception.

Instead of building a radar unit with this discovery, he proposed using this technique for precision ground-based radio beacon navigation bombing aid.

3/ Image
Read 12 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us!

:(