Trent Telenko Profile picture
Apr 11 24 tweets 8 min read
Alright folks, this is going to be a long logistical thread🧵 where I will try and make the case that that advanced US weapons systems like the Patriot SAM, M1A1 Abrams tank & F-16 with AMRAAM can be both rapidly transitioned & effectively used by Ukraine.

It won't be cheap
1/
...to do.

I going to walk you all through about 37 years of US military history (1985-2022) with an emphasis on the concepts of "Contractor Logistical Support" and "Private Military Corporations" with a bit of history involving the personnel policies of Claire Chennault's
2/
Flying Tigers thrown in.

Trust me, it's needed.😉

In the late Cold War year of 1985 LOGCAP or “Logistics Civil Augmentation Program” was established primarily to pre-plan for contingencies and to “leverage existing civilian resources.”

Basically, we are talking a contract
3/
...form meant to buy civilian contractor logistics from Germany & other European economies in event of a major NATO land war.

It was not really used in a large way until the 1st Gulf War of 1990-1991, to take advantage of the Saudi and Gulf States civil economies to replace
4/
uniformed American logistical support.

This was as much a political move by the Pres. George H.W. Bush Administration to manage American anti-war, and primarily Democratic anti-war, opposition to the US Military retaking Kuwait as it was primarily a logistical exercise.
5/
LOGCAP was later expanded by the Clinton Administration to cover “operations other than war” in places like Somalia, Southwest Asia, Haiti, the Balkans, and East Timor.

This allowed the Clinton Administration to exercise
6/
web.archive.org/web/2017030708…
a muscular and multilateral foreign policy with the minimum of senior uniformed military opposition.

Opposition which balked at “operations other than war” as the American Senior military leadership’s version of the “Vietnam War syndrome,” as the US Army’s
7/
deployments during the Kosovo war made clear.

This Clinton Administration “work around” approach to American military “Flag Rank” opposition was hugely apparent with the Croat “Operation Storm” in Bosnia, where the private military corporation
8/
“Military Professional Resources Incorporated” acted as an American military surrogate to plan & execute logistics for the Croat Offensive that broke Serbian power in Bosnia.

Effectively “Private Military Corporation” contractor support has been the keystone of American
9/
...military power projection since the 2nd Clinton Administration. This fact has been documented in a lot of places.

See this Defense Industry Daily article that speaks to the LOCGCAP 4 contract.
10/
defenseindustrydaily.com/Billions-of-Do…
The two Pres. George W. Bush Administrations further expanded the use of LOGCAP after 9-11-2001, not only to manage public opposition to the “War on Terror” but also as a “Fight the War on the Cheap” exercise because your average logistics/garrison specialist first class

11/
...(SFC) with government income, military medical care, education benefits, and housing allowances for three dependents earns arguably $125-150K in “benefits.”

The green eye shades cost account crowd points out that while A DynCorp or Halliburton-KBR contractor costs the
12/
US government up to twice what a SFC costs in terms of annual income, but it is a known, predictable, fixed cost incurred and gone; whereas the Federal government will pay for the SFC and his dependents for another 20+ years in terms of benefits obligated by service.

13/
This was in fact one of the reasons Democrats in Congress hated private military corporations doing uniformed military work in the War on Terror. Their extensive use in the 1st Gulf War plus the ongoing operations in Iraq & Afghanistan hugely reduced the long term
14/
...opportunity for graft and corruption via the Congressional administration of uniformed veterans' education and medical benefits.

The DEA uses a number of private military corporations in the Drug wars in Latin America for aerial electronic surveillance and training of
15/
...local security forces.

The American government also uses a number of private military corporations to furnish spares for things like the ATK built AC208B fixed wing gunship in Iraq.
16/
You can find LOGCAP tweets here on Twitter by major defense contractors.

17/
And by individuals who served a private military security contractors in Iraq.

18/
All the long term training required logistical support necessary to operate a Patriot battery, an M1A1 Abrams Tank and an F-16 with AMRAAM can be hired done via contractor logistical support through a LOGCAP contract.

This includes the weapons system operators.
19/
Folks like Dyncorp or Halliburton-KBR can sub-contract to L3's MPRI division to put together "private military security contractors" for a Patriot Battery, M1A1 tank crews and F-16 pilots w/ground crews.

Pres. Zelensky would then give "security contractors" legal status as
20/
..."Ukrainian Foreign Legion" members for protections under the Laws of War.

However, to do it quickly requires using the kind of Presidential patronage FDR provided to Chennault to hire away active or reserve US Military servicemen.

IOW, give MPRI DoD service files & OPM
21/
recent retirement papers for people with the right MOS series skills to fill out a 'private security units' quickly.

Getting the latest US weapons to Ukraine is a 'money solvable logistics problem' the USA has done for 37 years.
22/
IOW, The Biden Administration 'de-escalation faction' has been looking for excuses not to support Ukraine because it doesn't want to.

I've just shown you they can if they want too.

And if they don't like americans as F-16 'private security pilots.' I'm sure there a lot of
23/
...other non-US F-16 pilots who would love to sign up with "Ukraine's Flying Tigers" in order to paint Su-34 silhouettes on their US surplus Ukrainian F-16's.

24/End

• • •

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

Apr 12
This is going to be a long thread🧵on the ongoing collapse of the Russian Army and how it is shaping events in Ukraine, including the recent Russian chemical attack on Azov troops in Mariupol.

Saddle up, it's going to be a wild ride.


1/
James Dunnigan's Strategy page -dot- com site put out a long analytical piece on Russian contract soldiers, conscription & the fading away of the Russian Army as a demographic consequence of the aging out of the
strategypage.com/htmw/htwin/202…
2/
...ethnic white Russian population inside the Russian Federation for the Ukraine War.

In a whole lot of words, Dunnigan lays out the current military power implications for the Russian Army of something @kamilkazani spoke to in the tweet here:


3/
Read 55 tweets
Apr 11
The biggest reason Saudi Patriot batteries are as effective as they currently are against Iranian-Houthi drones & ballistic missiles is US Contractor Logistical Support.

My old agency administers those contracts.

Declaring it was "impossible" to equip Ukraine
1/
with Patriot batteries quickly is playing a game of "Pretending not to know" what is happening in Saudi Arabia right now.

This is a favorite game of the De-escalation faction in the Biden Administration.

You can mark everyone who said it was 'logistically impossible' to do
2/
...so on Twitter as either a fool or tool for that DC faction.

In fact, such Patriot contractor logistical support is being used in NATO right now.

See:



3/
Read 7 tweets
Apr 11
This is the best video I have seen out of Ukraine demonstrating the military phenomena of "Target fixation."

The UA Igla operator doesn't move a hair when the blast wave from the dropped Russian bomb rolls over his #2.

He tuned out all other reality to make the shot.

1/
Then after the missile departs, #1 moved his assets out of the way to avoid counter fire.

This is why cohesive teams are better on the battlefield.

Other servicemen can keep 'situational awareness' while a heavy weapons operator takes his shot.

Look at the #2's head
2/
It is swiveling around looking for threats while the Igla #1 is hunting a Russian aircraft.

Doing this consistently & effectively in combat takes good leadership & training.

All that 'military stuff' mindlessly drilling these actions over and over again is what a
3/
Read 4 tweets
Apr 10
Western Intelligence 🧵

There were eight years of US, UK & other NATO training teams in Ukraine between 2014 & 2022 teaching mechanized logistics as well as modern anti-Russian tactics.👇
1/
So there were literally hundreds of NATO servicemen who could have been debriefed about Ukrainian Armed Forces effectiveness and what Ukrainians know about Russian logistics.

2/
Given the US DoD computer model predicting the outcome of a Russian invasion of Ukraine -- USING THE MOST UP TO DATE INTELLIGENCE ESTIMATES -- predicted Ukraine would fall in 72-to-96 hours.

Do you think anyone from the US CIA, DIA, US Military intelligence or their NATO
3/
Read 12 tweets
Apr 10
Alright boys and girls, we are going for another wild ride in modern logistics & intelligence🧵

I want you to pay attention to the Russian artillery ammo & it's wood box packaging because I'm going to visually explain why it shows pre-mechanized logistics of the early 1930's
1/
The twitter denizen @thinkdefence has a wonderful blog site that explains lots of things logistical, combat engineering & UK military procurement.

One of his efforts is a multi-part post on modern mechanized logistics with many photos.
2/
thinkdefence.co.uk/2014/11/boxes-…
To quote him:

"...it is preferred to handle stores as ‘unit loads’ in the most appropriate box or container on a sliding scale, for example;

Ammunition box >> Multiple ammunition boxes on a pallet >> Multiple ammunition boxes on multiple pallets inside an ISO container"

3/
Read 20 tweets
Apr 10
If you have not read this ISW 🧵thread today you need to.

I've a comments to add for my own🧵.

ISW Short form:

The Russian military has hit the trained manpower wall until well into June 2022.👇
A major "proxy" supporting this ISW thread surfaced today.

Three Russian Army lieutenants were killed acting as the driver, gunner and commander of a BMP infantry combat vehicle.

See👇
2/
Lieutenants normally act as commanders of three vehicle platoons of Tanks, BMP's or BTR's.

That is, one commander for 3 vehicles and 8-to-19 men.

So, three lieutenants would command all the Mechanized Platoons of a Motor Rifle Company.
3/
Read 14 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 on Twitter!

:(